What ever it takes!

Wow! that was crazy.  My wife was sick all through Christmas and I thought I was awesome for not catching it.  Well we drove home from Wyoming last Friday, I was fine all day but that night it hit me hard, I have been pretty much completely out since Friday night Saturday and Sunday I couldn't even get out of bed.  I actually went to the gym on Monday but called in sick to work and went back home.  I felt considerably better today, but running still made my lungs burn so I just stuck to the elliptical.

One good thing that came out of it was I had a couple of nagging pains in my right heel and left hip that I was thinking I would have to deal with for the next 3 months but 5 days without running both of those pains seem to have gone completely away.  Hopefully it stays that way when I start running again.

I have put together a 12 week training plan for Boston starting January 21st.  That's not to say I wont be running until then but the main goal until then is loose weight, and stay as fit as I possibly can without injury. 

Still feeling a little weak this morning, and I have some fluid in my lungs but I really wanted to run again.  The trick was to find a pace that didn't require me to use my lungs so I wouldn't start coughing uncontrollably.  Started out at 7mph, worked up to around 8mph for a total run of 8 miles in 1:04:37.

I'm actually getting real excited, I went and added a workout appointment into my Outlook Calender with specific workout goals for everyday starting Jan 21st so when I wake up I can just look at my phone and it will tell me what to do.  I like it when my phone tells me what to do.

I have a long way to go, but that's part of the fun I suppose.  At least I'm starting the year healthy, well with the exception of the flu.

Although I feel about 500% better than 3 days ago I'm still pretty drained of energy, I kept wanting to stop but some how dragged myself through 8 miles.  At 1 point I considered going 10 but that urge went away pretty quickly.

My energy level is still just in the toilet.  I feel fine sitting on the couch, but running really takes it out of me :)

Hopefully next week will be better.

 I just signed up for the BigHorn 50 again, I'm not sure why, I'm pretty sure I hated every minute of it last year.   It's Britt's fault, she got a hair brained idea that she wanted to run the 30K, she wanted me to run it with her, I told her I'd run the 50M and catch up with her so we can run the last few miles together.  Now I have to catch her.

Energy seems to be back to about 90% but my lungs are still burning a bit, I'm not sure if its the bad air or still being sick.  

10 mile progressive in 1:08:10  6:49 avg pace.

Today must be official New Year Resolution day, cause the gym was packed.  At least no one stole "my" treadmill.

Humm! absolutely nothing interesting to write here.

10 easy miles in 1:19:33

Had my running clothes on and about to walk out the door this morning when I was all of a sudden inspired to swim instead of run today, so I went and threw my swimsuit on and swam instead.  Very happy with my decision except when I got to work and put swimming into my new loose weight app on my phone, swimming burns about 1/2 the calories as running does in the same time.

48 laps (1.5 miles) in about 55 minutes with a quick break every 10 laps.  Followed by 30 minutes of weights, mostly legs.

Good little "workout" this morning.  Everyone was making me feel guilty with their Boston training already so I decided I'd do some 1 mile repeats too.  I was feeling really good this morning after swimming yesterday so what the heck.  6 mile progressive warm up in 42:18, took a quick water break and then 3x1 mile repeats with 1/2 mile jog in between.  First mile in 5:53, would have been faster but the treadmill ramp up took a few extra seconds, second mile in 5:46, last mile in 5:37.  That one hurt a bit, I was going to run a 2 mile cool down but I was too sick after the last mile and stopped.

I was pretty surprised how easy my legs found the pace, and pretty happy I was able to get through all of them, and even happier I was able to get faster each time. 

10 miles in 1:07:46, 6:46 avg pace for total run.

10 easy mile in 1:17:04. 

Wow, what a crazy snow day.  I'm glad I don't live in Davis County. I have the craziest driveway, our neighborhood didn't get a whole lot of snow, maybe a couple of inches it's hard to tell cause the wind just blows it away anyway, but for some reason there is a vortex that piles all of the snow from our entire neighborhood in a huge drift right in the middle of my driveway making it impossible to get my car out.  So after I shoveled out seriously a 3' snow drift out of my driveway the roads were completely clear all the way to the gym.  Pretty bad up by my office though.

Quick update, Riverton Paul is back and running pretty good again lately, I see him every morning cranking out a couple miles at a good pace so everyone go to Paul's blog page and try and get him active again.  Consider it your home teaching assignment to get the non-active back on the blog.

Plan was 18 miles today but we have a kids soccer game at 8:00 and 6:30 pace wasn't in the cards, and I got a 5 minutes later than plan start so I had to cut it a bit short. 

I decided to follow Jakes training advice and run in different shoes today.  Well there is a reason I only run in the same shoes all the time, cause they work and don't hurt my feet.  It's not like these were brand new shoes, I have over 400 miles in them but they really hurt, I got blisters, I felt like I had mud on my feet the whole run, it pretty much sucked.  So from now on I guess I'll stick to what works, Nike Free's, I've seriously been through so many shoes but I keep going back to the Free's.

16 miles in 1:51:40  6:54 avg pace

I'd forgotten about my Kinvara's, they're my second most comfortable shoes, so I wore them today.

Good news is I can run 5 miles at marathon pace, bad news I can't run 26 miles at marathon pace.  I guess it's good I have 13 weeks to get so.

7 mile warmup in 51:13 7:18 avg pace

5 mile Tempo in 31:52 6:22 avg pace

It actually wasn't horrible, I could have gone further but I wasn't complaining when I was done either.

My wife started her "training" for the BigHorn 30K today.  She texted me her training schedule and I think it could really catch on.

"I'm going to run on hair washing days, and lift on non-washing days"

I love it!! 

Kind of easy day, one thing about it, yes running on the treadmill is boring, but running slow on the treadmill is really boring.  I go in telling myself I'll just run an even slow pace but always end up getting faster and faster just to make the time go by.

12 miles in 1:29:00 with 5 x 0.1 mile strides at the end at 13.1,13.2,13.3,13.4,13.5 mph.

Do these count as VO2 max when they are only around 30 seconds each.  Not sure where they fall in, definately not easy miles.

Wednesday Swimday, I like swimday, I may incorporate it into real training as opposed to all the fake training I've been doing lately.

48 laps, in some amount of time slightly less than 1 hour followed by 45 minutes of weight lifting to get me that sculpted upper body I have always dreamed about.

My Garmin kind of bit the dust and I've been wanting a new one but don't want to fork out the money.  This new device was a CES this year and is suppose to come out this summer as a competitor to the Garmin 910XT.  Not sure if it's worth moving away from a trusted product like Garmin but it does have some pretty cool features a geeky computer nerd could really appreciate.

Also, I am somehow in charge of organizing my kids Elementary school 5K fundraiser this year.  My wife is a teacher at the school and I once ran a marathon which obviously qualifies me to organize a 5K.  Anyway, here is the link to the info/registration page, should be fun.

Speaking of geeky fun stuff.  I just ordered 1 Kindle Fire HD, 1 Google Nexus 7,  1 Samsung Galaxy Tab 2, and 1 iPad Mini to compare.  If anyone is in the market give me 2 weeks and I'll let you know which one is best. 

I attempted the Justin Park Scott Keate workout today but quit halfway through the 3rd interval.  I have a whole slew of excuses but really I just didn't have it in me today.  Maybe I'll try again next week.  Tried 11mph on 9 mph off, may have been a bit too aggressive but I had some other issues making that pace un-sustainable other than just not being in good enough shape.

10 miles in 1:11:??, I also was having treadmill issues today, it just died on me twice before I gave up and went to another one.

I sure hope I'm not getting sick again, but it sure seems that way.  I got on the treadmill just couldn't bring myself to push the start button so I went to the elliptical for 15 minutes, went back to the treadmill ran for about 1 minute and went back to the elliptical.

I really don't get it,  were there people that actually believed Lance Armstrong never used drugs?? 

First of all, why would you believe 1 person that had everything to loose by telling the truth, and not the hundreds of people that either saw him do it, saw the evidence of it, or heard him admit it that had nothing to loose either way.

Second, HE HAD CANCER.  Where do you think these drugs come from?  They didn't invent HGH, and EPO so people can go win the Tour De France.  They get the money to develop these drugs from funds for things like cancer research.  He was obviously taking drugs, people don't get over cancer naturally, that's why they spend Millions of dollars on cancer research, to make drugs that make the body do things it normally wouldn't do.

This brings up the final question.  Why do we (you and me) need a hero so bad.  Lance didn't start out wanting to be a hero.  He wanted to not die from cancer and go win a bike race that no one in America even cared about.  He didn't set out to defraud people, who cares if he's not a "nice guy" it's companies like Nike, and Trek that enable this to happen.  They are the ones that try to create super humans that look and smell nice, and perform at a level above what a normal human is capable of.

Lance may be a very good liar, but it's not like he didn't know it.  He tried to make the best of it and started a foundation to help millions of people to try and make up for it.

Felt pretty good today considering how crappy I felt yesterday, so I'm not sure what my problem was.  I went and got a flu shot last night even though I already had the flu this year.

Started out slow cause I didn't know how it was going to go, planned on running 12 but felt really good and went for 15 cause that's all the time I had before soccer games.

15 miles in 1:46:08 7:04 avg pace.

12 weeks to go, I officially started my Boston training last night by starting to re-read Ryan Halls "Running with Joy"

Today didn't start off so great, first of all I forgot to set my alarm last night, luckily my internal alarm is only off by about 15 minutes.  I charged my Garmin last night with the intent of tracking HR and every mile split, the stupid thing died on my after only 3 miles. And then I attempted to finish my workout by doing speed intervals, but on my second interval my left glute totally charley horsed on me, so I just finished my final 2 miles really slow.   I'm guessing the risk of speed workouts isn't worth the risk of injury.  I think for my goals speed isn't all that important, I mainly just need to get my general fitness back, so from now on (at least for a while) no speed work faster than around 1/2 marathon pace.

10 miles in 1:16:00

Average HR was around 150 for the first 3 miles at 7:30 pace.  Pretty high actually.

Resting HR this morning 52.  Also high, it used to be down around 40.

Wasn't sure I'd even be able to run today after my muscle cramp yesterday,  I spent a lot of time on the roller and stretching though so this morning it felt OK.  Had to start slow to warm it up but after 3 - 4 miles it was fine.  I pulled out the ol' Garmin305, the things a bit clunky but much less temperamental than the 405.  My HR is still crazy high, based on HR my whole run should have been catagorized as marathon pace, but I'm just feeling a bit off lately, so I'm going to give myself a week or so to get over what ever ailment I may have before adjusting pace goals.

Distance	Time	Split Time	Avg HR
1	7:54	7:54	152
2	15:39	7:45	155
3	23:12	7:32	160
4	30:34	7:21	165
5	37:44	7:10	167
6	44:45	7:00	170
7	51:37	6:51	172
8	58:19	6:41	173
9	1:05:36	7:17	161
10	1:12:42	7:06	170
11	1:19:37	6:55	171
12	1:26:34	6:56	171
13	1:33:22	6:48	172
14	1:40:02	6:39	174
Total	1:40:02	7:08 avg	166

Recovery day, I considered swimming but the thought of that initial jump into cold water scared me away.  I wanted to run really slow so to satisfy my urge to push an up arrow button every mile I pushed the incline button instead of speed.  My HR was getting higher than I wanted even with the slow speed so I had to go down in speed every 1% I went up.

Mile 1 at 1%, Mile 2 at 2%.....Mile 6 at 6%.  Mile 7 and 8 flat. That's 1,100' of elevation if I do my math correctly.  6 miles X 5,280 X 3.5%.  Nothing special but I do feel like it gave my legs a break while still getting a cardio workout.

Mile	Time	Mile Split	Avg HR
1 @ 1%	8:51	8:51	135
2 @ 2%	17:52	9:00	138
3 @ 3%	27:06	9:13	145
4 @ 4%	36:36	9:30	150
5 @ 5%	46:26	9:49	155
6 @ 6%	56:26	10:00	160
7 flat	1:05:01	8:34	141
8 flat	1:13:04	8:03	147
Total	1:13:04	9:07 avg	148

Felt a little bit better this morning than I have this week.  Good news I'm getting out of the cold and smog for 2 weeks, bad news it's in Vegas.  Worst running city in the world, and the Palazzo gym doesn't open until like 7 or 8, to late either way to get in before work.  So starting Sunday it's going to be endless 2.5 miles loops around the Wynn Golf course for me :(

Here is a question that is probably dumb, and I've probably read it but I don't know the answer so I'm putting it out there.  12 weeks out from the marathon, when I'm running at "marathon pace" should that be my current marathon pace based on effort and HR or do I run it at my goal marathon pace?  HR for marathon pace based on calculations I made in much better shape are 151bpm - 168bpm.  Currently my goal MP of < 6:20 puts me around 172bpm, which I still think something is wrong with me and that will go down. but way, way to high never the less.

Distance	Time	Split Time	Avg HR
1	7:54	7:54	151
2	15:21	7:28	155
3	22:36	7:16	158
4	29:42	7:05	162
5	36:38	6:56	165
6	43:25	6:46	168
7	50:02	6:37	171
8	56:27	6:24	171
9	1:03:29	7:02	159
10	1:10:20	6:51	168
11	1:16:57	6:36	170
12	1:23:16	6:19	174
Total	1:23:16	6:56 avg	163

Easiest run of the week to give my legs a rest for tomorrows long run with tempo.  In December I took one week where I ran 18 miles everyday of the week, the purpose I thought was to make it so when I was doing official training long runs wouldn't scare me.  Well it didn't work, cause I'm afraid of a dumb 17 miles run tomorrow with 8 mile marathon pace tempo.  Strange.

Distance	Time	Split Time	Avg HR
1	7:30	7:30	146
2	14:54	7:24	151
3	22:13	7:19	153
4	29:29	7:17	156
5	36:53	7:24	155
6	44:23	7:30	154
7	51:55	7:32	154
8	59:54	7:59	151
Total	59:54	7:29 avg	152

 

Sometimes a good day comes along just when you need it.  I was nervous about this run for some reason but I woke up feeling the best I've felt all week.  Ran an 8 mile "warm up" I guess, the plan called for an 8 mile tempo at marathon pace but it was so (dare I say) "easy" I just went 9 to finish up the whole 17 miles.  6:10 pace was hard but sustaining goal marathon pace was definately doable.  I've decided no matter how good I start feeling, or how well my training goes over the next 11 weeks I'm not going to change my goal time.  I'm just going to work on making my goal time feel easy.  I went after sub 2:40 for so long with nothing but failure so just getting a nice PR will make me the happiest boy on earth.

Distance	Time	Split Time	Avg HR
1	7:53	7:53	140
2	15:31	7:39	152
3	23:00	7:28	150
4	30:21	7:21	155
5	37:32	7:10	160
6	44:35	7:02	162
7	51:33	6:58	162
8	58:27	6:53	163
9	1:04:52	6:25	161
10	1:11:15	6:23	170
11	1:17:34	6:18	172
12	1:23:49	6:14	174
13	1:30:00	6:11	175
14	1:36:14	6:13	174
15	1:42:29	6:14	174
16	1:48:48	6:19	174
17	1:54:55	6:07	174
Total	1:54:55	6:45 avg	163
Tempo Total	56:35	6:17 avg	172

 

Flew to Vegas this morning and everything went eerily well, all of our DS3's came online, all of our equipment just worked.  It's almost like we know what we're doing.

Anyway, we got done working nice and early so after dinner I decided to go down to the hotel gym.  Ran an easy 4 in 33 minutes followed by some weights and stretching.  Good news, I found out the gym now opens at 5:00am.  I'm still going to try and get outside for some running but will probably do my main workouts on the treadmill for the next 2 weeks.

Guess what I did today?  I ran outside, I know pretty unbelievable.  My plan was to go run 2 Wynn Golf course loops 1 loop = exactly 2.5 miles and then go run a 5 mile LT tempo run on the hotel treadmill but once I got outside into almost perfect (47 degrees) running weather I couldn't really see myself going back to the treadmill.  Ran the first 2 laps pretty easy, I actually enjoy my little loop, there is just one awful stretch that is always windy, uphill, and all the homeless people sleep along the sidewalk there, other than than the loop is really nice.  After my second loop I stopped to stretch and decided to attempt my tempo run.  Should have stuck to the treadmill plan for 2 reasons, 1 my first 2 loops were nice, no cars and I hit every light green but by the time my 3rd lap came it was later and lots more cars, and I seemed to hit every intersection red, not good for a tempo.  2nd reason, I went out to fast, pulled my left glute again and had a shooting pain go all up my left leg.  So I scratched the LT pace idea and just tried to maintain a slightly 'uncomfortable' pace for 2 laps. 

Came back to the hotel, filled up the tub with cold water and a pillowcase full of ice and sat in it for about 15 minutes.  I haven't done that in a while either.  The Palazzo has some really great rooms.  Nice big tub, seperate shower, and a TV in the bathroom to watch while in the tub.

PM, 5 miles on the hotel treadmill in 37:30.  Ran next to my friend Jeff.  I need to get him running again.  He claims running hurts his knees.  I tell him running hurts my everything, that probably doesnt help my cause. 

Pretty rough run today, I think my treadmill legs just aren't used to running that far on pavement. 6 Golf Course loops today, any more than 4 gets tough.  After my first loop today I had the brainiac idea to start running the opposite direction around my loop.  That way I replace the aweful uphill, into the wind, in the ghetto with the nice side entrance to the Encore hotel.  Now I could run fast through all the broken beer bottles and homeless people, and my slow section was more enjoyable. This turned out to be a great idea, there were quite a few shady people out this morning,  I passed a guy twice that was just casually walking down the sidewalk at 5:00am with a big TV in his arms.  He must have been looking for an outlet to plug it in.

Distance	Time	Split Time	Avg HR
1	7:46	7:46	145
2	15:38	7:52	143
3	23:18	7:40	146
4	30:48	7:30	149
5	38:33	7:45	153
6	45:52	7:19	151
7	53:14	7:21	157
8	1:00:56	7:42	154
9	1:08:19	7:23	155
10	1:15:51	7:32	158
11	1:23:17	7:25	152
12	1:30:53	7:36	155
13	1:38:40	7:46	154
14	1:46:17	7:38	152
15	1:54:07	7:50	155
Total	1:54:07	7:37 avg pace	151

 This run definitely should have been run at a faster pace but I just didn't have it in me today.

My wife and I have always been very self sufficient and just try to do everything on our own, but yesterday we finally broke down and hired a Nanny to help my wife out.  We have been looking for a while but just couldn't find anyone we trusted, but finally we found one that seems very good and reliable.  I'm going to feel much better now while I'm traveling that there is someone helping out with the kids while my wife is working.  The master plan wasn't for her to start working full time so soon but I guess if the opportunity is there you take it.

Very nice run this morning, 48 degrees, clear sky, no wind. Took it really easy, I think it's going to go a long way to making my legs feel better.  3 loops plus a little out and back along the strip to get an even 8 in 1:07:35.  8:27 avg pace.

P.M. 

4 miles in 33:33.  These after work runs are really hard, the motivation to want to go just isn't there at all, and then my stomach is completely jacked up from eating conference food all day.  Just no good. I walked over to the mall to try and find dinner afterwards and my legs are pretty sore,  I thought running slow would help.  I'm fallin' apart!  Hopefully a good night sleep will help.

I'm a bit of a wreck.  I think I'm just not recovering because I'm walking around a big convention center all day instead of sitting in my cubicle writing comments on peoples running blogs.  Today was suppose to be 12 miles, I wanted to try to average 7:00/mile pace but by hips just wouldn't release and I noticed my feet were kind of clompy.  ended up slow and short.

10 miles in 1:22:00

I'm noticed something interesting about people in Las Vegas.  In Utah if you come running up behind someone they usually jump and scream, and sometimes even pull out the pepper spray.  In Las Vegas people don't even react when I run up behind them.  They must be used to being surprised.

I may need to take tomorrow off of running if I'm going to get a quality run in on Saturday.

I had a great night sleep last night and woke up feeling way better, I could have easily ran but I had already told myself to cross train today so I went to the hotel gym for an elliptical workout.  I decided to do it 'Fritz style" and go hard.  I bumped up the resistance and tried to get my HR up, goal at first was mid 150's but by 30 minutes I actually got it up into the 165 - 170 range.  Seriously the hardest elliptical workout I've ever done, I was feeling way sicker at the end than my 8 mile tempo run last week.  I think this was good for at least a 4 mile marathon pace run, or at least a really good uphill run.

I was trying to figure out why my hamstrings were such a mess, I ran 18 miles a day for a week and wasn't even as sore as I have been this week.  I thought my form must be off, I was trying to figure out what I was doing wrong and then I realized I went from treadmill running for the last 2 months to pavement running, so most likely everything changed.  Plan for my long run tomorrow is to split it up, 10 miles outside, and then when the gym opens finish up on the treadmill.  Hopefully that helps, but if my legs feel as much better tomorrow as they do today I should be fine.  I never really felt injured, just very sore.

Really happy about my run today, was planning on 4 loops then going to the treadmill but the weather was so perfect I just couldn't stand the thought of going to the stuffy gym, T-shirt and shorts.  15 miles at just a good pace, then I tried to push the last 3 miles at around 6:30 pace, probably was higher because of uphill but I was very happy I had anything in me to run faster after 15.

7 loops + 1/4 mile out and back on the strip.

18 miles in 2:09:58  7:13 avg pace.

I woke up not wanting to deal with traffic this morning and went down to the Hotel Gym, got there at 5:00 and it wasn't open, waited 10 minutes and it still never opened, called the front desk and they told me it didn't open until 6:00.  I have no idea why it opened at 5:00 last week and not this week.  So I headed back outside for my loop, again, and again.   Didn't have my Garmin cause I thought I was running on the treadmill today, 4 laps in ??:??:??.  Not terribly slow cause I kept feeling like I was running behind schedule from not getting started on time.  I almost got hit by a Taxi crossing the road, I had a green man and I don't even think he slowed down coming around the corner.  Other than that un-eventful.  Tomorrow is my last run in Vegas cause I just found out I get to fly out to New York for an emergency meeting tomorrow. 

6 loops around the Golf Course.  Last day, so glad to leave Vegas today.

15 miles in 1:52:15 7:29 avg pace.  Legs felt good but I was kind of lacking energy today.

So, funny story. The President of my company called and told me I need to fly to New York for a meeting with him and a bunch of big wigs from Marriott hotels at the New York Marquis.  I told him I didn't pack any dress clothes so he told me to just go buy some and expense them.  I seriously don't buy dress clothes,  I hate shopping, my entire wardrobe is marathon T-'s and nerdy tech t-shirts from conferences.  Oh, and polos that have my company logo on them.  I am in the most expensive place to buy clothes anywhere probably, so I went out shopping last night and spent over $400 on a shirt pants and belt.  I still don't have shoes.  I'm totally sick to my stomach about the whole thing.  If I wanted to spend that much money it definitely wouldn't be on clothes.

6 miles on the hotel treadmill before my meeting today.  5 X speed intervals the last mile just to get the legs moving.  Anything faster than 5:30 pace really felt like I was going to pull my hamstring again so they were relatively slow for speed intervals.

I hate talking in front of people, in general I hate talking to people, except virtually, then I talk to people a lot.  So I was very nervous about my presentation today, almost as nervous as talking in Church, except I actually know what I'm talking about here.  But once I started talking about RF frequency, Co-channel interference, and 802.11n, and MiMo,  the General Manager of the hotel was totally getting into it and asking me all sort of questions, I got really comfortable and it went really well.  This is really one of my favorite hotels, and I have spent a lot of time here so I hope my company keeps the contract.  I think it will after today.  Anyway, as I already commented, they all came up to me after the meeting and told me how much they liked my shoes, I thought that was pretty funny, usually shoes don't bring that much attention but I think it was perfect that I was the Technical guy, the only one without a suit coat on, and flashy yellow shoes really paid off.

___________________________________________________________

P.M. 6 miles on the hotel treadmill in 49:30.  I'm surprised how much these easy afternoon runs actually help me on my next day long run.  Instead of making me tired they actually make me less sore.

I kind of wanted to just wake up and get on the 7:00am flight outa here, but I said I'd run Central Park so I did.  I didn't think to pack any dress clothes, but at least I packed running tights, so you know I've got my priorities straight.  I thought to myself I'd just get my 20 miler done today instead of Saturday if I felt good, unfortunately I think this trip is finally taking it's toll.  My throat is scratchy, the Central Park Rollers were bugging my hamstring, and my stomach is a bit of a mess.  It's .75 miles from Times Square to the park and then exactly 6 miles around the big loop.  I ran the big loop twice since it was the only exact distance I knew and my Garmin didn't want to wake up this morning, it was still on Vegas time.

Even though it wasn't a great run, I really enjoy the park every time I go there, it's so amazing how many people are out running and biking at 5:00am in 25 degree weather.  I'm sure I'll be back soon.

I sure hope this scratchy throat doesn't turn into anything worse, I really don't want to deal with sick again.

Back to the Lifetime treadmill today, running on roads must have taken all my speed away, either that or all this travel has zapped my energy.  Had a really hard time getting it all going this morning.  Eventually was able to get up to marathon pace for the last 2 miles of the run.

I finished Tyler Hamiltons book on the plane home yesterday, I was actually really into it and had a hard time putting it down.  I used to think that maybe there were some clean riders in the Tour De France during the "Lance Era" but after reading this book it only made sense that everyone had to be doping, that's the only way they could get away with it for so long.  The ICU didn't care, the Tour De France didn't care, the sponsors were making tons of money, the riders were making tons of money, Cycling was getting more world wide attention than ever, all the viewers were eating it all up.  The only thing Lance really did wrong 'in my opinion' was being a huge jerk, it's not like he started the whole doping problem, Spain didn't even have laws against doping, Germany's government probably sponsored Jan Ulrich's whole program, so really in European cycling you pretty much had to do it to compete. I was pretty surprised to find out they were doing transfusions.  I thought that was total 70's and that EPO had replaced blood doping.  The other thing that kind of struck me was that the doping really controlled their entire life, dodging testers, smuggling EPO and Blood Bags across borders in Dog Kennels, flying to Spain every 2 weeks for transfusions.  I kind of pictured it being, well less dramatic.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the book, it was really facinating to read what a glamorous life these guys were living, living in villas in little European villages, riding bikes around the alps everyday for a living, flying on private jets, and then for it all to come crashing down around them. Pretty amazing stuff.

Sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do. And this morning what I had to do was run 20 miles before the kids indoor soccer games.  It was pretty horrible to tell the truth.  Well actually the first 7 miles were really awful, and the last 4 miles were pretty bad,  those 9 miles in between that were pretty, umm! forgettable I guess.  I was thinking 7:00/mile average would be a pretty good goal but I was actually able to pick it up towards the end, never faster than 6:30 pace.

20 miles in 2:17:32  6:52 avg pace.

After I was done a couple came up and said, wow you run a long time on the treadmill, are you training for something.  I said Boston, they said Ooooh!  Funny how training for Boston is for some reason more impressive to people than training for say Ogden.  No offense Ogden trainer people,  I think your training is very impressive.

Despite massaging, icing, and stretching my hamstrings all weekend I woke up incredibly sore still this morning.  I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong lately, I've never had hamstring issues before.  Anyway, today called for a 5 mile LT run, I felt like I've just kind of been getting the miles in lately and not getting any quality workouts in so I decided to try and go for it anyway.  Started out slow, did a 5 mile warmup, took a quick water break and then started on the tempo run, the plan was to try and do 5 miles in 30 minutes, start out at 6:10 pace and progressively get faster, things started OK but after the first mile I bumped up the pace and my body just didn't want to respond, I felt like I was going to hurt something, so I just left well enough alone and just ran at that pace.  Last mile a little faster.  Truthfully, I should be able to get into the 5:40 range on an LT run, I'm not sure if today did more damage than good but at least I got through it, based on HR it really was still an LT run so that's good I suppose.

Distance	Time	Split Time	Avg HR
1	8:30	8:30	149
2	16:37	8:07	141
3	24:01	7:24	153
4	31:09	7:09	159
5	37:58	6:49	163
6	44:10	6:11	165
7	50:21	6:11	172
8	56:31	6:10	172
9	1:02:44	6:12	171
10	1:08:43	5:58	172
11	1:17:03	8:21	150
Total	1:17:03	7:00	159
Tempo Total	30:42	6:08	170

 

My wife has a head cold and kept waking me up all night, finally at 3:15 I decided to stop trying to fall asleep and just go to the gym.  I rolled out and stretched before running which I don't normally do, then did about 5 minutes on the elliptical to try and loosen up. Started out running slow, and progressively got a little faster.

15 miles in 1:53:00  7:30 avg pace. 

I've decided I'm getting burned out, I'm tired, my legs hurt, I've developed an eating disorder trying to get back to race weight, which is just driving me nuts.  I've been trying to loose weight since the start of the year, I've lost about 5 lbs but I still want to loose like 15 more.  I know it's not good to train and try to loose that much weight, but I didn't loose it before I started like I'd planned.  So yeah, I'm in the dumps.

I really needed that after all my whining yesterday.  Swimming really is a great cross train, legs feel great afterwards and I really can think better, the rest of the world just kind of disappears when you swim.  I realized that yeah, maybe I'm not in as good of shape as I'd like to be, but who is. Last year at this time I couldn't even run. So I'm not quite sure what my problem was yesterday, maybe a bit sick, maybe just tired.

Anyway, 32 laps in the pool, 20 minutes on the elliptical, and then 30 minutes of random weight machines.

Felt OK this morning, legs felt a little better after a day off of running but this pain in my butt is getting to be a real....  Well you know.  Today was very strange, I've been going to Lifetime fitness for like 7 years now (with a break in between when I moved) but anyway, I get on the same treadmill every morning on the front row and rarely does anyone run next to me, I always figured it was cause I stink.  But today I went through like 3 different sets of people who came up and ran next to me, some of them even talked, one girl told me people didn't run next to me cause it was intimidating.  I'm not that scary.   I thought having people to talk to would make the time go by faster, it didn't. 

Tomorrow Ryan told me he would run 18 miles outside with me, we'll see how that goes.  He's been out on injury leave for months now.

14 miles in 1:41:00 7:12 avg pace.

Pretty awesome run with Ryan and Jeff L this morning.  Ryan has to go to St. George today for Soccer tournaments so we decided to run this morning instead, and since he is the CFO of our company I have a good excuse for being late to work :) 

I decided to just make today my long run since I had people to run with so I went down early and did a 3 mile loop around Thanksgiving point before meeting Jeff and Ryan.  We started out kind of slow, truthfully faster than I though Ryan would be willing to run but slower I guess.  Out through West Lehi out to Utah Lake and back.  Very nice morning, I actually thought the temperature was perfect, not quite cold enough to freeze your sweat.

Pretty happy with the run, I felt really good the entire time.  I was actually suppose to do a 10 mile Tempo mixed in but that's OK, I still got the mileage.  I ran an extra 2 mile out and back alone at the end to finish off my mileage.

Thanks Jeff for meeting us on such late notice, that was a lot of fun.

I felt incredibly good today, I remember back even when I was in better shape than I am now a 19 mile run would have immobilized me for the rest of the weekend but I almost had no soreness this morning. 

8 miles pretty easy followed by 10X speed intervals, 12.1, 12.2, 12.3......13mph.  I have been skipping speed intervals lately cause I felt like they were going pull something but today for some reason they felt good.  I actually had fun doing them.

Britt scheduled us in house massages for Valentines day, This morning (did that make sense) Anyway, she surprised me by have a massage lined up for me this morning at 7:00am right after my run.  It seriously hurt more than any massage I have ever had, but it was great.  I can tell she really worked out some of the kinks I've had for quite a while.  Good massage therapists are amazing how they can find those muscles that you didn't even know were sore.  I was holding back tears a few times.

Saturday afternoon I decided to take my son snowboarding, well first time getting off bunny hill lift we crashed into each other and I pulled my hamstring really bad, I couldn't even bend over to do my bindings. It hurt so bad Saturday night it kept waking me up. I thought for sure Boston was done, but after stretching iceing and relaxing all day yesterday it felt a lot better. This morning I work up almost normal. Started the run out slow to be safe but the longer I ran the better it felt. Pretty happy I seemed to get away with it this time.

12 miles in 1:27:55. 7:19 avg pace.

Pretty good run, I have to start out all my runs pretty slow just to get my hamstring loose but after 3-4 miles things start working nicely.  I'm giving myself 3 marathon pace miles today, dipped into the upper 6:2ish range between miles 8-10 and 14-15.

15 miles in 1:46:35, 7:06 avg pace

I swear I saw a Meteor just like the Russia one over the west desert this morning at 4:24, I can't find anything on the news but it wasn't your normal shooting star, it was huge and lit up the sky, anyone else see it?

Part of me wanted to just swim this morning, the other part of me suffers from a severe case of FRBmia.  The obsessive compulsive urge to post miles on Fastrunningblog at any cost. So I ran, slow, and I enjoyed it, so I'm not complaining.

8 miles in 1:06:55 followed by 30 minutes of weights.

I've been looking at this graph today, and I gotta say it looks pretty "easy"  even that little bump between 20 - 22.  Can someone who recognizes this graph slap some sense into me?

Pretty happy with my run this morning, more because I did it than anything.  I've been skipping some of my workouts lately and substituting for miles just due to not feeling good and not wanting to get hurt.  Workout called for a 4 mile LT run, I went into it thinking 5:40 pace sounded good, I really had no reason to think I could actually run that pace it just sounded nice.  Turned out 5:40 was more terminal velocity than sustainable pace, more I think because of my hamstring than my actual fitness.   Anyway, I got through it, pretty happy with it since the last time I did an LT run I couldn't even break 6:00 pace.  I don't think I've gotten that much faster in that time, I just wasn't feeling very good last time.  I think today's run is more indicative of my current fitness, not spectacular, but not horrible either.

6 mile progressive warmup, stretch and water break, 4 mile tempo, 2 mile cool down.

Distance	Time	Avg Pace	Avg HR
1	7:27	7:27	149
2	14:43	7:16	153
3	21:48	7:06	157
4	28:44	6:56	160
5	35:31	6:46	163
6	42:09	6:38	164
7	47:58	5:49	165
8	53:44	5:45	174
9	59:33	5:49	173
10	1:05:24	5:51	172
11	1:13:48	8:25	158
12	1:21:13	7:24	157
Total	1:21:13	6:46	161
Tempo Total	23:15	5:48	171

10 miles in 1:14:50, the last 2 in 12:30 cause I was feeling spunky.  It sure feels like I've run further than 57 miles this week.

I know, I need to get more actual road miles in.  But due to the nasty blizzard that's going on outside (according to the weatherman) Ryan and I cancelled our run this morning.That's OK, I really wanted to get this marathon pace run in.  I didn't do it last week, and next week I'm going to be very busy so I don't know what will happen.  It was pretty hard, had a bunch of different leg pains going on but it wasn't horrible.

8 mile progressive warmup, then a 10 mile marathon pace tempo.  I think I'd be better off just running it flat pace than trying to average out, but that's boring.  6:15 pace was OK much faster got pretty hard.  I'm happy with the run, I'd hope to get my HR down about 5-7 bpm for that pace by marathon day. 

I had to do a treadmill reset at 9.5 miles which was totally lame.

Distance	Time	Avg Pace	Avg HR
1	7:56	7:56	144
2	15:40	7:45	146
3	23:13	7:33	150
4	30:34	7:21	153
5	37:45	7:11	155
6	44:46	7:01	158
7	51:37	6:51	160
8	58:21	6:44	162
9	1:04:47	6:27	156
10	1:11:15	6:27	165
11	1:17:37	6:23	167
12	1:24:00	6:23	169
13	1:30:19	6:19	168
14	1:36:38	6:19	168
15	1:42:53	6:15	169
16	1:49:07	6:15	169
17	1:55:21	6:12	170
18	2:01:32	6:06	168
Total	2:01:32	6:45	160
Tempo Total	1:03:11	6:19	168

I ate like crap all weekend and paid for it this morning.  I was glad today wasn't a hard day.

I'm frankly scared of tomorrows workout, worried my hamstring wont hold up but I think I have a plan.  We'll see how it goes.

12 miles in 1:32:50.

Rivertonpaul was crankin' out sub 7:00's today, pretty impressive.

And that is why I don't run 5K's.

Todays workout called for .75's or as known in the running world 1200's, Blah!!  I'm pretty sure this is the exact workout that blew my hip out 2 years ago and put me out of commission for almost 1 year.  I tried to think of a XT workout I could do to simulate a Vo2 max workout and then realized I could still run, just with an incline.  I think from a fitness standpoint I can probably run 1200's at 5:00 pace but I doubt I'll ever find out anytime soon.  I tried to think of what the incline equivilent that would be, I decided to start out at 10mph at 8% incline and go faster if that was too easy :) turns out that was suicide, I forced myself to finish 1/4 but after that I almost just ended the workout.  Jogged for about 5 minutes and then decided to re-adjust my goal and go for it again.  Next time I started at 9mph at 5% grade, that seemed more reasonable.  I bumped up the speed each 1/4, it was discouraging to be working that hard and not even be running at MP but I kept telling myself this was a HR run, not pace.  My charts from a couple years ago had my max HR at 182, if I use the ol' 220 - age calculation my max should be 180, it's probably pretty close, I pushed myself pretty hard on the last interval, that last .1 miles at 10mph, so maybe 180 is max, I kind of doubt that was everything I had in me, but maybe,  I did feel pretty darn sick after I was done.

4 miles in 33:05, my 1/4 mile death run, and then 5 X 1200's with 1/4 mile jog in between.

Distance	Time	Avg HR	Max HR
.25	1:33	?	178
.75	4:54	169	178
.75	4:55	170	177
.75	4:56	170	177
.75	4:51	167	178
.75	4:50	169	180

Wow, I felt amazing today,  I felt like Floyd Landis on Stage 17 of the 2006 Tour De France after a fresh blood transfusion.    But really,  I don't know what was up this morning, I didn't plan on feeling good so I started out slow but the faster I went the better I felt.  Progressive run through 10, but then ended up running the last 5 miles at Marathon pace 6:20.  I didn't wear a HR monitor, or track miles but it felt great.  Marathon pace felt easy, my legs were light, and I was hardly breathing.  Easiest 15 mile run ever.

15 miles in 1:42:57  6:51 avg pace.

Since I know I get the wrong "there" all the time.  This is for Rob Murphy, whom I'm sure I drive crazy with my grammar.

Kind of a strange run today due to me not reading my schedule correctly, or at all.  I thought it was a short run easy day so I ran 6 miles in 58:30 with a 4% incline.  I never realized how good of a XT slow incline running is.  It really works different muscles and the legs feel pretty fresh when done.  Anyway, I finished and noticed a calendar reminder on my phone saying today was a 10 mile run, not 6.  Oops!  So since I'm anal about following my schedule I ran another 4 in 28:00.  Luckily I woke up early this morning and had extra time.  Did some various weights after than.  Pretty nice easier day, feeling good.

I start setting up for Adobe Summit at the Salt Palace today so my next week is going to be crazy.  Not sure how well I'll keep to the schedule especially for Saturdays long run since Saturday is our busy long work day.  This is the conference where I have to stay at the Downtown Salt Lake City Marriott all week.  They don't want to risk me being 30 minutes away at home in case of an emergency network outage.

A reporter meets a man carrying an eight-foot-long metal stick and asks, “Are you a pole vaulter?” “No,” says the man, “I’m German. But how did you know my name is Walter?

10 miles at 4:00 this morning so I could be to the Salt Palace by 6:00am to start working.

Progressive 8.5 with followed by 7 x Speed intervals.  12.1,12.2....12.7mph.

Well, yesterday was crazy and there was just no way to get a run in.  We worked from 6:00am to 10:00pm at the Salt Palace, and I was very grumpy by the end of the day.  I told my crew to not come in until 8:00 today, they thought I was being nice but really I just wanted to get a run in today.  Yesterdays run called for an 18 miler with 12 at MP.  Today's replacement run was 16 miles and an 8 mile MP run on the Downtown SLC Marriott treadmill.  I actually had time to get 18 in but a guy got on the treadmill next to me that really needed deodorant, and when your trying to run a tempo run bad smells are just not good,  Plus I wanted time to go jump in the pool and hot tub.  I'm OK with the run, we probably walk about 12 - 13 miles a day at work so I don't want to end up getting hurt.

16 miles in 1:49:30.  6:50 total avg pace.     8 mile tempo was in 51:15 6:24 avg.

10 miles on the hotel treadmill, 8 x speed thingys to finish off.  The treadmill caped out at 12.5mph.

I figure it's March, I have 3 weeks of hard training left, it's about time to start weaning myself from the treadmill.  It's done a fabulous job getting me back in shape but now it's time to hit the ground running :-).

Started at 4:30 am, decided to wear shorts, I did wear compression socks to keep my shins warm though, no one likes cold shins.  Ran from the Marriott up to the U, up Sunnyside to the Zoo and then basically just followed the last 10 miles of the Des. News course.  It was really hard, very nice morning but really cold running up Sunnyside into a cold headwind.  I was pretty hammered by the end, and glad it was done.

15 miles in 1:52:43 7:30 avg pace.

OK, I'll stop running on treadmills after this conference is over :)

10 miles slow, except the last one I ran in 6:12 and defeated the whole purpose of my first 9 recovery miles.

10 miles in 1:18:03 7:48 avg pace

This workout was really hard and I probably should have skipped it, work is tearing me up this week.  Very long hours, and lots of stress.   Scott Keate came and found me and said hi which was cool, I was walking around with my boss who came to see what I do for a living so I couldn't talk to Scott much, I asked if he was going to the Concert and he said no he had to wake up at 5:00am to go running.  Maybe that's why he's faster than me cause I went to the concert and woke up at 4:15 to go running.

5 miles in 41:10 8:14 avg pace, Followed by an "LT" Tempo run.

7 miles in 44:28 6:21 avg pace.  I wanted it to be faster but I was seriously just beat up and didn't think it was a good idea.  6:20 pace was hard enough.

Nice spring morning run this morning. We got done with the conference from Hell last night and I got to come home and sleep in my own bed.  Slept in until 6:30, put on my trail running shoes, shorts and a long sleeve T.  ran my original 10 miler out around the Highland Smiths and back, I ran on gravel the entire way, the new Murdock trail is really nice cause they put in a horse/trail runner lane the entire way. I figured it would be muddy with patches of snow, but it was pretty dry the entire way.  Pretty easy pace just enjoying myself and pleased to be on break for a while.

Long miserable run with Ryan and Jeff through Lehi, American Fork, Cedar Hills and Highland. We had cold, we had hills, and lots and lots and lots if wind. The only thing that made it better for me was knowing I wasn't quite as miserable as Ryan :)

Glad to get it done, and glad to have my longest Pre-marathon run in the bag.

Feeling pretty sleep deprived for some reason this morning, didn't make for a great run.  Plus I thought my hamstring issues were through but my long run on Saturday showed me different,  towards the end of the run it was really acting up on some of the hills, I felt like I was going to cramp up if I stopped. 

Anyway, today called for 5 X 800's at 5K pace, I thought since my 5K pace is about the same as my marathon pace I should try and make them a little bit harder and shoot for 1/2 marathon pace instead.  They were pretty hard, my hamstring took a bit to stretch out and the first interval and I about quit but after that it actually felt better.

6 mile slow warm up,  5 X 800's with 1/4 mile jog, followed by a 1.75 mile cool down.

Splits for 800's ----

Interval	Time	Avg HR	Max HR
800m	2:50.83	170
800m	2:55.47	166
800m	2:51.90	167
800m	2:51.07	168
800m	2:48.05	169

Humm, my Garmin wont show me Max HR unless I upload the workout and I forgot my USB cable.  I think the highest I saw it get was 175 so not as hard an effort as my hill "sprint" 1600's the other day, but pretty decent effort.

P.M.

My wife actually came up with the answer to my doubles problem.  My sons soccer team decided to start practice today so she suggested I take him to soccer and run while waiting instead of sitting on the sideline yelling at him for not running hard enough and getting mad at his dimwhit coach.  His practice was at Lehi Jr. High which I knew had a track so I put on my running clothes and ran the track.  I had not idea how far I'd make it, and had no time monitoring device so I just ran until practice was over.  Ended up with 28 laps, in around 50ish minutes.  They are planning on practice everyday this week so it could end up being a good week for me.

Fritz e-mailed me last night and canceled our morning run citing injury prevention, I sent Scott Keate a text to see what his group was doing, they were doing 800s on the track, which I'd already attempted my 800's for the week, I sent Ryan a text and he didn't want to wake up early to run.  Sooo, you can't say I didn't try.  But I woke up and did what I do and went to the gym.

14 miles in 1:39:01 7:04 avg pace.  Progressive run, the last 5 miles were pretty quick, just under marathon pace.  Schedule said 15 this morning but at 14 I figured there was nothing more 1 mile was going to do for me this morning, plus I plan on running laps on the Jr. High track for Soccer practice again tonight.

I didn't get my afternoon run in yesterday cause I made my poor son run on the treadmill the night before.  Well, he crashed and burned on the treadmill and got scraped up really bad, knees and shins.  I feel terrible about it, but long story short, he didn't go to soccer practice last night cause he can barely walk, so I didn't run the track during practice.

I didn't feel real great this morning, my stomach is a bit sick, and my legs are just getting pretty worn down, but I really wanted to go run with the Utah County group this morning.  Met Scott, Reed, Mike, Toni, Dan for a nice 10 mile out and back run on the Murdock trail.  Perfect morning for a run, no wind, nice temps.  I could really feel the hills on my hamstring which makes me nervous.  I really need to figure out how to completely heal my hamstring without loosing fitness over the next 4 1/2 weeks.

Got my bib number for Boston yesterday.  Turns out my St. George disaster is still haunting me.  I start in Coral 5 so I figure I have about 3,500 people to pass to get my goal time.  should be fun.

8 easy miles in 1:05.  8:07 avg pace. 

I told myself I'd retire my 5th pair of Nike Free's when I got 1000 miles out of them.  Well, I hit exactly 1000 miles today so I guess I need to go to the shoe store.  I think I'll get myself some Nike Free's.  Maybe the 3.0's this time.

As my 10 year old son would say, Epic Fail, I usually reserve my epic fails for race day.  Today's workout was pretty key for me both physically and mentally.  I've been struggling a bit this week, just tired and not feeling quite right but I thought I'd be able to get through it at least, turns out I couldn't.

I remember the very first race I ran was the Canyonlands 1/2 marathon,  this was a long time ago, even before I considered myself a "runner" and I remember seeing the lead guys take off and were a 1/2 mile down the road before I even crossed the start line and I thought to myself 'Wow, those guys are going like 10mph, I wish I could run 10mph" lucky for me I didn't know they were actually going closer to 13mph.  Anyway, when I started getting serious about running my goal was to run 10 miles straight in less than 1 hour.  At the time it seemed daunting turns out it's even harder than I imagined back then.  Even in my best shape I've only accomplished it a few times.  Twice in downhill 1/2 marathons, once in a full marathon, and maybe 2-3 times on the treadmill during a workout.  I guess 10 mile LT runs just don't come up a whole lot when marathon pace is less than that.  So this year when I started training for Boston I told myself that a 10 mile run in less than 1 hour would be the indicator that I was finally back, I put the workout down twice on my calendar, once today, and again in 2 weeks.

I ran a 1 mile warmup, stopped and stretched, took a quick drink and started the run.  Decided to just run it flat 10mph instead of trying to progress, started out fine, my HR was high but I'm used to my HR surging at the beginning of a tempo, the problem was it never calmed down, usually I can get my breathing and HR under control after about 5 minutes but today I couldn't.  at 15 minutes 2.5 miles I realized it wasn't going to get easier and I just pulled the plug.  After a minute I tried to just start backup at slow marathon pace but realized after 2 miles I was probably just hurting myself more than anything so I just all together quit and went to the elliptical for 20 minutes.  Pretty disappointed, I'll give it another try in 2 weeks but for now I just need to figure out what's gone wrong with me.  More sleep I suspect would help.

One more thing that's got me down.  I have pretty much worked with my best friend since Jr. High Dave since I got out of college 20 years ago, we have worked at 3 different companies together and pretty much have always gone where the other goes.  Well, the travel finally got to him and he is going to accept another job.  I'm happy for him but it's going to be really hard for me.  I know, kind of sappy but I'm kind of in a funk right now about the whole thing.

18 miles with Ryan in 2:15, then I came home and my wife wanted to go for a run so I did another 3.5 with her.  She had to walk the hills so I put it down for an even 3.

I tried to give myself affirmative affirmation this morning that I was feeling better.  I think it worked for the most part.

10 mile progression run in 1:11:13  7:07 avg pace.  Last 3 miles in the 6:30 - 6:18 pace range.

I went to the shoe store and found the exact same shoes I was replacing on the clearance rack for $50, so I replaced my old shoes with the exact same shoe and threw the old ones in the garbage can so I wouldn't be tempted to wear them again.

Long story, but I'm going to tell it anyway.

I took my car in to get new brakes and tires yesterday morning, well at 3:00pm last night I called to see if it was done and they told me I needed new shocks as well, and that my car wouldn't be done until 7:00.  Well that did me no good since it was Britt's birthday yesterday and we were planning on going out to dinner, so I caught a ride home with a co-worker.  I could have got a ride back to work this morning with the same co-worker but that would have totally messed up my workout so I decided to man up and pull the ol' bike down.  Charged up all the batteries last night, (yes my bike has lots of batteries to charge) took it for a spin to make sure everything was working, and got out all the bike gear.

This morning the thermometer said 38 degrees, not bad for running, but biking is different.  dug up as many cold weather clothes as I could fit on and headed out.  Wasn't too bad, but in the summer going over the point of the mountain I always have a nice tail wind, this morning it was a massive headwind.  I wasn't too cold except for my fingers and toes.  I definitely need to figure that out if I ride to work in the cold again cause my toes were really miserable.  I took it pretty easy because I'm paranoid of wrecking, and going downhill fast was way to cold, but man some of those uphills kicked my butt, running fitness and biking fitness for some reason aren't the same.  I was suckin' air pretty hard going up the hill from 13th to Wasatch.  Anyway, made it to work in 1:25, I think my best time is around 1:12.  I don't feel bad about missing my run this morning at all.  I was suppose to do 1200's but really at this point is not doing a VO2 max workout really going to change my time in Boston?

Oh!  one last story.  I had no clothes stashed at work so I had to carry a backpack with clothes.  I rummaged through our closet and the best backpack I could find was Britt's hiking Camelback, problem is it's bright pink.  I asked my 9 year old if he thought people would make fun of me if I had a pink backpack.  He said "nope" I said "why not" he said "cause it's better than nuthin',  I think they would make more fun of you if you didn't have any backpack" I have the smartest kids on the planet.   I wore the pink backpack with pride.

Perfect morning run along Wasatch Blvd with Fritz, we had a great time except for him almost getting ran over crossing Wasatch.  I'm sure I slowed him down a bit but that's to be expected.  I felt pretty good, my hamstring slowed me down a bit on some of the uphill, but the downhill with a tailwind was fun.

P.M.

20 laps around the track during Bradin's soccer practice.

Good day for a recovery day at the gym.  20 minutes on the elliptical, 6 miles in 48 minutes on the treadmill, 30 minutes of weights. 1 hour drive in the snow to work.

Felt like garbage when I woke up this morning but I felt bad about my slacker day yesterday so I had to force myself to make up for it.  Took some Imodium AD and some ibubrofen. and headed to the gym.  By the time I got to the gym I was feeling quite a bit better, probably from the OD of drugs.  Ran an 8 mile progressive run, then I did 8 X speed intervals at 12.1,12.2....12.8mph.  Followed by a 2.5 mile slow cool down at 7:30pace. 

12 miles in 1:27:19, 7:16 avg pace.

I'm really having mixed feelings, part of me thinks this has been the most successful marathon buildup I've ever had, but another part of me feels like there is something missing.  I'm just not feeling as good as I have in the past, part of it I think is passion, I used to crave to run fast, I used to love the feeling of pushing my body to the limit. I'm not sure if it's fear of getting injured again, or if something else is different.

Boy, I'm sure glad I didn't bail on my speed intervals after all this speed interval talk today.

This morning I did something I don't remember ever doing before.  I got in the car and started driving down to meet Ryan for our 21 mile run, he called me and we decided to cancel due to the blizzard, I then started to drive to Lifetime for a run on the treadmill,  just before getting on the freeway I thought to myself, this is stupid and I turned around, went home and climbed back in bed. 

But I made this pace chart for the Boston Marathon so my morning wasn't a complete waste.

 http://goo.gl/abp4V

Well, taking 2 days completely off from running and missing the all important 3 weeks away long run definitely wasn't my plan but it was probably the smartest thing I've done all year.  I woke up feeling really good this morning, and my hamstring almost didn't hurt at all, it makes me think that a good 2 week taper could actually heal it, at least well enough to run a marathon. 

6 mile progressive warm up, 5 X 800's with 1/4 mile jog in between each, 1/2 a mile cool down.  Plan was to do my 800's in 2:45, 5:30 pace I actually went in not sure I could even hold that pace, turns out I was able to exceed my goal on all 5 sets, so pretty happy with it.  The hamstring did start acting up on the 4th set but something about knowing there is only 1 more to go can get you through almost anything.

Distance	Split Time	Time	HR
1	7:52	7:52	146
2	7:32	15:24	154
3	7:22	22:46	157
4	7:11	29:58	160
5	7:01	36:59	161
6	6:50	43:49	165
6.5	2:39.7	46:29	179 Max
6.75	2:15.08	48:44	165
7.25	2:41.75	51:26	180 Max
7.5	2:20.25	53:46	167
8	2:40.61	56:27	182 Max
8.25	2:26.04	58:53	169
8.75	2:41.77	1:01:35	180 Max
9	2:25.93	1:04:01	168
9.5	2:40.98	1:06:42	180 Max
10	4:25.65	1:11:07	162
Total	7:06 avg pace	1:11:07	161

Almost positive that's not how the LR is suppose to feel, we felt guilty for missing Saturdays run (Ryan more than me) so we decided to do a make up run this morning.  I wanted to run to work but he forgot to pack a bag so we ended up just meeting at Maverik and running our normal West Lehi run.  I pretty much knew when I woke up this morning that it would be a train wreck, my legs were still pretty hammered from my 800's yesterday.  Anyway, we got through it, both of us were pretty slow, maybe the slowest run Ryan and I have ever done averaged just under 8:00 pace.  I think I'm going to start my taper early,  like right.....Now!

Nice relaxing swim today, at least for the first 20 laps.  I was planning on doing 1.5 miles but around lap 20 all the lanes were full and I had to start sharing with someone.  Usually I'm there early enough that I get a whole lane to myself, and frankly I'm not a good enough swimmer to share lanes, it's way to stressful wondering if I'm going to slam into someone on the turns, I might as well be sharing a treadmill.  So I got out and 32, and went to the weight room where I totally fit in.

5 miles on the track during soccer practice. 8 laps with my 9 year old in 18 minutes. I made him do track math every lap, kids are really good at track math, much better than us adults that can't count by 10's.

It was so nice this morning with the full moon and all I decided to not drive to the gym and just run my normal 10 mile home route.  Out along the Murdock trail on a perfect morning, almost didn't need a light the moon was so bright.  On the way back I ran in to Carina so I did a few back and forths with her, definitely my fastest portion of the run.

Same run as yesterday but about 1:30 faster per mile, still not fast enough.  I think today is the day I admit to you and myself that a PR is not going to happen in Boston.  I don't have a great excuse, training has been pretty good, I'm not really feeling bad, my hamstring has been a problem but I'm not sure that's the entire problem.  So I think I'm going to change my goal and just try to enjoy the experience more, maybe I'll shoot for a PR this Summer or fall but for some reason I just haven't gotten myself to the point where I can maintain 6:20 pace for 2:45.  I've definitely been more cautious this time around, I used to just go out and run every run at 6:30 pace, that worked for a while but eventually got to me.  So I'm not sure what the perfect combination is for me but for now I'm just going to be happy that I'm in pretty good shape, and for the most part can still enjoy running.

I listened to Depeche Modes new album on my run this morning, pretty good but there is a song on it called "Slow"  The lyrics go "Slow... Slow.... Slow as you can goooo"  Worst Tempo run song ever..

Good quality run with Ryan this morning, we met on the Murdock trail and ran down to Lehi and back and then up to Highland and back.  Averaged pretty close to 7:00 pace for most the run, I had to slow us down on uphills because of my stupid hamstring.  I told him to try and run the last 3 at marathon pace, he locked us in right at 6:30 for the last 3, now I am thinking it's my hamstring that's limiting me cause it's really the only thing that was holding me back.  15.4 miles with Ryan.

Last night I tried to organize a last minute group run of the Running of the Tigers 5K with the entire neighborhood so I came back to meet at the start line with my kids.  Well no one showed up except us and my 11 year old twisted his ankle at his soccer game Thursday so I ended up running it with Ethan my 9 year old just him and I.  He's looking really good, I only let him walk through where the aid stations will be.  We came in right around 30 minutes which was fine for a practice run, only the second time he has run that far.

40 minutes on the elliptical, my legs were a little sore today from Saturday and I have to go sit on a plane for 20 hours today so I wanted to give my legs a break.  I miss an entire day flying to China so I'll actually mis 3 full days of running, which is probably fine.

They were doing bone density tests at the gym today, mine came back at 1.41, have no idea 1.41 what but they said that was really good for an old guy like me.  A healthy 25 year old should be a 0.0.

2 weeks to Boston.  Who is ready???  Hope the weather can hold out, I'll take rain, wind, and cold over hot any day of the week.

Got into China last night at 11:30, to the hotel by 1:00am.  I slept OK but woke up at 6:00 am anyway so I decided to go run.  I was going to take the day off but thought running would be better for jetlag than laying wide awake in bed.  

I seriously used to  hate coming to China just because there was no place to run but last year I found Forest Park just 1 mile from the hotel and now this is one of my favorite places to run.  It's an extremely well marked, 3K, 5K, or 10 K loop all on red rubbery track service around a, well foresty park.  The terrain reminds me of Central Park, maybe a few less hills but pretty rolly, and truthfully it's prettier than Central Park and way less people.  I can't believe it took me 4 years to find it.  Anyway, ran to the park, ran the 10K loop The full loop actually ends up being 6.5 and then back.  We are now planning a site seeing day since our shipment wont arrive until tomorrow.  We are going to the Great Wall, and Forbidden city.  I'm here with 3 people that have never been here before so it should be fun.

Yesterday I did a good 3 hours worth of Xtraining on the worlds first stair stepper (The Great Wall of China) that thing will give even the most in shape person a run for their money.  I would really like to go there with someone in really good shape one day though, I'm always there with my out of shape co-workers who complain the whole time, it would be really fun to just go for an entire day and see how far you could go.

So today I felt really good, I think the stair stepping really stretched out my hamstring nicely.  I had to get an early start at work so I started at 5:30, just ran around the Olympic venue until the Forest Park opened at 6:00, then I ran the 5K loop and back to the hotel.

Planned elliptical trainer workout in the hotel gym this morning, I pushed really hard to keep my HR at slow marathon pace the entire hour it was very uncomfortable and I was very sweaty but it felt good, and I feel like I got a good workout without aggravating any of my injuries.

I'm never quite sure if I totally get ripped off on my birthday each year, or if I get a 38 hour birthday.  When I woke up this morning my phone said April 6th, which is my birthday, but my wife and family refuse to acknowledge it's my birthday cause it's still the 5th at home, and by the time it's the 6th at home I'm already asleep and somehow missed the whole thing, and then about 4:00am my phone starts ringing off the hook with people calling me to wish me happy birthday, plus I just have to work all day anyway.  So I'm going with ripped off.

Years ago when Walter ran 40 miles on his 40th birthday I said that's what I was going to do it too.  Well, obviously that would be stupid since Boston is a week away, and I had to work anyway.  So another goal blown.  Anyway, beautiful day today, a wind storm blew all the smog out of Beijing last night and this morning was the clearest day I have ever seen here.  Cool temps, I could see the moon, and the sunrise was amazing.  So a really nice birthday run anyway.

I've been doing conferences for Intel about 6 years now, and every time people say "you should run with Joe" I've e-mailed 'Joe' before but we never hooked up and actually ran.  Well, on Saturday I met Joe for the first time and we decided to meet for a run this morning. Joe English is his full name and he's a pretty good runner, he even has an online training site running-advice.com  just going off marathon times we figured we were pretty equivilent runners, although he has a lot more experience than me. 

He's in the nice hotel, instead of the Vendor hotel where I stay so I met him at his at 6:00, we ran to the park.  We got to the park and he said "lets do some speed work" Umm!  OK, really who goes running with someone they just barely met and says lets do speed work?  He wanted to do 2 sets of the 3K course, I told him I didn't really want to go faster than 6:00 pace, he said that was OK for the first lap and took off, I stayed with him but at the .5K mark I looked down and my Garmin said 5:22 pace, I said, or we could do 5:20 pace if you want.  He slowed down to around 5:50, I stayed with him until 2K then he slowly got away.  He waited for me, maybe 30 seconds at the finish line, we jogged to the start again and he said he was going to do the next loop faster, I told him he'd be going alone :)  I went out at about 6:00 pace, stayed there until my foot started hurting and then slowed to 6:40 pace to finish.  It was really fun to find someone to run with, hopefully he doesn't do speed work everyday, I think it was probably good for me to do a shorter run with speed this week, I would have just ran easy all week if someone wasn't pushing me.

Go figure, I stop running as much and I start getting more injured.  The heel of my right foot was really bothering me all night and this morning, so I just did the elliptical for 30 minutes.  I'm done with China and want to go home, it's going to be hard to get on a plane to go to Boston.

I've been very lucky this trip with beautiful weather, normally is smoggy and gross the whole time but it was been great this week.  We had an early start so I had to get out at 5:00am to go run, it's already starting to get light here at 5:00 awesome, they must not do daylight savings time. My hamstring is almost a none issue but my stupid heel really started bothering me out of now where.  It took about a mile to get going but I felt really good and refreshed after that, and now my heel even feels better than before the run.

Last day in China, conference is done today and I fly home first thing tomorrow morning.  Easy loop around forest park, the foot felt better but still hurts.

Can't wait to go home.

It's official, I'm insane.  I agreed to help put on the 1st annual Traverse Mountain 5K.  The Principals crazy idea to have all 899 students run a 5K.  I started the planning last October, put the website together, had an online registration form and everything.  Unfortunately I was the only one thinking that far ahead, everyone else started their planning about 3 weeks ago.  Anyway, I really don't want to go into a long story, I flew back from China this morning, rushed home from the airport, went an marked the course with Allie and Carina,  I had allie pace the Kindergarten and 1st Graders, Carina paced the 2nd and 3rd Graders and I paced the 4th, 5th, and 6th grader.  2 4th graders had the best overall times at around 23:30 with me.  Carina had a 3rd grader come in at 23:50.  Don't know what's wrong with those lazy 5th and 6th Graders.

The race went very well considering how hard it is to just organize 3 kids, let alone 900.  I only got yelled at by a couple of parents who think their kids should have won.

Now I head off to Boston tomorrow morning,  I really don't think I'm setting myself up well for a good race on Monday.

5 nice miles on the trail before flying to Boston. Now I'm hanging out with a bunch of guys who are way faster than me.

Sad, Sad, day. What the H311 is wrong with people. A little disappointed with how the race went for me, but I was disappointed weeks ago so no big deal. Kind of a rough day for a lot of us, not sure why cause conditions were perfect.

Writing a race report seems a little insignificant but I realized that this is my personal record of my experience and some day I will probably like to come back and read it.  After my flight home today I'm a little more emotional than even yesterday, the Boston Airport was a little crazy, policemen questioning everyone who might have seen something or had pictures they could send in, lots of people asking me my experience.  I felt a little awkward cause my experience was about the same as all of you, all my information came from watching TV since I had already made it back to the house when it happened.  I was actually on the phone with Scott Keate trying to figure out how to get into the house, he was on the bus coming home and all of a sudden he said "I think a bomb just went off" I said, "well I better let you go then." I spent the next hour and a half sitting on the front steps of the house locked out wondering what the heck was going on.

OK, now to my report.

This is the part where I make all of my excuses.  As I've stated in numerous posts for some reason my training wasn't working out so well, I was going through all the motions but something was missing, various injuries may have been to blame, travel may have taken it's toll but for some reason I just never really got it all together like I had wanted.  My hamstring plagued most of my 12 week schedule, it was tolerable but I just wasn't able to ever feel confident in my workouts, then 2 weeks before the race I figured my hamstring would finally have a chance to recover during taper and out of nowhere my heel started hurting for no reason.  I logged 60 miles total for my 2 week taper, which I think was the right thing to do, I actually felt pretty prepared.  In China my heel was acting up again so when I got home I purchased some cushy inserts for my shoes which seemed to help a lot, so Saturday when I finally got to Boston I felt like things were looking good.  Despite being Jet laged and just overall tired from travel I felt very good, and thought I had my heel and hamstring problems worked out.  Sunday night I couldn't sleep at all, Jet lag or nerves I'm not sure but I was up all night, not only that, between midnight and the marathon start I counted going to the bathroom 15 times,  I was really worried about de-hydration but every time I took a drink I was in the bathroom 5 minutes later.  Very strange I've never had that problem before. 

Anyway, we all woke up early, missed the first bus downtown by 10 seconds because none of us felt like running after it :) so we waited out in the cold 40 minutes for the next one.  Got to the marathon buses still on time and took a very long ride to the start line.  Weather was perfect, cool, a little sun but mostly cloudy and a slight breeze.  My dreams come true, I felt good (except the 7 trips to the porta potty at the start).  We all waited together until it was time to ditch the drop bags and start walking to the start line, I lost everyone then cause my drop bus was in the 4000's theirs were in the 100's so I walked to the start alone. 

I was pretty sure 26.2 miles was going to eventually reveal one or all of my injuries but I wasn't sure when and I wasn't sure which, so my plan was simple.  No plan, no pace goal, no time goal.  I said 2:50's would be nice but I realized that if my hamstring cramped up 3:30 wasn't out of the question.  So I just found my spot at the front of corral 5 and decided to just go with it, passing 4000 people would be impossible anyway.   And then we were off, very slow at first, took 3 minutes to cross the start line and then we were still walking a 100 yards or so after the start but eventually we started going.  Immediately I found out which injury was going to come out first, the initial downhill was killing my heel, pins and needles shot up my let every right step.  I told myself I only had to deal with it for 13 miles cause I was only running on that leg 1/2 the time :) I tried to ignore it and make sure it didn't affect my stride too much.  I just stayed with the same group, pretty much everyone there qualified with a 3:05 and was shooting for sub 3:00 we eventually locked into 6:45 pace and that suited me just fine.  I quickly realized that if you start with the 3:05 group mentally it would be hard to run anything other than a 3:05 cause by the time it opens up enough that you could start passing people your pretty content to just stay there, it would take a lot of mental determination to break away and start passing people I think.

Despite the pain, I found super power in all the little kids and giving them high fives, I'm not sure why I like it so much, I'm not sure why they like it so much but giving high fives gives incredible strength, every time I started to slow down I'd just focus on the crowds and for an instant the pain would go away.  The people of Boston are amazing, why is this the only Marathon in the World with so much local support? those people love the marathon, it's really an amazing experience.  I can still here the echo of the aid station volunteers yelling "gaderade, whada" I love the accent.  Ya gotta say it with the accent to really appreciate it.  Anyway, by the time I made it to Welsley College (that was crazy) I really hurt, those girls got me through that section but after that I had to make a decision.  Continue torturing myself, or just try and get all I could out of Boston.  If you look at my splits you'd say "classic bonk"  1:29 first half 1:38 second "bonk" well, I'll tell you, it wasn't, I never actually bonked, in fact I'm pretty sure my HR never went above 165bpm.  I simply just made a conscious decision at the 1/2 way point that my only goal was not to leave Boston with a bad taste in my mouth and never want to come back again, so I purposely slowed down to relieve some of my foot pain, it still hurt, but it was manageable and for the rest of the race I just enjoyed the people, read the signs, high fived as many kids as I could find and tried to enjoy it.  The hills did get to me a little bit, heart break was slow going but not a big deal but I made it, I experienced the Boston marathon which is what I have wanted for me 40th birthday for 4 years now, so I'm very happy.  I have other races I can try and run faster but for now I'm pleased with the out come. I had a great time, made some really good new friends and I just really want to thank Scott, Dan, Reed, Brandon, Craig, Paul, and Ryan for a great time.  I'm sorry the whole thing was shadowed by tragedy but it really is an experience I will never forget, or regret.

First run I've done since Boston, actually felt really good, my foot still hurts and my hamstring is a bit tight but pretty nice to run again.

30 mile bike ride around West Lehi, along Redwood to Bluffdale and back on the windy frontage road.

4 miles on the hotel treadmill in Vegas.

45 minutes on the elliptical trainer in the hotel Gym.  Very busy but fun day yesterday, Sportstacking Competition followed by swimming and then Blueman group.

5 miles around the Eagle Summit track with Tara.

Tried to run but the foot still hurts.

8 miles on the treadmill, longest run since Boston.  I actually felt pretty good.

8 miles in 1:02:44

8 Miles on Murdock trail

5 Jetlaged miles on the Elliptical.

Felt good to run again,  Foot still hurts but it's getting better.  18km in the Humid Gym in Macau in 1:30.

13km (8 miles) in 1:06

I've been in the Hotel Gym since I got to Macau 4 day's ago due to jetlag, injury, and monsoon weather.  This morning I woke up pretty over jet lag, feeling pretty good, and the rain had subsided so I decided to venture outside.  I saw a small mountain close to the hotel that I Google mapped that looked like a good place to go.  Turns out it was awesome, I started out just running on the paved road but about half way around the mountain I saw a trail head and decided to try it out, it was pretty amazing trail running through rain forest, water falls and nice dirt trails that felt good on my foot.  It was crazy humid, and I was totally soaked when I got done.  I was pretty excited to find such a great place to run, I was worried I'd be stuck on the treadmill for 2 weeks but Macau is a pretty awesome place.  They say its the Las Vegas of China but so far it's 100 times better than Vegas.

I've decided to come back to the Blog, mainly because of runs like today.  It seems a waste to travel as much as I do, find these amazing places to run in random places and have no one to tell about it.  Even if people don't read my blog I can feel like I'm telling someone, frankly my wife gets bored with it.

So, I guess, I'm back.  I'll just try and stay away from education, and political posts.