Our workout today was crazy fun. Intervals are usually fun, but today was extra special because of several reasons.
1) There were about 16 athletes and 6 coaches.
2) We had a big hill.
3) We got to go as fast as we could.
So we classic ski up this hill for about four minutes as hard as we can until we reach a little side road where the coaches are hanging out. Then we pull off and stop with our heart rates super high and breathing hard to get our lactate tested. Usually your own coach, but if they didn’t have an empty lactate probe, someone else would beckon you over, wipe off a section of your finger and prick you with a needle gun, then they would suck up the blood (wiping away the first blood) into a testing strip. Then you wait around until it comes up with your blood lactate level (about a minute) and ski back down the hill to do it again! I thought it was fun to end an interval in such a chaotic area; there were three lactate testing spots set up and athletes coming in every 20-40 seconds. Craziness. And it was the first really hard intervals I had done all year so I was excited to see how hard I could go and pretend I was racing. Vroooom!