Recovering From Microfracture Surgery

Jasper, AR before we hit the road for a 14 hour drive to Albuquerque. Legs still sore and tired from all the hills. Finished ahead of the 7:30 guy buy about 2 minutes.

Ran 5 easy miles after driving 23 hours the last two days. Legs and body are tired from traveling. Meeting Sasha at 5:30am and hoping he takes it easy on me!

Back from vacation and on the standard 10.04 Provo River Run with Sasha. We ran 69:00 flat but had to run 33 on second five to do so. Trail is mostly clear now but it is suppossed to snow a bunch more tomorrow so we will see how things turn out. My legs are still sore from all of the hills in Arkansas last week so this morning was not much fun. My new years resolution is to stop drinking carbonated drinks and deep fried foods. Try to eat healthier overall but I figure if I can cut hose two out all together that is a good start and will help get me back in racing shape. I am alos going to try and ride my bike to and from work at least 3 days a week as well.

Ran Provo River route with Sasha and did 8x400 hard 400 rest. 400 hard was between 1:25-30 and 400 rest was at 1:45-1:50. Overall under 70 minutes but was not an easy day.

Rode bike to work and home 4.2 miles. To work is downhill so an easy ride. Home is uphill 2.1 miles and today it was uphill and in the snow. Roads had about 1-2 inches on them on the way home so it made the hill even tougher. My quads are going to get a good workout riding home up the hill if I do that everyday.

Shoveled 5 inches of snow from driveway and then joined Shasha fo our 10 mile run. Wind was blowing and it made it very cold and the trail was very slick again. We met another runner at about 6 miles and ended up slowing down to run with him. Found out he is dating Doug Padilla's daughter. Overall worked out well as it gave us an easy day for once and my legs needed it. Averaged about 7:40 pace for the run.

13.4 today with Sasha on Provo River Trail. Very cold 12' weather and wind chill said it felt like 2' Brrrr! Did 2.5 mile out-n-back four times. Was not feeling very good from the start and to top it off the trail was about as bad as it can get. Sasha and I both almost fell several times on the ice and I felt me feet sleeping almost every step of the way. Ran overall 65:00 with splits as follows: 6:31, 6:34, 6:26, 6:23, 6:31, 6:35, 6:28, 6:32, 6:37, 6:17 according to GPS. Noy bad for the conditions I guess. I just hope come the spring these workouts translate to faster times.

Ran from BYU at 4:45AM and met Sasha on the trail. School is back in so I am back to the very early morning starts again as I have to supervise a class at 6:00AM Mon-Thu. Felt ok until about 7 miles and then started feeling quads again. I dont know why but my quads have been very tired and sore for the last couple of weeks. Even on good days I still start to feel them by 7-8 miles into a run. First 10 miles was at 7:00 pace overall and then during class I ran 2.4 more easy miles with cadets.

Rode bike to work so I will get 4.2 miles on bike today as well. Also did 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups.

Ran the standard Provo River 10 from Sasha's at 4:45am. We did 6x400 and then 4x800. 400's were all in 1:25-28 with a 400 rest between in 1:46-51. 800's were 2:50-55 with 800 rest in 3:35-39. Felt ok but still not good. Right quad felt tigh and heavy at about 8 mile mark today. Still have not had a day recently where the legs felt normal. Overall 10.04 in 67:45 with about 4 miles at sub 6:00 pace.

Ran 10 from BYU at 4:45 and met Sasha on the trail. Easy day today at about 7:00-7:20 pace most of the way. Then did 2.2 more with cadets that included 15x15 second strides.

Also did 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups.

Rode bike to work so will end up with 4.2 on the bike as well.

Ok, Sasha has made an update. Now we can play with font, etc...

Well, today was another 10 miles on the Provo River and we slept in and ran at 5:30am! Lately my legs have felt pretty tired and I think my body is telling me that it is still adjusting to the new early am schedule, the increased mileage, and the additional bike rides to and from work. Sasha wanted to do 2.5 miles of tempo work and when we started at 6:00 pace the first quarter my body was not very happy so Sasha took off and I backed off. However, I gradually picked the pace up and got it down under 6:00 pace the lsat half mile. It was not hard but the legs and body in general just didn't feel like pushing any more. The lst half was in 2:55 but actually felt easier than the first quarter at 1:31. I think I could have gone faster but I did not have the motivation or desire to do so. Hopefully the body adjusts and responds over the next few weeks. I am only at about 70 miles per week on six days doing singles but the body feels worse than when I was doing 120 miles per week on seven days with doubles. I figure if I just keep up the work and stay consistent I will push through it and get the strength back eventually. Once the strength returns then maybe I can start working on the speed as well.

I do not recommend to anyone to not run for a year and a half. The work it takes too return to ones previous fitness is a long and difficult road. There are still many miles that my feet must carry me to reach my goals. But each step I take at 4:45am will be well worth it in the end. Some say it is the journey that counts so I guess I just have an epic of a journey to enjoy!

Easy run at 4:45am, if there is such a thing at that time in the morning. Met Sasha along the trail. Was very slow going as there was about 2-3 inches of snow on the path with occasional ice patches underneath which made things fun. Averaged just under 7:40 pace. Also added a little with cadets to include some line drill sprints. Then did my 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups.

The snow kind of forced an easier pace and I think it will be good for my legs. Went home and shoveled six inches of snow from my driveway. That is always a good upper body, especially lower back workout in and of itself! The snow piles along the side of the driveway are now about four feet deep. My kids have actually dug tunnels from the driveway to the yard through the snow piles. Tomorrow should be nice as I am not meeting Sasha until 7:00am for our run. I think we will do 13-14 miles.
 

Easy run with Sasha at 7:30am. Did not push it today, I want to let legs rest. Was going to run more this afternoon to get to 70 miles this week but again felt the legs need the rest so I will wait and try and hit 70 next week. It was very cold this morning, 9' F and is getting colder the next couple of mornings. 

Went sleding with the kids so got some good walks up steep hills in as well. 

No run today but I was truly inspired by Ryan Hall's 1/2 marathon performance today. The 7th fastest man ever at the 1/2 marathon is now an American. What is most impressive is that he ran by himself from start to finish. He beat Meb by over 2 minutes and beat the American Record by over a minute. This breakthrough race for him should show all that American's can run with the African runner's. And to think he has never raced a 10K. He has always been a mile and 5K runner until recently when he set the American record in the 20K at his debut for a race longer than 5K. And then today he goes out and shatters the 1/2 marathon record. Along the way he also ran splits for 15K, 10 miles and 20K that were all faster than the current American Records.

Todd Williams - 15K=42:22 in 1995 / Ryan Hall split = 42:21

Greg Meyer - 10M=46:13 in 1983 / Ryan Hall split = 45:33

Ryan Hall - 20K=57:54 in 2006 / Ryan Hall split = 56:36

Mark Curp - 1/2M=1:00:55 in 1985 / Ryan Hall New American Record = 59:43

Only runners to ever have run faster in a 1/2 Marathon are: (None Aided Course)

Paul Kosgei (KEN) 59:07

Zer. Tadesse (ERI) 59:15

Sam. Wanjiru (KEN) 59:15

Paul Tergat (KEN) 59:17

Robert Kipchumba (KEN) 59:27

Evans Cheryuiot (KEN) 59:29

Ryan Hall (USA) 59:43!!!!

Even if you add in aided course times he is still the 13th fastest man ever over a half marathon! Overall there have only been 17 men in the world that have ever run under an hour on a certified course. Before today every one of them had been an African born athlete. What an awesome run by an American runner who is only 24 and has never raced at this distance before.

Ran an easy 10.04 on the Provo River Trail with Sasha at 7:15am. It is noce to have a day off and be avle to sleep in until 6:30am. It was very cold and therfore I wore three layers. When I left my house my temperature probes read -6.5'F and -5.8'F. The Provo airport officially recorded -5.8'F at 7:15am and then at 8:15am it recorded a drop to -7.6'F. At 8:45am, just after we finished, the airport reported it had climbed back up to a whopping -4.0'F. The coldest morning of the year so far but at least the wind was not blowing. I was actually on the warm side in my three layers but that is ok. The only down side is that the three layers of clothes is sort of cumbersome to run in and adds a lot of weight. We took it easy and did not chase the 7 minute guy but still averaged about 7:10 pace overall.

I keep telling myself that running through the bitter cold days and not so good snow and ice conditions is excellent training. I think it toughens one up both mentally and physically. In fact it was after a very cold couple of winter months in Kansas that I ran my marathon PR.

I was shooting for 70 miles last week but came up short a little at the end of the week but I needed a small break anyway. Maybe this week I can get to 70. We will see how the legs feel. I turn 38 this week so one year closer to being able to race as a master. It is kind of strange but unlike most people I am looking forward to turning forty and the chance to race as a master.

Ok, another cold day today at 4:45am this time. Official temperature from airport for our run recorded -2.2'F. So actually much warmer than yesterday. Today we did somewhat of a tempo run for 2.5 miles on the noraml spot on the Provo River Trail during our 10 mile out-nback course. Sasha once again pushed out at about 6:00 pace and my body did not immediately respond so well. However, I was able to gradually speed up and get things going. My first mile was 6:16 then second mile was 6:09 and finally the last half was 2:56. 15:21 for the 2.5 mile section, not bad conisdering the trail is still covered in snow and ice and -2.2'F is not the best running conditions, I had three layers of clothes on so I had to be caring quite a bit of extra weight as well. The last half actually felt a lot easier and smoother than the first mile. I am starting to think that my body has a hard time at 4:45am jumping from 7:30 pace straight to 6:00 pace. It seems that I do better with a more gradual acceleration. Once I get going then 6:00 pace seems much more reasonable. Overall legs felt a little better today than they have for awhile. I think if I can keep the easy days truly easy then my legs will feel better for the harder days. Not sure if I will make my goal of 70 miles this week as I am off to a slow start the first couple days.

Ran from BYU at 4:45am and met Sasha on the trail. Flet ok today and therfore caught ended up just under 7:00 pace overall for the run. After running 10 with Sasha then ran 1.1 miles on the BYU indoor track with cadets. I really do not like the indoor track so much as the air is very dry and bothers my throat. I actually prefer running outdoors even when it is -2.2'F as it was for our run today. So 11.1 miles on my 38th birthday and took my first fall of the winter as well. The funny part was that I did not slip on ice but actually tripped on it. It was too dark to see very well and I hit a chunk of ice that had fallen off of a car in a parking lot but was frozen to the ground so it was like hitting a block of cement. The fall was not bad as I caught myself with hands and just slid on all fours for a few feet and popped right back up. Also did 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups. Actually feels like I may be coming down with a slight cold. Hopefully that is all it is. Today makes five days in a row of negative temperatures and we actually tied or beat a record low for Provo for five days as well. You know its bad when our high was 17'F today and I actually thought it felt warm. It sure will be nice when the lows are back in the double digits again. No bike ride today as it was still below freezing when I had to leave for work. I have a no ride rule for myself when it is single digits. I can run in any weather but the bike is another story. My hands and feet do not do so well riding a bike when it gets that cold. Something to do with the wind chill factor on the bike. 

Our late morning day, started at 5:30am. Did normal Provo River run with Sasha. Trail is getting better but legs were tired today and I definetley have a cold as I am congested. Sasha did tempo run for 2.5 miles but I just was not up to going fast. With Sasha's advice we went slow so I could let the body rest and recover. Ended up just over 75 minutes. It was yet again another day in the negatives. The Provo airport reports show that the low for the day was at 5:35am at -2.2'F. Most of the run shows it was actually only -0.4'F. Either way it was almost out of the negatives today!. Maybe we will get lucky tomorrow and have a run not in the negative temperatures. Planning on an easy day tomorrow and hopefully I will feel good enough to do a 10 mile tempo on saturday. We will see. Looks like I will end up with about 65 miles this week instead of 70. I wanted to be higher by now but am still willing to just take it day by day right now. Weighed myself recently and I have lost 10 of the 20 pounds I gained while in Iraq. I expect most of the rest should come off over the next six months and as it does the times will hopefully come down as well.

Easy 10 miles at 4:45am with Sasha. Sasha did a mile pick-up but I kept it easy. I am trying to get over a cold and probably need to make sure I do not overdue it. Official airport temp readings had us at -0.4'F at 5:35am but the majority of the run it was actually 1.4'F. That makes every run this week with at least part of the run in negative temperatures. I sure hope this is not typical for Utah! Hopefully I feel good enough to do a 10 mile tempo tomorrow. Plan is to get 13 with a 10 mile tempo in the middle with Sasha tomorrow. Oh yeah, did 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups as well.

Ok, made it through a nice long run with a 10 mile tempo this morning at 7:15am with Sasha. Well I was only with Sasha for a little while on the tempo. It was 1.4'F when we started the run so finally not im the negatives for once. It was up to 6'F at the end of the run and I actually felt like I overdressed as the three layers was a bit much during the tempo. I felt ok for the first 3 miles but things were not as good after that. Between being a little sick and the cold weather I did not runa s fast as I think I can right now. Splits for 2.5 mile sections were 15:31, 16:04, 16:31, and 16:14 for 10 miles in 64:20. Overall I am glad that I managed to average under 6:30 pace but I really think I should be running no slower than 6:15 pace on long tempo runs right now. Not feeling so good right now, stomach hurts a bit. That may have had something to do with it. I just hope it does not last as I wanted to go ride my mountain bike for a few hours later today.

Did an Army Physical Fitness Test (APFT) with cadets this morning. I did 76 push-ups in 2 minutes and 83 sit-ups in 2 minutes followed by a 11:30 2 mile run. Beat all of the cadets on the run. Run felt ok. Then hit the trail and met Sasha for 8 more easy miles. Once again official temps were -2.2'F at 6:15am and warmed up to a whopping 1.4'F by the finish. So it looks like we are in for another week of negatives and low single digits. I sure hope this is not the normal for Utah!

Easy 10 miles along Provo River with Sasha at 4:45am. Temperature was 3.2'F when we started but 1.4'F by the end. Ran relaxed and time was just over 71 minutes. Still feeling under the weather with this cold. I have been waking up congested and my throat has been a bit sore. More cold in the forecast! I just keep telling myself to keep putting in the effort and it will all come around eventually. Slow and steady I guess.

 This afternoon I went for a 14 mile mountain bike ride. Worked hard on the hills and could feel the burn in the quads. Only I learned a lesson today as I underestimate the cold weather and the wind chill effect when riding the bike. My hands starting really getting cold and painful about halfway through the ride. At this point it was too late to do anything as we were doing an out and back course. The pain started to subside on the way back but I knew this was not a good sign as my hands were frozen enough that it became difficult to even shift gears. When I finished the hands were pretty much frozen. A couple of minutes after getting inside and taking the gloves off the hands began to thaw and the pain was one of the most intense sharp pains I have ever felt in my fingers. The pain finally subsided about five minutes later but it was pretty bad. I think I finally have full movement back and it has been about an hour. The fingers still feel funny but I think they will be ok. There is a saying in some units that there is a "fine line between hard and retard" and I think I crossed it today! In the future I need to invest in a good pair of cold weather biking gloves or not bike in the cold. I also wore biking shoes that clip in to the pedals for the first time today. It made riding alot easier overall. However, I had not practiced unlocking from the pedal and when I came to a stop at the end of the ride I underestimated the motion required to unclip. Therfore I fell over. Besides being embarassed I dont think I hurt anything. I hit my knee but it feels ok.

I am sure my legs will be a little tired in the morning but right now they feel ok. We will see how tomorrow goes. I have never done much biking in the past but hopefully it will add some strength training to my routine.
 

From BYU at 4:45am and met Sasha on trail. Considering yesterdays 10 miles and 14 mile mountain bike ride my legs were better than I thought they would be. My hands are still not 100% recovered from the freezing episode on the bike but to make sure they were not cold this morning I put some hand warmers in my gloves and kept them toasty warm. Offical temp during run was 6.8"F today but it dropped to 3.8'F at the end of the run. So one of the warmer days in quite awhile! Easy day today averaging just under 7:20 pace. Did 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups routine as well.

6.8'F!!! Starting to get warm! Well, I still had about 2-3 layers on but did feel a little warmer finally. Ran with Sasha and he wanted to do  the 2.5 mile tempo. My legs (quads) were tired from the 14 mile mountain bike ride a couple nights ago so I was not to excited about it but figured I would just try and relax and gradually get things going. As I took off I was not to sure how things would turn out but decieded to not look at the watch and just run. Hit the end of 2.5 miles and watch read 14:48. Splits afterward show that I did 6:04, 5:56 and then 2:48 for last half. So I was able to gradually speed things up the whole way. It felt pretty comfortable and did not feel like I was pushing too hard. I did pick it up a little the last 1/2 as Sasha had stopped to go potty and he was in hot pursuit. He caught me right before the end but he had to put in a 1:18 400m to do so. I am pretty happy overall as I really did not expect much with the 10 mile run and 14 mile mountain bike the other day.

Very easy 10.04 today with Sasha. Left BYU at 4:45am and met on the trail as usual. Today for some reason I took note of how quite and peaceful it can be at 4:45am on the trail. Ran easy and chatted the whole way. Averaged just under 7:30 pace. Also did 125 push-ups and 100 sit-ups and played ultimate frisbee with the cadets for 30 minutes. So some short fast sprints off and on for 30 minutes. Temperature was 8.6'F at the start but had dropped to 6.8'F by the finish. It dropped even further after the run to a low of 3.2'F for the day. Unfortunately it looks like we will remain in the low single digits for another week or so for low temps.

Woke up not feeling so well. My throat was scrathy and I had a bit of a cough. On top of that my hip flexors were pretty sore from playing ultimate frisbee yesterday. Needless to say I almost called Sasha to tell him I did not want to run. However, I forced myself out the door and met Sasha at 7:15am. Official temperature when we started was 14'F but I told Sasha shortly after we started that it felt like it got colder. Sure enough the airport reported that it dropped to 12.2'F for the majority of our run. Still the warmest run in quite a while! Anyway, I knew Sasha would want to do the 10 mile tempo run. I did not feel like I would be up to running very fast so we decieded to have Sasha give me a one minute lead and then I expected him to catch me by about 2 miles or so into the run. Things went much better than I would have ever guessed for me. I did not pay much attention to my times until the first  turn at 2.5 miles. Sasha had not caught me and when I looked at my watch it said 14:35 for 2.5 miles. I did not feel like I was running that fast or pushing the pace but I knew I better slow down if I wanted to finish the 10 mile tempo. I kept an ok pace from there to the finish and Sasha ended up catching me just about 8.5 miles into the run. Of coures he had a bathroomn break as well. I ran 61:48 for the 10 mile course with the following splits: 5:55, 5:53, (14:35 for 2.5 = 2:47-800m) 6:02, 6:12, 6:15, 6:20, 6:15, 6:15, 6:20, 6:20. Overall I am very pleased considering how I felt going in and the conditions of the trail were still pretty icy and slippery.

Easy run with Sasha. Left BYU at 4:45am as usual and met Sasha on the trail. Easy run averaging just under 7:15 pace overall. 6.8'F and still fighting a bit of congestion in my upper chest and throat. This inversion is not helping matters. Also did 125 push-ups and 125 sit-ups.

Met at Sasha's house at 4:45am. Still feeling pretty sick. Very congested and have a bit of a cough in the morning spitting up nice yellow stuff. Needless to say I was not looking forward to the run especially since I knew Sasha would ask the question "so are you up for a tempo?" I did not feel up to it but conceded to give it a shot anyway for at least the normal 2.5 mile course. Did not feel great but tried to relax and keep a decent rythem going. I felt worse than on Saturday physically but the trail conditions were slightly better. Still ice and snow for the whole first mile but after that it is only patches of snow every couple hundred meters or so. Temperature today was a nice and warm 12.2'F! The first run in the double digits for over two weeks. Did not really pay attention to splits but knew first mile was under 6:00 pace. I was thinking I would end up around 14:30 or so similiar to Saturday's first 2.5 miles but ended up with 14:13. Sasha stopped for a nature stop and then passed me as I stopped for a nature stop so ran most of the tempo on my own. Splits were 5:48, 5:42, and 2:43 for the last 800. Surprised considering how I have been feeling lately. This was my best time on this 2.5 mile course by 22 seconds and it was run with 2.5 layers of clothes at 5:00am with ice and snow at 12'F. I can't wait for some warmer weather to see waht kind of difference it makes. One of these days I need to run our tempo workout in the afternoon to see the difference as well. I seem to run better in the afternoon for some reason but I just don't get the opportunity to do so very often. Sasha wanted to do the 2.5 tempo on the way back as well but my mind and body were not willing to participate. Sasha took off and I just ran at about 6:30-45 pace. Overall 10 miles was just under 7:00 pace average.

The last day of January is upon us. Met Sasha on the trail again after a 4:45am start from BYU as usual. Ran the Provo River Trail route. Easy run today average just under 7:30 pace. Felt ok but still dragging a little from this cough and cold. It was warmer today, 19'F, but snowing again. So much for the trail starting to clear up. It seems as if every time the trail conditions just start to get somewhat better it snows again. Hopefully the snow will clear out some of the smog from the inversion. Although the forecast is for the cold to return and the invresion to stick around for at least another week or so as well. Did not expect this bad of air quality in Utah! When one thinks of Utah they usuallly think of a more fresh mountain air scenario. That's about all for today.

It's a new month and still no change in the weather. It was 10'F for our run this morning so just out of the single digits but still very cold. It also looks like the inversion is here to stay for at least another week. I was getting used to the cold but this inversion is something else. I am having a hard time shaking the upper chest tighness and it is getting old hacking up stuff all morning. I thought it was just a cold but I am starting to think it is sticking around longer due to the inversion. Once again I knew Sasha would be ready for another tempo day and I was not very excited. It is hard to get motivated to run fast when you are coughing up gunk. I went with Sasha for first 1.75 miles but felt like I was having to work a little harder than on tuesday and I was coughing a bit more. Sasha took off at 1.75 miles and I just tried to maintain to the finish. I maintained a fairly even pace to the end instead of trying to pick it up over the last 1/2 mile like tuesday. Overall time was 14:22 for 2.5 miles with splits of 5:47, 5:42 and 2:52 for the last 1/2 mile. On the way back Sasha did another 2.5 mile tempo while I just maintained an easier pace until the last 1/2 mile which I sped up to 6:00 pace or slightly faster. Overall got 3 good miles of tempo pace in for the day. For now I am pleased with that and the week overall considering how I have been feeling.

Easy 10.2 miles this morning but got a late start (4:54am) due to the fact that I had to shovel 3 inches of snow off of the driveway. That puts me at 36 inches of snow for the year to date at my house. The snow piles are still 5 feet high on the side of my driveway. At least the temperature was a toasty 19'F. Provo River Trail did not get as much snow but the roads and trail are once again snowy and icy the entire route. Ran just under 7:30 pace and felt pretty relaxed. I was noticing that in the past weeks my quads used to be pretty sore and tired by the end of most runs. However, this week my quads have not bothered my but my lower calfs have been sore most of the week. This coincides with me running faster times as well. I am wondering if my running form has changed and thus the faster times and sore calves inspit of the inversion and cold weather. After run played soccer with cadets and did 125 push-ups and 125 sit-ups.

Ran with Sasha at 7:15am. Did our normal route but I only did 2.5 miles of tempo and then just ran relaxed for rest of run instead of the normal 10m tempo. I need to try and let the body recover and hopefully shake this cough. The 2.5 mile tempo was 14:35 with splits of 5:52, 5:50, and 2:53 last 1/2 mile. Felt relaxed but I was still having problems hacking up gunk throughout the run. Overall ran 14.4 miles and averaged just under 7:00 pace for the whole thing. 10 miles in middle was in 65 minutes and change. The inversion was not bad today smog wie but the temperature was 5'F at the start so another pretty cold day. Had 2.5 layers on bottom half and 3 layers up top. Yesterday they said old Puxatoney Phil, the gground hog, did not see his shadow so spring should come early this year. I sure hope he is right.

Easy 10.2 miles at 4:45am with Sasha on the Provo River Trail. Felt a little tired today. Right hamstring was tight along with left calf. Also felt some tiredness in lower back and towards the end of the run the quads were tired. Temperature was 18'F and I actually commented to Sasha that it was nice out. It is sad when I consider 18'F nice. At least it looks like the rest of the week is going to be warmer. One of these days we will actually get to run in shorts and a t-shirt and it will feel great. Also did the push-up and sit-up routine of 125 push-ups and 125 sit-ups. The workout I have been doing is not all 125 straight but in sets. I do 40 push-ups then roll over and do 40 sit-ups (with hands behind head) then sets of 30, 20, and 10. Then top it off with one last set of 25 each. Try not to rest too much between sets just enough time to transition from push-ups to sit-ups. If I had to do them non-stop I can probably hit about 90 push-ups and 95 sit-ups without stopping. The goal is to get over 100. The most I have ever done in two minutes is 100 push-ups and 102 sit-ups.

Normal tuesday run from Sasha's house at 4:45am. It was about 21'F today so on the warm side. Instead of doing the normal 2.5 mile tempo in the middle of run decieded to do 2x1 mile with 1/2 mile running rest in middle. Felt a little tired still and the cough is still hanging around a bit. The first mile was 5:22 followed by 3:59 1/2 mile rest then did a 5:26 for the second mile. During second mile I felt like I did not have much more speed but it also felt like I could hold the same pace for another mile. The speed is not really there yet but that is ok as we have not done any speed work at all. On the way back Sasha wanted to do the 2.5 mile tempo. I wanted to make sure I did not push too hard so started out with just an easy gradual pick up. First mile was a very relaxed 6:41 followed by the second mile in 6:13 and the last 1/2 mile in 3:06. The last 1.5 at 6:13 pace felt relaxed and under control. Legs were a little tired but the pace was comfortable. Plan on riding the mountain bike later today for 10-15 miles. For those running this saturday's Striders 5K the profile link is below. Looks like a pretty tough course climbing from 4700ft to 5000ft in the first 1.5 miles. It also looks like a chance of rain/snow Saturday morning.

 Ended up riding 16 miles on the mountain bike tonight. Good second workout for the day!
 

Very easy 10 mile run at 4:45am from BYU alog Provo River Trail meeting Sasha along the way as usual. Just under 7:30 pace the whole time. Ran very easy today as the legs were pretty tired from yesterdays workout and the 16 mile mountain bike ride last night. Was a balmy 20'F again so thigns are getting better. Hopefully the warming trend will continue and the inversion will not get as bad as it was. My cold and cough are still hanging around but not as bad. Trying not to push too hard this week overall as I want to let the body rest a bit and hopefully get over the cough altogether. Once it clears it will be time to increase the miles and effort once again.

Well, I thought the congestion and cough were going away  but this morning I woke up very congested. Worse than I have been. Ran the 10 mile run with Sasha easy, just under 7:30 pace overall with 6x100m strides during run. Body and legs felt very sluggish and tired this morning. Most of the run the legs were asleep and I felt awkward running. However, at about mile 9 I started to feel a little bouncy. Suddenly the body woke up and the legs and back felt springy. I'm not sure why but we ran the last 1/4 mile in 1:32 and it felt very easy, I had to hold myslef back from going any faster. Strange morning for me. Overall this week has not been a good week for me compared to last week. I have had a few aches and pains that have popped up the last couple days. Hopefully they all go away soon. The biggest plus was the weather, 39'F. For the first time in 54 days it was above freezing for our run in the morning. Looking back it has only been above freezing for our morning run 7 of the last 91 days!

Cut the run short this morning. Normal time of 4:45am but yesterday my right foot/tendons were really bothering me all afternoon. Not sure what I did but they are sore and irritated. I could feel it every step. Not enough to not run but thought it would be good to only run 6 easy miles. Will have to ice it some tonight as it is still bothering me today. We will see how things go tomorrow at the hilly 5K. I'm not expecting any great results but I need to get back in a race to remember what it is like to race. I have not run a race in over 2 years!

Not a great day for me but since it was my first race in over two years I am happy to just be back out there again. Going into the race I was not feeling great and definetly not expecting much. With the nagging ankle and foot problems along with the cough I was not too excited. This course has to be one of the toughest 5K courses I have ever run if not the toughest. Kind of lost it mentally during the 2nd mile. I felt like I checked out mentally and just backed way off. Around 2 miles I was passed by a couple runners and that somewhat woke me up again. Mile splits were 5:53, 6:24, and 5:31 according to GPS. The first two mile markers agreed almost exactly with the GPS. However for some reason the third mile on GPS and the 3m cone were off by 8 seconds. From 3m cone to finish was measured at .1 so it was accurate but overall distance came out as 3.14 miles. I guess I must not have run the tangents very good during the last mile or the GPS was off by .04 during mile three. 12 miles total for the day after running with kids when I got home from the race.

It was nice to meet a lot of the fastrunningblog community in person and it seems as quite a few had good races today. Congrats!

Started at 4:45am as usual from BYU and met Sahsa on the Provo River Trail. I was pleasently surprised that my legs are not very sore at all from the 5K. I thought they would be pretty sore due to the steep downhill sections. The only soreness is a little bit in my shins and calves but not very noticable at all. My quads are fine and my ankle and foot problem were barely noticable as well. The cough is much better and I was much less congested this morning as well. Ran the normal 10.04 mile out and back and then did two more miles on the BYU indoor track. Two miles on the indoor track were 6:47 and 6:17 and felt very relaxed for both. The 2nd mile surprised me because I did not feel like I really picked it up very much. It was about 30'F this morning with some fairly icy patches on he roads and trail. It sure was nice to run in just shorts and a shirt on the indoor track after having pants and layers outside. I think the extra clothes really slow you done more than one thinks. Overall averaged about 7:10 pace for the 12 miles. Hopefully things will begin to look up this week after having a down week last week physically. Also did the normal Mon, Wed, Fri push-up and sit-up routine of 125 each. This workout is getting easier and easier so I can tell that my core strength is increasing nicely.

Ran from Sasha's house at 4:45am. Congestion still hanging around but gettting much better. For some reason my lower back was feeling out of whack and running felt awkward. We did normal 10 mile course and also did the 2.5 mile tempo. I did not feel good for the entire tempo, again just felt awkward, not very smooth. Ended up running 14:08 for the 2.5 miles which is my fastest time so far this year but was surprised I did the way I was feeling. Mile splits were 5:36, 5:45, and 2:47 for the last 1/2 mile. On the way back I gradually picked it up for the 2.5 mile section again and ran splits of 6:33, 6:22, and 3:00 for last 1/2 mile. Not a very good day as far as how I felt but at least I did get 2.5 miles of qaulity in. Plan on riding mountain bike later today.

 Went mountain biking for about an hour. Probably only covered about 8 miles but it was on some very hilly and rough terrain. Actually had to get off bike and carry bike on shoulder in several areas on the trails due to steepness and rocks. The quads got a very good workout this evening!
 

Easy normal 10 mile Wednesday morning 4:45am run. Quads were a little tired from hard run and mountain bike yesterday but not too bad. Ran between 7:20-40 the majority of the run. Did normal 125 push-ups and sit-ups workout as well. The cold and cough is getting much better but still not completely gone yet. This thing just wants to linger. Maybe by the end of the week it will finally disappear.

Not a good day running for me. Legs felt very flat and awkward today. It could have something to do with not getting much sleep last night as my youngest was up every two hours throwing-up. I also have been having lower back problems this week that could be effecting my running. I should probably see a chiropractor as I tend to have these problems about one week every month ever since I returned from Iraq. Sasha and I ran at 5:30, our sleep in day. We did ten miles total with majority very slow. We planned on doing 5x1000 but ended up doing 2x1200 in 4:04 and 4:11. After the second one we determined it was best not to do any more. My legs just did not feel right today and I was working way to hard for a 4:11 1200. After that we just ran easy and then did 4x100 on the way back. The 100s were fairly fast for in the dark on the trail. We did them all between 14.7 and 16 seconds if I recall correctly. Overall a very flat down day for me.

Easy running today but upper quads were a little sore from the 4x100 sprints. This tells me that I have not used my fast twitch muscle fibers and they are sore from the effort yesterday. I probably need to incorporate more 4-6x100 type efforts into my routine. Ran at the normal time (4:45am) and route (Provo River) with Sasha for 10 miles and then did 125 push-ups, 125 sit-ups and ran two more miles on the BYU indoor track. Outside I was running about 7:20-30 pace easy and when I ran inside with what seemed to be the same effort I was running 6:30-45 pace. It seems to make a pretty big difference running in shorts with the lights versus in the dark with tights on. I have noticed this in the past as well when I would run in the early morning versus the late afternoon. In the morning I would have to work to run sub 7:00 pace but in the afternoon I would run an easy run and 6:45 would be very relaxed. For me it seems that the difference from morning run to afternoon run was at least 20 seconds per mile with waht I percieved as the same effort. It would be interesting to see what the heart rate says at the same pace in the early morning versus a late afternoon run. I have an appointment with the chiropractor on Monday so we will see what he ahs to say about my back. This has been a rough week for me running wise so hopefully things will feel better next week.

I keep thinking one of these days I will wake up and not have any congestion. Today wasn't that day. The cold that never ends is still with me. Either that or I just keep getting one cold after another. Quads were still a little sore today. Met at Sasha's house at 7:00am and did a 2 mile warm-up. Then did our normal 10 mile tempo run on our 2.5 mile section of the Provo River Trail. I decieded to be more conservative from the start today and try and run a more even pace the whole 10 miles. Ran 61:10 for the 10 miles with all miles between 6:00-6:12 pace. 2.5 mile splits were 15:10, 15:15, 15:25, 15:20. The quads were very fatigued and heavy the whole run but other than that I was able to hold a pretty steady pace. We then ran 4 more miles to make it 16 for the day. Average for the whole 16 was 6:35 pace. 70 miles for the week on six days of running plus a good mountain bike workout. Considering how me legs felt this week not a bad week.

Ran at 7:00am with Sasha in the snow. The snow was not too bad but the wind made it miserable down by the lake. It was almost blizzard conditions along the lake front. Ran easy the majority of run except for a mile where we were trying to catch another runner that had passed us earlier. Averaged under 7:30 pace but ran most miles close to 7:00 pace as we started at 9:00 pace for the first 1.5 miles running with a neighbor of Sasha's. Legs felt flat today but no soreness to speak of.  

Went to see chiropractor today but will not get the results from x-rays and test until tomorrow. We will see what he has to say tomorrow.

I took my son James who is 12 to the BYU indoor track to run this evening. He wanted to do a mile time trial. We did 3.1 miles total. We did a 1 mile warm-up in 8:00 minutes and then did his mile time trial. James was motivated to run fast because some of the BYU runners were there including Josh Rohatinsky. He ran his best mile time by 24 seconds. He ran a 6:29 mile so his daily 3-4 mile runs are starting to pay off for him. He was pretty excited. The track is 5 laps to the mile and his splits were 1:18, 1:18, 1:19, 1:20, 1:14. 

Easy Provo River run at 4:45am with Sasha. Legs are still a bit tired and heavy feeling so decieded to just keep it easy today. Maybe run something faster tomorrow but will wait and see how I feel. 10 miles in just under 7:30 pace overall. 

Rode 12 miles on mountain bike in the hills. Worked hard on the hills and felt the burn in the quads. Good workout for the quads overall. Did 60 push-ups and sit-ups.

13.4 miles total this morning. Did 10.4 with Sasha along Provo River as usual but we did 1 mile in 5:44 and then 4x400 in 1:23, 1:21, 1:20, 1:18 with a 400 jog rest between. The rest of the run was easy. Then did the normal 125 push-ups and sit-ups at the BYU indoor track followed by 3 miles on the track with last mile in 6:35. Averaged just under 7:20 for the total 13.4 miles. Legs were tired today but not as bad as I thought they would be after last nights mountain bike ride. Just over 36 miles of running and 12 miles of mountain biking in the first three days this week. I plan on running the Striders 10K this weekend but I want to keep my mileage up. I can't afford to drop mileage for these races when my real goal is to get the miles up this year and lose the last 10lbs that still needs to come off. This years races are not as important to me as the return to high mileage and my previous weight. I figure I need a good solid year of higher mileage to get back to the level of fitness I was at two years ago.

Easy 10 mile run with Sasha on normal daily route. One of these days I will convince Sasha to run a different route. Legs felt pretty tired today. 

Easy 7.1 miles in the snow this morning. The snow could make the conditions for the 10K in Ogden tomorrow interesting. I crashed my bike on tuesday while avoiding being hit by a car. At the time I did not think much of it but I noticed yestreday that my left shoulder, left knee and left foot were a bit sore and bruised. I was wondering why they hurt and then it dawned on me that is the side that I hit the ground on when I crashed. Better hitting the ground and getting a few bruises than getting hit by the car that made a left turn without looking. Only did 50 push-ups and sit-ups this morning followed by 30 minutes of shoveling the heavy wet snow out of the driveway. See all those going to the Striders 10K mountain race tomorrow morning.

A tough course and a cold day made for a challenging day. I felt very flat during my warm-up an the quads were tired just trying to do strides. I was hoping that they would feel better as the race progressed but they did not. The legs felt very heavy and dead even on the downhill sections. I never truly felt winded but felt like I had hit the wall in a marathon pretty much the whole way. Overall this was a tough day for me. That's ok though because it is good to just be able to get out to the races and at least get to know everyone a little better. I have not really set any goals this year time wise so I keep having to remind myself to not be disappointed in the results right now. My first goal is to get the mileage back up to at least 100 miles a week before the end of the year. My second goal is to run a sub 2:45 marathon this year. I figure if I accomplish the first goal the second will happen as a result. I am up to 70 miles a week the last two weeks on single runs so things are headed in the right direction. Next week I will shoot for 75 miles and then take a drop down a little the following week. I have found that three weeks of building or maintaining higher mileage followed by a week about 10-20% lower works well for me and lets me recover enough to build again for three weeks. I hope to be up to 85 miles a week by the first week of May and maintain that through most of the summer before increasing the mileage again after TOU Marathon. If all goes well I will be at 100 mile weeks during the month of December. Well there you have it my year long progression plan. Hopefully it all works out so next year I can start going after some PRs at the age of 39.

Congratulations to all for finishing today and especially to all of those that actually had a decent race. I am not sure how tough the 10 miler will be in a couple of weeks but I hear it is another tough one. It sure would be nice to run one of those fast downhill courses that Utah is famous for because so far the only two races I have run in Utah have been two of the toughest courses I have ever run. Here's hopeing that tough race courses equals faster racing in the future!

Conducted an Army Physical Fitness Test with the BYU cadets at 5:30am. This consists of doing as many push-ups as you can in 2 minutes followed by as many sit-ups as you can in 2 minutes and then a 2 mile run. During push-ups your arms must come to about 90 degrees (basically even with the shoulder blades) when going down and the elbows must fully extend when going up. You cannot rest by touching your knees to the ground during the 2 minutes, you can stop but must stay in the push-up position only. During sit-ups you cannot stop in the down position, you can stop in the up position but cannot use your elbows or hands to hold yourself up in any way. On sit-ups you must come all the way up until the shoulders are past the lower spin, basically until your elbows are at the edge of your knees. You must also keep your fingers interlocked behind your head at all times. Someone holds your feet during the sit-ups. After sit-ups you get about a 10 minute rest to stretch out and warm-up before running the 2 mile run. You are then scored by your age. A maximum score is 300 points but there is an extended scale that will score beyond 300 but only if you get 100 points in each event first.

I did 83 push-ups, 101 sit-ups and ran the 2 miles in 11:01 on the BYU indoor track. When you enter that score in the APFT claculator it comes out to a 360 which is one of my higher scores over my 15 year career. It is also one of the top 7 scores out of about 200 cadets in the program. I like to give the cadets a hard time about being beat by an old man. If you want to do your own test and see how you would score you can get your score from the following on-line calculator.

APFT Calculator

Before the 2 mile I ran a mile easy warm-up and then ran even 5:30 splits during the 2 mile run. I actually felt ok except for my shins were pretty tight from the sit-ups. I felt like I could at least maintain that pace for a 5K which would give me a shot at sub 17:00 on a flat course or the track. Afterwards I went for a 10 mile run with Sasha. Ended up with 13.2 miles with an average pace of 6:59. Felt much better than I did on saturday.

Easy 10 mile run with Sasha this morning. Legs are a little tired from yesterday. Did 8x100 strides towards the end of the run. May run or bike more later today depending on the weather. 

Nothing exciting today just the usual 4:45am run. I ran 14.04 miles total at an average of 7:05. Legs were dead today. The quads and IT were fatigued and the legs just did not want to go faster than 7:00 pace. ran 10 outside and last 4 on the indoor track at BYU. Sasha wanted to do a tempo but I was not up for it so he took off for a 5 mile tempo on his own. Only did 50 push-ups and 50 sit-ups as I am still a bit sore from the APFT on Monday.

After today's run I feel like there should be a category above for very easy miles. I really needed a true easy run and today I did just that. I did the normal run with Sasha but we just chatted and ran at about 7:30-8:00 pace the entire time. This was a good true rest day for me. I need to force myself to do this every once in awhile as I have a tendency to gradually pick runs up to 7:00 pace or faster on a daily basis and it adds up after awhile. It felt good to not feel tired by the end of the 10 miles.

13.5 miles at a steady pace and last three miles at about 6:10 pace. Felt ok for 4:30 in the morning. Not much else to talk about.

Was up in Logan this morning and got up at 4:15 and ran 13 miles with one of cadets that is on BYU Track Team. I forgot my GPS so just ran by feel and estimated distance. We started at what felt like 7:20-30 pace and gradually picked it up. By the end I thinkg we were at about 6:30-40 pace at least. This was an easy run for him and he guessed about the same paces I did throughout the run. It was very cold in Logan official temperature when we were running was -9.4'F!!! I'm starting to be thankful for Provo weather considering it was 15'F this morning in Provo. 

After running we went downhill skiing at Beaver Mountain. It was a perfect day with awesome fresh snow and about 9 inches of powder. I have not skiied in over 10 years and was a little concerned but things came back to me quickly. My goal was to not get injured and I managed to come away with no crashes and no injuries that I can speak of right now. I stuck to blue courses most of the day but towards end of the day went on a off course powder run that turned into black diamond material. I was in a little over my head but managed to make it out unscathed except for some very tired quads. I forgot how much of a workout downhill skiing can be. The quads really get worked pretty hard and I am beat after driving back at the end of the day to Provo. A very long, tiring day but fun. 

Ran a total of 13.2 miles this morning with an overall average of 6:40 pace. Met Sasha for 4:45am run as usual and he wanted to do a tempo as well. He wanted to do 5 mile tempo but I decieded a 2.5 mile tempo for myself was good. I actually felt ok today. Not what I would call great but not bad either. I ran the 2.5 mile tempo in 13:55 which is my fastest time. Mile splits were 5:39, 5:35 and last half in 2:41. I had about a one minute bathroom stop just before 2 miles so it probably helped the last half mile but I still feel I was faster than my previous best time of 14:08. Finished run back to BYU and did 135 push-ups and sit-ups followed by 3 more miles on the BYU indoor track. Last three miles on track were 7:22, 6:45, and 6:21. Gradually picked it up as I ran and felt ok even at 6:21. It was nice to have a day where quads were not feeling totally fatigued.

Easy 10 miles from Sasha's house at 4:45am. Average pace was about 7:33. We did 8x100m strides during the second half. I ran the 100m strides in about 18-19 seconds each. Legs were a little tired and could feel some soreness in the quads throughout the run. Right groin is bothering me a little as well. Sasha is planning 12x400m hard tomorrow so we will see how things go for me as I want to make sure I do not push it to hard.

14.15 miles total today. Met Sasha and did 6x400m with 200 jog on the trail in middle of run. 400s were hard but not all out. Splits were 74, 73, 74, 74, 75, 75. Quads still a little heavy and right groin and hip still bothering me a little. Ran back to BYU and did 150 push-ups and sit-ups followed by three more miles on indoor track at 7:06, 6:53, 6:27. Relaxed but gradually picked up as I felt ok. I have increased the push-up/sit-up routine to the following. I do sets of 50, 40, 30, 20 and 10 of each for a total of 150 each now. Previously I was only doing 125 each. Only rest is the time it takes to switch between push-ups and sit-ups after each set. Trying to keep mileage up this week but will probably not run more than easy runs the next couple days before the 10 miler to give myself a chance at running at least a good tempo on Saturday.

Ran a very easy 8+ miles. Decieded to not run 10 today as the right groin and hip are still bothering me. We kept it very easy the whole time today between 7:30-40 pace. Not much else to write other than it was a balmy 39'F today.

Another easy day of only 6 miles and did 4xstrides just for the heck of it. Hip and groin still not 100%. Another grueling hill race in Ogden tomorrow! Should be a good workout at least.

Finally felt ok during a race. I felt pretty good at the start and decieded to just go with a faster pace and see what happens. I did not run the hills very strong but was able to recover and run well on the down and flat sections. Overall I am pleased with the result for where I am at in my training right now. Ran 3.1 warm up and a little over 4 miles after the race. Course was at 9.93 miles on the GPS. It was noted that we turned a block early around the 3 mile mark so that is where the .1 difference was lost. 17 miles for the day puts me at about 70 for the week as well.

Oh yeah my GPS mile splits were 1=5:53 (this felt very easy and actually caught Sasha's group and told them they needed to speed up); 2=5:12 (11:05) (mostly downhill but still very fast as I was trying to hold on to the tail end of Sasha's pack); 3=5:45 (16:50) (slowed down this mile as I knew this was a more realistic pace with all of the uphill running to come , at this point I was pretty much running by myself the rest of the racee); 4=6:05 (22:57) (this was a gradual uphill mile but not too bad); 5=6:39 (29:36) (this was when the road started to go up and only got worse as we went); 6=6:55 (36:31) (this mile would have been even slower but the last 1/4 mile was a slight down, this was a pretty tough 2 mile stretch); 7=7:18 (43:49) (pure pain right hear! monster hill that I just went into survival mode on and realized that I am not very strong on hills right now, OUCH!); 8=5:20 (49:09) (I recovered well and was able to really get moving again on the downhill at least for this mile); 9=5:55 (55:04) (I could feel the headwind on this mile and was not really enjoying it at this point); 10=5:32 on the short GPS mile but clocked a 5:58 actual last mile per course marking which I was happy with considering it had another good hill in it; overall 60:36.

Went kayaing on the Provo River for about an hour and a half in the afternoon. Kayaking is a great upper body workout and believe it or not it actually worked the cardiovascular as well. However the water is very cold at this time of year so my feet and hands were pretty frozen by the end. Two weeks until the Moab Adventure Xstream team race that I am racing. It should be pretty fun and very challenging.

14.04 miles today at an average of 7:23 pace. The legs are a little sore from the race on Saturday. Soreness is mainly in the outer quads and some in the shins. Ran relaxed today on the Provo River as usual. Ran 11 miles with Sasha and then hit the BYU track and did 150 push-ups and sit-ups routine followed by 3 more miles on the indoor track. 3 miles indoor were 7:16, 6:52, 6:43. Looking at having a higher mileage week this week and then somewhat of a rest week next week. Would be nice to hit somewhere around 80 miles on six day singles this week. Also plan on riding the bike at least twice and kayaking again on Saturday.

Easy 10.04 in the AM with Sasha along Provo River trail. Legs still a little sore but not too bad.

Rode mountain bike 12-14 miles on the trails along the bench. Tough up and down riding for just over an hour. I'm sure this counts for something mileage wise but not sure what. Worked the quads really hard during the ride. 

Ran from my house for a total of 11 miles. Sasha was not feeling well so I was on my own. Tough part about running from my house is finishing the last two miles up some pretty decent hills. Averaged 7:30 pace even with the hills. Relaxed run overall and legs are starting to feel much better.

Easy but very early 4:15am run. Met Sasha for 8 miles of it but he was still recovering from sickness. I have been running easier this week but increasing the miles. Goal is to get at least 80 miles this week and then look at adding tempos, etc... back in to the mix again next week. 12 miles for the day at about a 7:37 average overall.

14.1 miles this morning starting at 4:15am again. Ran 8 with Sasha and 12 on the Provo River Trail. Easy miles again. However, the last 2 miles I joined the cadets for their 2 mile run test. I was pacing the faster cadets. The first mile was 6:00 and the second mile was 5:33. Both felt good and very relaxed. I think I could have finished with a 5:20 mile but I was trying to pace one of the cadets and started to pull away too much so held back. Overall not feeling too bad and the miles are coming along nicely. Long hard workout day tomorrow so we will see how things go.

Wow, what a day. 38 miles total covered today via kayak, bike and running. 20 miles running, 14 miles in the hills on the mountain bike and 4 miles in the kayak down at the lake. Started the day with Sasha int he canyon and did 15 miles with 7.5 miles of up hill running and 7.5 miles of down. We ran the 3 mile tempo going down in 5:42, 5:42, and 5:29 and then turned and went up medium effort for a mile in about 6:29. My goal on the down hill 3 miles was to stay relaxed at what felt like a good 1/2 marathon effort. The 5:42 miles felt more like 1/2 marathon effort whereas I picked it up the third mile and that felt a bit harder but still not what I would consider 5K effort. When we turned to go up I backed off to what felt closer to marathon pace effort up hill. Finished 15 miles at 8:00am and had to hurry home to go watch my daughter sing int he conference center in Salt Lake. Left the house at 8:45am and was pulling up to the conference center about 9:30am just in time for the start. We then had to hurry back to BYU because she had a band concert that she needed to be back for at 12:30. We made it to BYU with 5 minutes to spare. At this point I was tired, hungry and ready for a break that was not coming anytime soon today.

The day continued at this pace as I met up with my team mates for the Adventure Xstream race for our final practice before next weeks competition. We headed to Utah Lake for an hour in the kayak covering about 4 miles. This is much more work than one can imagine if you have not done this before. Very hard on the upper body to work the paddles for an hour straight. The legs also get a little cramped up sitting for that long int he kayak. As soon as we were done we put our running shoes on and ran from the lake to BYU campus which is 5 miles of gradual uphill. This was our first real test with our whole team on a run and I was very surprised as everyone ran pretty strong. We were not sure how fast our female athlete could run but knew she had potential. Today she proved she can run. She had a baby about 3-4 months ago and she has obviuosly bounced back very quickly. We decieded to run at her pace and she actually was running about as fast as one of our male runners wanted to go. The first mile was 7:10 and she was chatting and very relaxed. Miles 2-4 were at exactly 7:00 pace and the 5th mile was a 6:45! 5 miles in 34:55 and she was talking the whole way. She is in much better shape than we anticipated.

From there we jumped on our mountain bikes and headed for the hills. We rode from BYU to Slate Canyon and started the severe climbing. There are some very long and steep hills along the trails that even required us to get off and push the bikes at some points. The quads were on fire big time and this was pretty tough. Climbing steep hills on loose surface on a mountain bike is not an easy or fun task. Rode for an hour covering only 13 miles so this gives one an idea of how tough this ride was. We really wanted to push it a little today as our final workout/test before next weekend at Moab. The race covers about 8-10 mils in the kayak followed by 30-40 on the bike and finishes with 6-8 miles running and a 300 foot rappel thrown in somewhere as well. We are hoping to do well even though this is our first attempt.

Overall, a very tough and challenging day today covering about 38 miles. with 20 miles running at just under 7:00 pace average. I am sitting here beat typing this. I did not eat or drink enough all day and am zonked. All I can say is I am truly glad tomorrow is a day of rest!

Ended up getting 81 miles of running in this week along with 27 miles on the bike in the hills and 4 miles in the kayak.

Overall I felt a little tired today but not any soreness to really mention. I thought I would be pretty sore from Saturday but fortunatley I am just a little tired. Ran almost 15 miles this morning at an average pace of 7:20. Started at 4:30am and ran almost 3 miles and then linked up with Sasha. Then ran 10 with Sasha back to BYU for a total of 12. Cadets were doing a 2 mile run for their PT test and I ran over to the start area and then decieded I should probably take it easy and just pace some of the slower cadets. Ran each 1/2 mile as follows at what felt very, very easy until the last 1/2 when I picked it up to what felt like threshold pace or slightly faster. Each 1/2 mile = 3:00, 3:10, 3:15, 2:45. Picked it up last 1/2 mile but still felt reasonable, I would say somewhere around 10K effort or slightly faster. Decent day overall. Also did 100 push-ups and 100 sit-ups.

Started at 4:30am and ran with Sasha after a couple miles. We did a 5 mile tempo in the middle that started off at a comfortable pace and we tried to gradually speed up but I wanted to make sure I stayed at what felt no faster than 1/2 marathon effort. We did not look at splits during run just ran by feel and looked at splits afterwards. Splits were: 1= 6:20, 2=6:10, 3=6:09, 4=5:59, 5=5:49. Sasha sped up and pulled away over the last 1/2 mile but I did not want to push faster than 1/2 marathon effort so let him go and maintained my effort. Overall a good run with only minor issues in legs. I am starting to feel like things are coming around for me. I feel like my fitness level has really started to increase. 

 Total today 12.1 miles average of just under 7:00 pace overall.
 

Easy run at 4:30am with Sasha. We got hit pretty hard by the storm this morning. The rain was coming down pretty good and the wind was blowing it sideways thus making it very cold and miserable at times. Ran easy and just chatted averaged 7:24 pace for 11 miles. Taking it easy the next couple days to make sure I am rested for the 50-60 miles I have to cover on Saturday in Moab.

Easy 8.4 miles a little later this morning at 6:15am. Ran on my own and decieded to sleep in a little to rest up for Saturdays Adventure Xstream Race in Moab. Averaged 7:13 pace.

6.55 mile easy run with Sasha. It has felt good to sleep in the last couple days. Depart for Moab today. Looking forward to a fun but challenging race tomorrow.

Well our team survived the Moab Adventure Xstream race. I did not run 22 miles but I am giving myself credit for at least 22 miles of running effort wise. I did not come out completely unscathed as I crashed on the bike three times and really banged my right knee really hard on one of the crashes. The weather was cold and worst of all wet most of the day leading to some extremely difficult mountain bike riding at times as some of the sections over the course were on what they call slickrock and we discovered why it is called slickrock. One of my teammates crashed five times. Fortunately no race ending injuries for our team but I will have to see how my right knee fairs. I hit it really hard on a piece of solid rock. At the time I was in a lot of pain but quickly jumped back on the bike and just ignored it. At the end of the bike leg I took a peak at it and saw some good blood running down the leg but did not have time to really care and took off on the run. Luckily it did not hurt during the run. The first real chance I had to look at it closer was when we were waiting for the rappell. At that point I was a little concerned as it was swollen up pretty good. Continued on as it was not really hurting. By the end of the race the swelling actually had gone down a little so I was a little happier. Overall I think it is just a pretty good bruise as it is mainly just stiff and sore today with only a little swelling. Ice and Ibuprofin are my friends today. Other than the knee the rest of the body is tired and only a little bit of soreness. We will see how this week goes running wise. It was an awesome race and I have a lot of respect for the professional teams after doing this and seeing how fast they really are. I am not sure I will rush out to do another one any time soon but I had a blast and experienced a whole new type of racing and pain. Below is my race recap.

Before the race they do not tell you the order of events or distances, you recieve these at check-in time the night before. This leaves some planning and preparation to be done on race night. In the past it had always started with the kayak and then bike-run-rappel-bike. At race check-in we found out it would be bike-run-rappell-bike-kayak. The distances this year went heavy on the mountain bike side with some very hard and long climbs. The race started at 8:00 for the 37 or so competitive coed teams. So you had about 148 mountain bikes all crammed on a two lane road for the start. Our team got stuck behind some traffic at the start but we made our way up to the back of the lead pack of teams right before we left the road and started to climb on the dirt roads. The first leg of the bike would be a real gut check as it was a total climb fest followed by a very slick, fast and technical downhill section. When we turned off road we were at about 3,800 feet and commenced our climbing. Over the next 5-6 miles we climbed about 2,000 feet and then it did not end there as it did level out a little but we still were climbing gradually until about the 20 mile mark peaking out at about 6,400 feet. The first 5-6 miles was some of the steepest and toughest climbing I have ever seen. Not only was it very steep but it was also very sandy and muddy in spots as well. It was bad enough that everyone had to get off and walk throughout many sections as it was impossible to ride. Our team actually was doing quite well at this point. We then turned downhill and began to really fly. Maybe a little too fast as this is where we had our crashes. As none of us are very experienced moutain bike riders we would lose control around some turns that were tighter than anticipated and when you hit the slickrock in a turn with too much speed things were not so pretty. We still held our own at this point as a bunch of rookie amatuers. The run leg doubled back on the bike course so we were able to count teams and we determined that we were in 7th or 8th at the end of the bike leg and transitioned to the run. We knew we had a strong run team so we took off on the run at a good clip. However, one of our teammates started having stomach problems and cramping up a little so we had to slow down quite a bit. At this point no teams caught us even though we slowed down. The run leg was about 6 miles and the last 5 miles was all up hill. The climb was similiar to the big hill on the Striders course but lasted for 5 miles and was on slickrock and mud. The run was easy for me as the pace was slow enough to not really make me work too hard. However, I did strap a rope from me to our teammate that was hurting and pull him along which made me work a little bit more. Once we hit the top we got to truly have a blast and rappell off a 300 foot cliff. This was truly the best part of the race. Nothing like hooking up to a rope and leaning back over a cliff and walking off backwards. 300 feet is along way up when you are looking down over your shoulder from the top connected to a rope. The last 100 or so feet was a free fall rappell as the cliff cut back and away from you and you went straight down. Again this was the highlight of the race! We were then back on the bikes and this is where bad luck came our way. Shortly after jumping on the bikes again we had one teammate get a flat tire. It took about 15 minutes to fix the flat and get going again. During this time a couple of teams passed us but we were probably still in the top 10 as far as we could tell and feeling pretty good. We took off again and caught one team and were gaining on another when our luck took an even a bigger turn downwards. At the base of the last big climb and with about 10 miles of biking left one of our teammates bikes derailer snapped completely off. For those that do not know you cannot pedal a bike without the derailer. We were doomed at this point and realized it was now a fight to just figure out a way to finish. We attempted to make the bike into a single speed bike as a derailer is not needed if you can do this. As we worked on the bike we watched teams going streaming by over what was about 45 minutes of attempted repairs. Ultimately we could not get it to work at all and decieded to walk the last big uphill section and have him coast down the other side. At the bottom of the big hill we had about 6 miles left but it was all flat and down so we hooked a tow rope up from one bike to another and towed to the kayak transition point. Overall we had lost at least an hour in repair time between the two incidents and probably a little more due to having to walk and tow a rider the last 10 miles. However, we were determined to finish at this point and were happy to have made it to the kayaks. The last leg was about 9 miles down the colorado river paddling for what seemed forever. Paddling hard for a long period of time was very painful and a lot more work than I anicipated. This for me was the toughest part of the race and I was extremely happy to see the finish.

The official race results will be posted some time on Monday so we do not know our overall finish amongst coed teams but we are pretty sure we dropped well out of the top 10 after our mechanical failure. We finished in 8 hours and 46 minutes and did notice that one of the teams that passed us when we were broken down finished in 7 hours and 44 minutes and was 9th place. So we were on track for around a 7 hours and 30-40 minutes finish when that occured is our best guess. At the least the top 4 teams are professional teams sponsored by Solomon, Nike etc.. and it showed. The winning team was Team Solomon and finished in just under 6 hours which is really moving. This is truly another sport that I did not know much about going into it but I have a lot of respect for it and had a great time. I'm not sure if I will do it again next year but we will see.

Well that is the long story. I'm not sure how many will read it but thought it was worth posting for those that may. Hopefully the knee is ok and I recover quickly. Now that this is over I guess it is time to focus strictly on running again.

Oh yeah the total distances were roughly 43 miles by bike, 6 miles running, 9 miles in the kayak and 300 feet by rope!

Well, today was a test for the knee and body in general to see how things are doing after Saturday's adventure. So far so good. The knee is still a bit swollen but it does not really hurt to run on it. It feels a little stiff but that is about it. However, I did discover a few other bruises. I have one on my left knee that I did not notice untilI felt it during the run and afterwards when poking around at it found that it was bruised a little as well. Overall I am pleased as I am not very sore (the legs at least) and the knee seems ok. Most of my soreness is actually in the upper body from the kayak and probably some from the bike as well.

I ran an easy 11 miles along the Provo River and joined Sasha as usual. He wanted to get two miles of tempo work in and I wanted to err on the side of caution and not really push it. However, I did gradually pick it up for a couple of miles at what I would consider marathon pace effort running about 6:10 and 5:59 for the mile splits. Felt a little fatigure in the legs but otherwise not to bad. Overall averaged 7:11 pace for the 11 miles. Did 100 push-ups and sit-ups and could really feel the soreness in the shoulders and back. 

Easy 12 miles this morning with Sasha. Everything felt ok but I felt really awkward running this morning for some reason. It could have something to do with little sleep lsat night but I just felt really uncoordinated or something. Never really had this feeling before so it was kind of strange. Averaged 7:13 pace for 12 miles and did 10x100 meter strides. Still in recovery mode. I will try and keep the miles up this week but not psuh it unless I am feeling good.

Sasha was doing speed work and i went on ahead on the trail and right in the middle of the trail ran into a skunk. I stopped to avoid getting sprayed by him as he was not to happy to see me and did not really care to move out of the way either. All of a sudden here comes Sasha doing one of his 400s and I tell him to watch out for the skunk on the path. He just flys by me and right up on the skunk. After he went by I continued down the path and could really smell the skunk. I then ran into Sasha at the end of the path and as I went by him I could smell the skunk odor again. At this point I was wondering if he got sprayed. I continued on my run and he continued his workout and when I passed him again later I smelt the skunk again. Now I was pretty sure he was sprayed. When we finally linked up after he finished his workout I could still smell a bit of the skunk odor and told him that I think he may have been sprayed by the skunk. Not for sure but I think he may have been hit. We will have to find out if his family smelt the skunk when he went home. I'm sure he will write about it in his blog. 

15 easy but very cold, wet and miserable miles early this morning. It was snowing very heavy but it was warm enough that I was drenched and soaked to the bone so I was about frozen by the end of the run. Not much else to write today. Oh yeah average pace was 7:08 today and I am feeling ok in general but my knees are still bruised up but getting better.

Good luck to all of the Del Sol Relay guys this weekend! 

On a field training exercise with cadets this weekend in the hills and woods sleeping outside on the ground so getting runs in was going to be very difficult. Only three hours of sleep each night and not much time where we were not busy conducting exercises. However, we pretty much a lot of miles all day each day so I guess that counts for something. A lot of hills. I did manage to get in an 8 mile run in the evening which was a hilly run and I was not feeling so great from all of the walking all day. I did manage the last three miles or so at 6:00-6:30 pace.

After three hours of sleep I did not expect to get a run in today as we had a full day from 4:00am until midnight planned with no real breaks to speak of. I waas on my feet hiking over rough and hilly terrain the entire time trying to observe as much trainng as possible with the cadets. I hiked at least 9 miles and probably more so I gave myself credt for 9 miles. Not the same as running but believe it or not my legs are actually a little sore from all of the hiking.

After a second night of three hours of sleep and about 3 miles of hiking from 5:00-8:00am I finally got home and crashed for a few hours before taking James down to the BYU track for a run. He wanted to do a 5K on the track and see what he could do. We warmed up a mile and then ran the following for his 5K. 

Mile 1 = 7:02

Mile 2 = 6:54

Mile 3 = 6:44

5K = 21:22

So James set a 5K PR and did so with each mile getting faster. He ws hurting pretty good the last mile but he is starting to learn how to push it better all of the time. Not bad for 12 years old I guess.

Afterwards we cooled down a couple laps and then decieded to see how fast James could run a all out 100m. I had him do three of them. He complained at first beacause he was tired from the 5K but he did ok. He ran a 17.19 on the first and a 17.21 on the second. I then decieded to see what I could do on the third one and I hit a 14.5. These were all from a standing start. After one more jog lap I told James we were going to test his 400 meter speed as well. He protested a little but was willing to give it a shot. He chose lane 7 from the stagger and we ran 1:25 which is now his fastest 400m as well. So he now has PRs of the following:

100m = 17.19

400m = 1:25.25

1 Mile = 6:29

2 Mile = 13:38 (last 2 miles of 5K)

5K = 21:22

Sasha is still out of town so I decieded to go a little longer on my own today. Also want to keep the miles up this week but be ready to run decent in the 1/2 marathon on Saturday. So I figure I will hit some higher mileage runs early in the week and then back off just a little before Saturday.

Overall the legs are still pretty sore and tired. I guess the hiking on Friday and Saturday were more work on my legs than I thought. I started slow and tried to pick it up as I ran. I ended up running the last 5 miles in 6:35-45 pace. Overall average for the whole run was 6:59 pace. Ok for a Monday morning run on sore legs. My left knee is still bugging me a bit from the adventure race bike crashes. I can really feel it the first mile or so and then it does not bug me as much after that. Hopefully it will go away over the next week or so.

For those interested the local masters family won the masters in both male and female at the Carlsbad 5K this weekend. Dennis ran 14:55 and Michelle ran 17:03! Link to article is below.

8.5 miles easy today. Cut things short today as my legs are truly trashed right now. My knees are hurting and my legs are just plain dead. I am concerned about making it through the week right now let alone being able to race the 1/2 marathon on Saturday. At this point things are not looking so good.

Legs still totally trashed. It really hurts and is very difficult to get moving. It gets slightly better as I go but still not comfortable at all. Most of the pain/issues are in the inside quads leading into both inner knees. Both are sore to the touch and every step hurts. I also have some issues in the hamstrings as well. On top of that my left knee really kills for at least the first mile. For these reasons I only ran 4.3 miles this morning. I could have run 10 but at what cost? I am not sure what is going on as I have not done any killer workouts or anything that I would cosider hard enough to bring this on. I have never really had anything happen like this before so I am in new territory. All I can think is that the adventure race took a bigger toll on my body than I initiall thought and I jumped back into high mileage too quickly and my body shut down. However, the first three days after the race everything was doing ok and jut took a severe dive on the fourth day onward. We will see what tomorrow brings. For now more ice and ibuprofin and pray that I can attempt to race on Saturday.

Easy 8 miles this morning with Sasha. Legs feel a little better but still not good. Left knee really hurts firs couple miles but this is more of a tendon/joint type issue than a muscular issue so it will probably take longer to heal. Muscular wise legs are still fatigued but not as bad as previous couple of days. I will try as suggested and keep the fluid and carb intakes high. I may even jump in an ice bath (although this is pure torture). I'm just hoping to feel half way decent by Saturday so I can run the 1/2 without dying.

Only 4 easy miles this morning. The legs are feeling ok except for my left knee. It kills me for the first couple miles. After that it is bearable but it is starting to concern me. I will be at the 1/2 marathon tomorrow and hopefully be able to race. 

I survived the Striders 1/2 Marathon this morning which was my goal. The knee hurt a little during the warm-up but not as bad as it has been so that was a good sign. It nagged at me on and off during the race but not enough to make me want to stop. However, I felt like I was running in mud the whole way so I am obviously still fatigued. The legs are very tired this evening and the left knee is stiff but other than that I think I should be ok. We will see how it feels come Monday morning. Race splits from Garmin below.

Mile 1	5:44
Mile 2	5:41
Mile 3	5:41
Mile 4	5:43
Mile 5	5:52
Mile 6	5:55
Mile 7	6:02
Mile 8	6:07
Mile 9	6:21
Mile 10	6:13
Mile 11	6:21
Mile 12	6:15
Mile 13	6:14
Last .15	49 Seconds
13.15 Total	1:19:05

Overall I am pleased considering how I have been feeling lately. Miles 9 and 11 were slow but I think these were the more uphill miles. Not as much downhill as I anticipated and the last 5 miles were pretty tough and seemed like they were on a gradual up the whole way.

Good job to all of the FastRunningBlog communiy today for a lot of good performances. Both Steve and Paul came through with some great performances finishing 1st and 3rd overall.

10.4 easy miles at 7:45-50 pace from BYU at 4:30am. Met Sasha as usual about 2 miles into the run on the trail. The quads are a bit sore but bearable. The good news is the knee was only a little stiff this morning and the sharp pains that I was having last week for the first couple miles are gone! It looks like the ice and ibuprofin routine are working. Hopefully this continues this week and it completely heals up. Overall I actually feel better today than I did all last week. However, I will take this week one day at a time and run how the body feels. I want to fully recover and get back to feeling good again so I do not want to push it to hard to fast. As one of the other bloggers sayings goes "patience and perseverance". 

Once again good racing overall by the FastRunningBlog community. The blog had some great results including 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 6th, 9th, and 11th overall just to name the bloggers that I know in the top group. By Sasha's analysis he feels this course is similiar time wise to the Great Salt Lake 1/2 which he has caluculated to be 2-2:30 slower than a flat sea level 1/2. 

Alarm did not go off this morning and I slept in. Did not have time to run in the morning so I had to wait until I got home from work this evening. I was planning on doing at least 10 miles and maybe even throwing in some fsater stuff but once I got going the wind was killer and I felt like crud so I just decieded to turn around and go home. I think my body is still trying to tell me something and I am trying hard to listen to it right now. I struggle with the decision to cut things so short as I think I am just being weak and should push through it. It is probably the right thing to do but I just wish I was feeling decent again so I could get on with the training I know I need to be doing. :-(

11 easy miles with Sasha for about 8 miles. I actually felt half way decent this morning. Not great but a lot better than I have been feeling. Sasha was tired from his hard workout and he actually was having to slow me down which is probably a good thing because even though I feel better I should probably not push it the rest of this week and give the body a true chance to truly recover. A much better sign as I was starting to get a little concerned with what was happening.

I slept in again today. At first I kind of felt guilty but then I figured that I must need the rest as it is not typical of me to sleep in, usually my internal alarm wakes me up before the alarm goes off. I was going to run after work but I just didn't feel like it when I got home. Again, a little guilt tried to convince me to run anyway but overall I felt I needed the break both physically and mentally.

Met Sasha and ran an easy 7.25 miles just talking about training and different workouts that have worked in the past etc... We did a couple of strides and then a 400 at the end. The 400 was 1:19 and felt very comfortable. Overall an easy run. I am very glad I took yesterday off as my legs felt a ton better and mentally I feel like I am ready to start getting more serious about my running. Up until now I ahve been running with no plan. Just kind of putting in the miles and doing whatever each day. No plan in advance or any long term training plan other than just putting in miles. I think it is time to sit down and lay out a real training plan. I need to sit down and plan out a 4-6 month day by day training plan in writing. When I have done this in the past it has really helped me focus on my training and really improve. Of course it adjusts and changes as things progress but at least it gives me focus and direction in my training. I think I will lay this plan out to start following Ogden with the goal being Top of Utah or St. George (if I can get a race entry!).

Busy last 24 hours but a decent race result. Not super fast but ok for the course. This week was a very low mileage week but I needed it. Next week I will try and get things going again. Friday night I had a military formal ball that I was at and did not get to bed until after 11:00pm. I then woke up this morning at 4:30am and jumped in the car for the 3 hour drive to Cedar City for the SUU Army ROTC 5K that the cadets put on each year as a fund raiser. Thwy did a great job and there was about 200 individuals registered this year. They had a ton of prize give aways and almost everyone walked away with something. I won a free pizza and a free desert. They even gave away a microwave a TV and a three day vacation. Not bad for a local 5K race. Now for the race report.

It was a hilly course and at 5,900 feet elevation with a little bit of wind as well so I knew the times would not be fast. The course is a two lap course around the SUU campus and starts with a gradual uphill for the first 1K that has a shorter (100m) steeper section right before the 1K. It then turns on a gradual down for about 800m. It is then fairly flat for 600-700m and turns back up for another decent climb (200m) bcak to the start area. Repeat and finish half way up the last hill on a 100m gradual hill. My GPS measured the course at 3.12 miles so pretty accurate. I do not know any local runners in Cedar City so had no clue as to how fast things would be. At the start I could tell they were one or two that looked like the running type but hard to tell. I decieded to go ahead and push the first 1K up the hill just to see if anyone was serious. I took it out and two guys seemed to jump in behind me. By the time we reached the steeper section of the hill right before 1K I noticed I was pulling away from them. I just cruised the down hill and tried to relax. At the end of the first lap I had a good 200-300m lead and was in time trial / tempo mode. I tried to hold steady up the hill again and keep things going well to the end. My goal going in was to break 18 minutes and I accomplished that running fairly steady. Mile splits were 5:30 (1k up and 600m down), 5:50 (600m flat and 1K up), 5:44 (mix of up and down). Loaded in course analyzer and it says it is 7 seconds per mile slower than a flat course. Overall I guess I am pleased. Not as fast as I would like but ok. I think with someone pushing I could have run 20 seconds faster or so.

Time to get back to some real training now that I am done slacking off this week!

Only three miles in the morning. Not much else to say other than this was not my plan.

10 miles total in the afternoon in 65 minutes. It was about 75 degrees and a little windy but I headed to the track to do some 400s. Ran 6x400 with a 200 jog rest. I was not sure what I could do for these but just wanted to see what kind of pace I could hold. The wind was a bit stiff on the back stretch but I still managed decent splits. I was thinking probably 75 seconds for each would be good. Splits were 70, 73, 73, 72, 71, 71. They were tough but not all out. After the last one I jogged a 400 and then did 2 miles at marathon pace effort in 5:58, 5:55. I have been having a hard time getting motivated to run lately. Kind of mentally fatigued I guess.
 

Easy provo River 10 with Sasha back at our normal 4:45am time. Felt ok. Ran easy 7:45 pace average.

Easy 9.26 miles with Sasha in AM. I feel like crud today. I did not sleep well last night as my head was pounding all night, my throat is killing me and my sinuses are backed up pretty good. Just sitting here my joints are aching all over. Right now it seems I just keep getting hit with one thing after another. Not a good month for me so far.

Easy Provo River day with Sasha averag pace 7:18. I bit on the tired side as I am still a bit sick and I drove to Cedar City yesterday afternoon and drove back last night as well getting home about midnight.

14 mile run today average pace  of 6:42 overall. Ran relaxed the whole way. I had my wife drop me off and I ran 14 miles in one direction. First 7 miles was easy and moving along a 7:00-7:05 pace. At this point I wanted to gradually pick it up to waht felt like marathon pace for six miles with the goal of each mile getting faster. I was able to do so rather comfortably even though I was running into a stiff head wind the whole 14 miles. Mile splits from 8-13 miles were: 6:45, 6:30, 6:20, 6:14, 6:05, 5:50. Cooled down last mile in 6:55. Overall felt decent today and in control the whole way. Never felt like I was really pushing even with the stiff headwind at times. Hopefully this is a sign that things are better and maybe I can have a good week of training this week.

Congrats to everyone that ran in Salt Lake today. Sasha and Steve were both in top five in the 1/2 and full, way to go!

Easy run with Sasha in AM. Average for 10 miles was 7:07. We picked it up last mile and dropped the last 1/2 at about 2:53. Legs felt ok today some mild fatigue in the quads but not bad. It feels like my center of gravity has shifted forward the last couple of runs which I think is a good thing. I feel like I am getting better leg extension as well. Hope it continues.

On another note James (my 12 year old son) wanted to run 8x400 today on the track. He did this on his own and recorded the splits. When I came home he had them written down to show me. He had about 2 minutes rest between them.  His splits were:

78, 81, 85, 90, 91, 89, 92, 80

A little inconsistent but not bad since he has never done a workout like this. The 78 and 80 are actually his two fastest 400m times that I can think of for him.

Was in Los Angeles at sea level. Ran on track since I was in an area I was not sure about the safety of running out on the streets. 9 miles was between 6-6:30 pace with each mile getting faster.

Not much else to say other than did not get the miles in (only 4 miles) as life seems to have gotten in the way the last couple days.

Easy morning run with Sasha on Provo River trail. We were about 7:30 average for 10 miles.

I was not too excited about today's race going into it. I have not been getting in themiles or consistency the last 4 weeks that I wanted to and was not expecting to do much for this race. I wanted to run it as I needed to get in a good quality long run before Ogden. I figured that anything under 2 hours would be good. I wanted to make sue I kept things at what felt like a long saturday tempo pace for at least the first 10 miles. I did this and felt pretty decent through about 8-9 miles and then had to start working after that. I was on my own from six miles until just before the finish. From mile 15-18 I waas really hurting and actually hoping someone would catch me so I could have someone to run with. Nate Pollard caught me with just under a mile to go and seemed to tuck in behind. He hung there all the way to the end. I tried to pick it up with about 400 to go but Nate just stuck on my heels and went by me with a sure with about 50 meters remaining. Overall I am happy with what turned out to be a decent day and a good MP training run. 

I have to mention that I was very impressed to see those that ran the Salt Lake Marathon last week come out and do so well today. Steve did an amazing job running 1:45 for 2nd overall!

My splits are below:

1	6:08
2	6:12
3	6:06
4	6:19
5	6:11
6	6:15
7	6:10
8	6:26
9	6:24
10	6:09
11	6:11
12	6:08
13	6:18
14	6:17
15	6:27
16	6:22
17	6:28
18	6:26
18.74	4:20
Total	1:57:25

Again great job by all today! 

Easy 10 mile Provo River Run with Sasha average pace of 7:21. Overall legs feel ok after the 30K. Some soreness in my right achilles and ankle but not much other soreness. Sasha wanted to do a 1/2 mile pick-up so towards end we ran a 1/2 in 2:44. A little tired but overall I am pleased.

13.1 miles total for the day. I decieded to join Sasha for his 5x400, 3 mile tempo, 5x400 workout this morning. It was a tough workout but actually went better than I anticipated. We did not do it in the canyon so it was along the Provo River closer to the lake which is mostly flat with some very minor rolls. After an easy 2+ mile warm-up we started the first five 400s. I wanted to stay relaxed during the whole workout today and not feel like I was ever pushing all out and just see what kind of times that produced. Overall I am happy as my splits were a little faster than expected and I stayed relaxed the whole workout and always felt like I had a little more in reserve. Anyway the workout splits are below:

5x400 = 74, 75, 74, 74, 73 (200 jog between 400s)

3 mile tempo = 5:48, 11:33 (5:45), 17:11 (5:38) was able to get faster each mile without really feeling like I was having to push to do so

5x400 = 75, 76, 75, 76, 74 (200 jog between 400s) these were all on slight uphill so a little tougher than the first 5x400

 It feels good to finally get a decent workout in after a month of subpar training!

Easy Provo River run with Sasha. Legs were a bit tired from yesterdays workout. We took it easy and ended up with about a 7:42 average pace.

Total of 12.16, overall about 7:10 average. Sasha was doing a 5 mile tempo but my right achilles was pretty tight so I only did the first and last mile with him. 1st mile was 5:33 and 2nd mile was also 5:33. The second one felt better than the first. Overall an easy day with a couple faster miles just for fun. Oh yeah it was rainy and miserable at 42'. I was about as cold and wet as one could get so really not much fun at all.

Easy 10 with Sasha at 7:39 average. At least it wasn't raining bt it was a nice warm 37'F on the 4th of May.

Met with Sasha for 10 mile MP tempo on Provo River Trail. Warm up 2 miles and then hit tempo miles as follows. I knew it was going to be rough as the wind was really blowing hard. Hard enough to knock me off stride every once in awhile. Overall time was 62:32. Splits were:

6:03  (a bit on the fast side but felt easier)

6:11

6:13

6:14

6:13

6:24

6:18

6:24

6:18

6:14

Besides fighting the wind this was about MP effort, I guess. It is hard to tell with the wind. I really do not like the wind as I struggle more mentally than anything else. I would rather run in the rain and cold than the wind!
 

Normal 10 mile river run but we were much faster than normal this morning. Overall averae was 6:58 pace with the last 5 miles at 6:42 pace. Not much else to say.

Great weather this morning. I wish every morning could be like this morning. Ran with Sasha, well at least during warm-up and cool-down. We did just over a mile warm-up and then did a 5 mile tempo at slightly faster than MP effort. My mile splits were:

5:54 (very relaxed and easy)

5:51 (picked it up but did not feel like I did)

5:56 (this includes a 180 degree turn around)

5:57 (started to feel it a little but focused on staying relaxed)

5:56 (uphill mile had to push a little harder to stay on pace)

Overall 29:34 for 5 mile tempo with 2.5 splits of 14:45/14:49. I was very pleased with this since it felt a lot easier than the first 5 miles of saturday's 10 mile tempo which I hit in 30:54. What a difference not having a strong wind makes. I was also surprised as yesterday was not as easy of a monday run as we normally do. Overall 10 miles at 6:51 average. 

8 miles with Sasha along Provo River, average pace 7:23. Easy running and chatting until towards the end Sasha wanted to do a faster 1/2 mile pick-up. First 1/4 felt easy and I decieded to make a little surge at the 400 to get Sasha going. It worked and Sasha responded and I tucked in behind him. I had thoughts of testing his kick with 100 to go but decieded that it was not in my best interest to kick it into an all out sprint at this point in my training. We hit the 1/2 in 2:40 with 400 splits of 1:25/1:15. The strange thing is the 1:15 actually felt pretty good. Great weather again!

Long afternoon yesterday re-building the kids tree house. Made for very sore upper body and some stiff legs and joints today. Decieded to run an easier run today but still get some quality out of it. Ran 8 miles on Provo River with Sasha with middle 4 miles in 6:40, 6:30, 6:27, 6:15. Was running very relaxed and easy for all four and did not feel like I was approaching marathon pace effort until the last half mile which was 3:03. Another beautiful day weather wise at 6:00am lately it has been perfect between 45-50 degrees and no wind. Hopefully Ogden Marathon will be blessed with such great weather.

Easy run for the most part except Sasha wanted to do a tempo mile in the middle. He let me set the pace and at first I was thinking 5:45 would be good. However, I felt pretty good and just rolled with it thinking we were probably around 5:40 pace. Sasha tracked the 1/4 mile splits but did not give the times until we finished. Mile was 5:32 with 1/4 splits of 86, 82, 82, 82. Felt pretty decent. Average pace for whole run was about 7:15. Legs are feeling pretty good overall.

Easy running for 13.1 miles today up in the Provo Canyon. Paced my son James for his first ever 10K at 12 years old. The course was 3 miles up the canyon and then return the 3 down plus .2 finish up. Ran more afterwards with Sasha to get miles in. James ran 46:52 and outkicked an older runner for 10th overall.

For the most part an easy 8 mile run at 6:57 average pace. After 4 miles Sasha wanted to do a hard mile again like last Monday. He let me pace and he checked splits but again did not call them out. I tried to just run by feel. I felt slower today than last Monday and was very surprised at our time when Sasha told me at the end. I guessed we were a little slower than last week. Last week we did a 5:32 and I thought we were at about 5:35-38 today. However, we did a 5:17 for the mile this morning. I did not expect that at all. At the end Sasha wanted to make sure we beat  7:00 pace so we ran the last 1/2 at sub 6:00 pace with the last 1/4 in 1:26. Feeling pretty decent with the drop in mileage.

Just over 7 miles total at 7:09 average but all but 2 miles were easy. Sasha wanted to run a 3 mile tempo and I decieded to pace him during the 1st and 3rd mile with just over a 1/2 mile jog rest between while waiting for him to come back from his 2nd mile. Another strange day pace wise in the sense that I thought we were going much slower than we were on both of the miles. On the first mile I would have guessed we would hit a 5:35-40 and we hit a 5:26. On the second mile I was thinking anything under 5:30 would be tough because it was an uphill mile. When we were running the second mile I would have guessed it would be about 5:30-35 and we hit a 5:18. So two times a mile at 5:26 and 5:18 with a 1/2 mile jog rest today. I'm not sure what to think of my fitness level right now as far as what to expect but I know I am starting to run faster. If I can up the miles after Ogden and lose the last 10 pounds of extra weight things will be looking much better for a decent Fall marathon.

5.1 miles today very easy averaged 7:12 pace. Sasha wanted to do 1 mile at marathon pace and I was more interested in taking it easy so I let him go and just ran my own pace. I did not expect to be near marathon pace as I was just relaxing and running very easy. My guess would have been 6:40 pace at best. However I ran that mile in 6:15. I guess it is good when 6:15 feels like an easy morning run pace. Two more easy days and we will see how things go at Ogden. Goals are:

1. Finish with no major problems and be sub 2:50.

2. Run even or negative split race and sub 2:45.

I guess that's about it. 

Easy 5 miles this morning. Feeling pretty decent.

Easy 4.4 with Sasha sped up to marathon pace for a mile. Heading to Ogden with Sasha this evening.

 On another note I took my son James (12) to his first ever track meet. He wanted to run a mile but the longest events for his age group were the 800 and the 400. We signed him up for both with the 800 being first followed by the 400 about 30 minutes after the 800. I was not sure what to expect in the 800 but I told him to just go out and run hard the first 400 and see what happens. I was thinking he would run around 2:45. He took off at the start and after the first 100 was in second. On the back stretch he took the lead and started to pull away. He hit the first 400 in 78+ and was well in the lead. At this point I was hoping he could hold on. He was able to hold on to the pace pretty well running the second 400 in 80+ with an over time of 2:39.2 and had a pretty big gap on second place. He was very excited about it as he did not think he could run that fast. The 400 was next and James was not too excited as he was pretty tired from the 800 and there was  a boy from his school that had beat him in the 400 at school several weeks ago during PE. I told him to just run as best as he could but the key was to get a fast start and push the first 200 hard. He led from start to finish and won by about 2 seconds running a 72.11. What was even more impressive is that the wind had picked up quite a bit and was blowing very hard directly down the finish straight. He commented afterwards that the when he hit the last 100 the wind was killer. This was a great day for James and a big breakthrough for him. Sorry for going on I guess I'm just a proud father and was very surprised at how fast he ran.

Well the race is over and I am feeling a bit crippled right now. Things did not go as well as I would have liked but I cannot complain. One thing I know for sure is that I did not have enough long runs in training. The first 10 miles felt great and I was feeling like I was holding back, almost like an easy long run pace. However, just after 10 miles I got this weird kind of numbing sensation in my quads. This is what I remember feeling like when my glycogen stores are running low. In the past when I have gotten this feeling I have been able to hold pace for about 5-6 more miles before things get ugly. It is a hard 5-6 miles but I can hold pace. With this feeling coming on at 10 miles I knew this was not a good sign of things to come. As predicted I really started to struggle at about mile 15. I tried to hang on after that but I knew I was pretty much done at this point and was really in survival mode with the goal of just finishing. To overcome this in the past I need to do a lot more long runs where it seems as if my body learns how to adapt and store more glycogen. Besides the Striders 30K I think I only did one 18 miler. This is by far not enough for my body to be ready to run a marathon withouot crashing and burning. The good news is that I know what I need to get back to where I was and I think I am furhter along than I though I was. Now I just need to increase the miles and long runs and in doing so lose the last 10 lbs of extra weight I am carrying around. If I can do this then my next marathon should go much better. Well, enough rambling my splits are below. Also, thanks for James and Jeff (from Idaho Falls) for running together for the first 14 miles and helping each other stay relaxed. Conrats to everyone on the blog that ran today as well, especially Paul and Steve who both ran very well and finished 1-2. My splits below do not include the stop at mile 24 and 25 to drink so I could finish as I was pretty dehydrated and was worried that I may not make it if I did not get a couple full cups down at each of thse stops. I lost 1:03 during these stops.

1	6:09
2	6:04
3	5:59
4	5:56
5	5:56
6	6:01
7	5:58
8	5:57
9	6:11
10	6:15
11	6:19
12	6:08
13	6:19
1/2	1:20:00
14	6:09
15	6:29
16	6:17
17	6:20
18	6:04
19	6:19
20	6:28
21	6:32
22	6:28
23	6:17
24	6:57
25	7:31
26	6:55
.24	1:35
Total	2:46:48 with stops

 I made my goal of beating my first marathon time of 2:47 so that is a plus. However, we will see if I make it through the next couple of days injury free. Right now I am a bit concerned about a few things.

 Once again congrats to everyone and thanks for the support and kind words.

 

Well, Sasha drug me along on a 5 mile easy but painful run. My quads are pretty torn up and painful the whole run but slowly got better as we went. We averaged about 7:51 for the 5 miles and Sasha was headed out for 5 more. He said he plans on doing his normal tempo run tomorrow. I will not be doing any tempos this week that is for sure. Probably another easy 5 miles tomorrow is all I will be up for. I plan on taking this week easy and then trying to get things going again next week.

Another easy but sore run. However, I am a little less sore today so progress is good. 7 miles for the day at a 7:28 average. Nice and relaxed but quads still hurt throughout.

What really shocks me is Sasha doing his standard 5 mile tempo run this morning and it was like he did not even run a marathon on Saturday. He only ran about 20-30 seconds slower than normal and he was taking it easy. There is something wrong/weird about anyone that can do this so soon after a marathon. Sasha has something strange going on that is for sure. I was telling him that he should take up ultra running as I think he could do very well and possibly be one of the best in the nation. 

Slowly but surely the soreness is fading away. Just a little bit of soreness remaining in the outer quads. Each day has gotten a little better. I think by tomorrow all of the soreness should basically be gone. Ran an easy 8 miles with Sasha at a 7:42 average pace.

10 Miles with Sasha today. Legs are feeling about 90% today which is probably one of my faster recoveries from a marathon. Ran warm-up with Sasha and then he wantedt o do his normal 5 mile tempo again. I did not feel like I am ready to push it quite yet as I do not want to risk an injury as I have been injury prone following psat marathons. However, after warming up I started to gradually pick it up and hit middle 4 miles in 6:49, 6:37, 6:24, and 6:05. Sasha and I then ran cool-down together and ran into a couple of other runners and joined them for the last couple miles. They are both very good runners one being Nick McCombs and the other a local fast tri-athlete. Overall average for the 10 miles was 7:03.

Son James (12) did 3x1 Mile yesterday afternoon with a 400 jog rest in 6:35, 6:34, and 6:15. The last mile was an 11 second PR after running 2 hard miles. He is really starting to show some progress from his consistent 4 easy miles per day for the last 4-5 months. He is a great example of how consistency pays off. What is great is he has run 4 miles a day on his own every day. My goal has been not to push him but just let him go out and run on his own. Now that school is out I will try and run with him at least a couple days a week. I think I will have him start posting on the blog now that school is out as well.

Normal Provo River 10 miler from Sasha's house. Legs still ok. A few minor things lingering but not bad. We averaged 7:05 overall but the first 5 average was about 7:17 and second 5 average was 6:52. Not much else to write about today.

Took my son James up to Magna with Sasha to run the Magna 5K. I did not want to race today but rather help James run a PR in the 5K. It is a fast course and James has really started to run pretty good lately so I expected him to do well. I was thinking a sub 20:00 was possible but I was not sure if he would really run that fast. Took off with James at the start which is the fastest part of the course and we hit the first 1/4 in 1:23 and then settled down into a more comfortable pace for him. He hit the first mile in 5:56 and was looking good. This is a downhill mile but that is the fastest he has ever covered a mile. The second mile starts to flatten out and the last 400 is actually on a slight up. He ran the second mile in 6:22. The third mile is all on a gradual uphill except for one section at about the 3/4 mile mark it goes down for about 150 meters. His third mile was a 6:48 which is pretty good for a mostly uphill mile, this one actually surprised me the most as I expected the hill to slow him down a little more. He finished in 19:45! So he broke the 20:00 mark with room to spare. Not bad for 12 years old and his first year of running. James was pretty excited and he finished strong passing about three people over the last 500 meters. It is one thing to run and race yourself but it is even a greater feeling being able to see your son run so well and be so excited about it. That was the highlight of my running day today.

I ended up running just over 10 miles for the day total. My right hammy, knee and hip are still bothering me a little so I will have to be careful not to push it too hard until they feel better. Feel like crud today as I started coming down with a major cold last night. I am totally congested and miserable this afternoon. Heading out to the range to take the kids shooting. It is fun to get out and shoot every once in a while and destroy some paper targets and clay pidgeons.

Easy running today as I am still very congested with this head cold. I am also having problems with my right hamstring still so need to be careful as well. Went with Sasha to a 5K in American Fork and paced his son Benjamin to a new PR of 22:49 while he and James paced his daughter toa new PR as well. Total of just over 11 miles for the day.

Met with Sasha at 6:15. We waited as we were expecting some others to possibly join us. Sasha invited David Bell, Nick McCoombs, and Steve to join us. However, it was just the two of us as usual. Sasha did his norml tuesday 5 mile tempo but I am still recovering from a cold and ran much easier. Legs felt good overall. Ran 10.2m miles total at an average pace of 7:00. Afterwards I picked up James and put my youngest son in the baby jogger and ran 3 more mile with James pushing the baby jogger. My youngest is almost three years old and when we were done he wanted to run so he ran 100 meters in 37 seconds.

Normal Wednesday 4:45am run with Sasha. 10.04 miles at an average pace of 7:12 with second half at sub 7:00. Overall feeling ok except for the head cold.

Ran four more miles with son James this evening. Paced him for a 3K on the track at BYU. It was suppossed to be a race but he was the only one entered so he did it anyway as a tempo run and ran 12:18 with about a 5 second negative split and a last lap of 1:27. 

Met Sasha at the Provo Canyon for his 5x400 alternating down/up hill followed by a 3 mile tempo and then another 5x400. Warmed up and did the first 400s in 71(down), 80(up), 74(down), 80(up), 71 (down) all with a 200 jog rest. I ran these relaxed and tried not to push much as my right hip still has some issues along with the fact the I am in the final stages of getting over this head cold. We then jogged to the start of the 3 mile tempo. Sasha gave me a 30 second head start so he could chase me down. I was shooting for anything under 16:30 or 5:30 pace per mile. I hit the 1st mile in 5:20 and backed off a little as I was afraid it was a little fast. The 2nd mile was a 5:28 but I was feeling ok still so I picked it back up the 3rd mile and tried to hold off Sasha. Sasha caught me right at the very end but I ran another 5:20 for the 3rd mile and ran a 16:08 for the whole three mile tempo. Sasha ran a 15:38 and he said he thinks that what you run on this 3 mile tempo is about what you can run on the Magna 5K course. With that assessment I am pleased with this effort. We then jogged back up to do the second set of 5x400. I decieded to just do 200s instead and pace Sasha for the first 200 of the 400s as my hip was still nagging me a bit. The 200s went as follows: 32(down), 36(up), 33(down), 36(up), 33(down) this time I finished out the 400 as well and ran a 68 for the down quarter. Overall I am pleased with this workout. The only issues I am concerned with are my right hip problem and my right foot, possible PF problem, acted up a little today. If I can get past these two issues things are looking positive for the future.

I was planning on racing the Heart of Holladay 5K but will not be able to as I am the Scoutmaster for our Boy Scout Troop and we have a campout that weekend. So I am done racing for awhile as I will be out of town from 15 June until 4 August as well. The next planned race for me looks like the Provo River 1/2 Marathon ont eh 11th of August. Between now and then my focus will be getting in as many miles as possible. I hope to get up to about 90 miles a week during this stretch. We will see how things pan out when I return in August. 

Went with Sasha and family to Hogle Zoo today. On the way we got out on the Des News Marathon route and ran two miles with the kids and then families continued on to the zoo and Sasha and I ran the rest of the way to the zoo through Emigration Canyon. The first mile was down followed by three miles of pretty steep climbing. At the 4 mile mark it was all down hill to the zoo. We were not running at marathon pace effort but we were moving along very nicely so I will give myself credit for some marathon pace miles anyway. Our average for the 8 mile down stretch was 6:22 with the following splits according to the GPS:

6:46

6:17

6:26

6:29

6:28

6:26

6:20

5:45

 We had a very strong headwind and it was quite warm so it was not really a pure easy run but again it was not quite marathon pace effort either. We picked it up the last mile just for fun.

We then spent the afternoon at the zoo with the kids. Overall a good day and a good 12 mile run. James took it easy today and only did two miles as he has a track meet tomorrow with a 1500 and an 800. It will be fun to see how he does as he is pretty excited.

Planning on 15 miles tomorrow. I am trying to convince Sasha to run a 15 miler at Deer Creek Resevoir with me instead of doing the same old Provo River Trail. Wish me luck!

Total of 18 miles today. 

Took James to the BYU track meet in the morning and did 1.3 miles of warm-up and cool-down with James. He ran the 1500 in 5:39. He was not really feeling that great today but still gave it what he had.

I then met with Sasha and headed out on the Provo River Trail. Sasha did his normal 10 mile tempo where as I just wanted an easy long run. Joined Sasha again after his tempo and added more miles. Ended up running 15.9 miles on the river at an average of 6:53 per mile. Felt ok and was starting to really feel the heat by the end. My car said it was 79'F at the end of the run.  

Ran .8 more miles with James as his warm-up and cool-down for an 800 meter race this afternoon. It was 86'F! James won his age group and was 2nd overall in the 800 with a 2:43. He was tired again and said he just couldn't get moving.

I only had about 65 miles planned this week but ended up with 81.75 miles this week (6 days) which is the most in a week for me since I started running again.

Standard 10 mile route along Provo River with Sasha. Easy run at an average pace of 6:55. Second have under 6:40 pace. The run was easy but my right foot was killing me the entire way. The right arch is hurting pretty bad for some reason. It has been hurting all day as well. Back to the ice and ibuprofin routine I guess.

Met Sasha at 6:00am. Ended up running 15.55 miles along Provo River at an average pace of 6:32. The bad news is my right foot was killing me every step of the run. The good news is other than the foot I felt great and never pushed the pace. This felt like an easy run pace the whole time and was very relaxed. Towards the end I was hitting consistent 6:15-20 pace and it still felt very easy. Now I just need to figure out what is wrong with my right foot.

Ok, not a god day for running for me. My right foot was in extreme pain this morning and I had to call it quits and turn back. I have rarely ever had to do this. I am usually pretty stubborn and will run through almost any pain. However, this morning was unbearable. My right foot hurts with every step on the inside top portion of the foot up about an inch from the top inside ankle area. Hard to describe but it is a very sharp pain that I could not continue to run on. I hit the elliptical for 20 minutes and it does not hurt on the elliptical. I jogged a little and it does not hurt as bad as this morning but it is still there. I went to the doctor and they took an x-ray but did not really see anything but also said that it is hard to detect a stress fracture with just an x-ray. They will order further tests if it still bothers me after doing the ice and ibuprofin routine a little longer. They suggested taking some time off and seeing if it starts to feel better. I am not one for taking time off so this is really a bummer for me. As I said I usually can just run through most injuries and just deal with the pain. I will ice again tonight and continue ibuprofin and see how it feels in the morning. If it feels ok I will probably go ahead and run but if it is still bothering me I may take a few days off and just hit the elliptical. I really do not need this right now. It is depressing to think about not being able to run right now.

Well, good news is the foot felt a lot better this morning. I got up and jogged on it to see how it felt. It felt ok but still there. I really wanted to go run with Sasha but there was a real nagging in my mind that said I better not. It was hard to give in and not go run anyway. I know if it started to feel better after one day then there is a possibility that it will completely heal if I give it another day or two. As much as I want to get out the door and run I need to force myself to take a couple more days off to see if it can heal up completely. Another piece of good news is that I am really starting to get the desire to really train harder and take things more seriously. Up until now I did not seem to have the same desire I did in the past when I was training hard. I am itching to get going again which is a good sign.

Easy run today after 4 days off to try and let me foot heal. Felt ok today and did not really feel like I was pushing the pace at all. Ended up running 6:41 average pace for the 10 miles with 2.5 miles at 6:12 pace in the middle. Even the 6:12 pace felt easier than marathon pace. The good news is that my foot did not hurt very much. There is still some pain in the same area but it is much improved. I can still feel it on almost every step but it is definetly heading in the right direction. Hopefully it will not get any worse as I run this week. I will continue with easier runs this week and hope for the best.

Easy 6 miles at 7:14 average pace. However, the bad news is I only ran 6 miles because my foot was killing me again. Not as bad as when I had to stop last week but close especially the first 2-3 miles. I will try to run another easy run tomorrow and see if it continues to get worse or not. I am starting to think it is a tendon problem as I cannot flex my toes on the right foot at all when I try. The pain seems to be right at the point where the tendon from the shin area connects to the inside top of the foot. I think it may be anterior tibial tendonitis after doing some research on the internet. The symptoms I am describing fit almost exactly.

Ran easy with my son James this morning. Foot still hurts so I wanted to just run easy and see how things progress. If it feels ok I will do more tomorrow. Continuing with ice and ibuprofin.

Easy 10.6 miles along the Provo River today at about 7:06 average pace. Bad news is that the foot still hurts. The good news is that it is not any worse and the pain may actually be slightly less today. Ice three times a day and ibuprofin overdoses seem to be helping for now. Tomorrow is my last day in Utah for the next 6 weeks. I am off to Fort Lewis, Washington for some sea level training.

Easy 10 miles with Sasha and Nick. Good news is the foot actually felt a little better today. It still hurts but I think it is healing. I will keep up the ice and ibuprofin routine until all of the pain goes away. Well, I will try and post my running on the blog as often as I can while I'm gone but I may only get around to it once every three or four days. Hopefully I will return a skinnier fitter version of myself in 7 weeks! I hit the road about 11:00 today for Fort Lewis, Washington.

10 Miles at Fort Lewis Washington.

10 miles at Fort Lewis, Washington.

13 miles Fort Lewis at 6:48 average.

5.1 miles at Fort Lewis, WA. Schedule starting to interfere with running. Only sleeping 4 hours a night.

Fort Lewis. Really tired as lack of sleep hurting.

No run as only 3 hours of sleep. To bed at midnight up at 3:00 am.

Fort Lewis. Just happy to run at all.

Fort Lewis. Really wiped out from lack of sleep. Schedule not really working out for running.

Fort Lewis. First run in about a week due to lack of sleep or time to get a run in at all. Happy to run today as I got 4 hours of sleep and squeezed in a run.

Fort Lewis. Able to run two days in a row and get 4 hours of sleep.

Fort Lewis. Rough time getting sleep and therfore not much running. Although lots of ruck marching everyday.

Fort Lewis. Forced another run in. Lack of sleep still not working well as far as getting runs in.

Fort Lewis. Out in the field the last 10 days and only sleeping abut 3 hours a night so unfortunately this was first run in about 10 days.

Fort Lewis. Two runs in a row. Yeah!

Fort Lewis. Another run which means I got at least four hours of sleep.

Fort Lewis. Had to stop as I was not up for a run after less than 3 hours sleep.

Fort Lewis. Five hours of sleep, the most I had ion a long time so went for 10 miles.

Ran with James on the Provo River trail. Easy 6 miles after driving 900 miles yesterday. It feels good to be back but I leave for another week on Monday. I am going to scout camp with James up at about 9500 feet. I will run with James every morning and use it as a high altitude running camp and try and whip myself back into shape. It was very dissapointing to not be able to get much running in at Fort Lewis. My schedule was a lot tougher than I had expected. I average 3-4 hours a sleep per night and was on my feet for most of everyday. I did a lot of ruck marching (hiking) everyday and sucj=h that made me tired enough that with the lack of sleep I could not force myself to sacrifice any sleep time to get up and run. The 3-4 hours was needed if I had to try and squeeze a run in as well it would not have worked so well. The only good news is that I still managed to lose about 3 pounds or so even without running. 

My plans for the rest of the year are pretty much shot at this point. I am probably done racing for the year and will just focus on building the miles back up and getting a good base for next year. Really dissapointing after starting to make so much progress and then not be able to maintain it the last 6 weeks.

5.1 miles at 9,400 feet elevation all up and down hill.

Well, first real run in about 6 weeks and I probably went further and pushed harder than I should have. I am sure I will be paying for it tomorrow. Started with Sasha and Jeff at Borders and went 7 miles up the Provo River Canyon and returned the same way. Ran one hard mile with Sasha and Jeff at 5:58 up the canyon into a pretty good head wind. This was very tough for me but I wanted to stay with them for at least one mile. After that I just ran at my own pace but still tried to keep it fairly hard. Anyway I know the next month or two will bereally tough trying to get back to where I was and get my mileage up but I am ready to go for it once more. Overall ran 1:38:14 for 14 miles so 7:01 average. Not bad with the first 7 up hill and not really running for 6-7 weeks. Other good news is that I lost a couple more pounds last week even without much running. Weighed in at 137lbs. Splits as follows:

7:50, 6:24, 7:27, 7:03, 7:40, 7:19, 7:14, 7:01, 6:49, 6:40, 6:41, 6:44, 6:40, 6:46 

Easy 10 miles with Sasha along Provo River. Well easy is a relative term as my legs were really feeling it the second half. This used to be an easy run but right now it is not what I would call easy. Total time was 74:46 for the 10 miles. I added .63 miles in the evening jogging with my eight year old Jared who wants to start running.

Push-ups=80; Sit-ups=100; + 3 sets of other core exercises; Weight=138lbs

Same 10 mile Provo River route this morning with Sasha and Jeff. My son James also joined us for the first three miles. Legs are tired and sore but still managed to average 7:12 pace. About 2:30 faster than yesterday overall. Second half average was 6:45. Sasha and Jeff took off after 6 miles to run a 7.5 mile tempo. May add a little more with Jared this afternoon.

Added .63 with Jared.

Push-ups=50; Sit-ups=80; + 3 sets of other core exercises 

Along the Provo River with Sasha and son James. James ran first three with us and mile two and three were 7:05 and 6:40. Averaged 7:25 for 10 miles. Easier pace today. Legs are stil sore and tired. Will probably run with Jared again in the evening after work. Ran with Jared. His third run in a row.

Push-ups=85; Sit-ups=100; + 3 sets of other core exercises

Sasha House 10 Miler

10 mile Provo River route in 70:16 (7:00avg.). Had a large group today. Son James, Breanna, Sasha, Nick and Jeff. James and Breanna ran first 3 with us then headed back. I ran first 6 with Sasha, Nick and Jeff and then they started there Tempo. I paced the first 400 in 1:20 and then went back to my own pace. Second 5 miles was in 33:08. Legs felt ok today, still a little sore but getting a bit better as the week goes on. I will probably add another short run with son Jared this evening.

Ran with son Jared; his 4th day in a row.

Push-ups=50; Sit-ups=100

Sasha House 10 Miler

Same old course again with Sasha, James and Breanna. James and Breanna turned around at 3.5 miles. A little slower today but legs still sore. Ran 75:32 (7:31 avg.) with second 5.02 in 35:20. Will run a little more with son Jared again later. Looks like I will get close to 70 miles this week. Not bad considering that is more than I ran for the last 7 weeks added together.

Added .63 with son Jared.

80 Push-ups; 100 Sit-ups; 3 sets of core exercises

Total of 19.26 for the day. I ran the Provo River 1/2 Marathon as a long run today and actually ran a bit quicker than I thought I would all things considered. I tried to run easy the first 10 miles and felt ok with 3 to go so decieded to go ahead and pick it up a little. I passed the lead lady and one other over the last mile with my last three miles being my fastest three miles of the race. Time was 1:20:07 (6:07 avg.) and I ended up about 11th overall I think. This puts me over 70 miles for the week as well. Still not decieded about Top of Utah as I am not sure I want to run unless I am in better shape than Ogden and I also may have a work conflict. Congrats to Sasha as he had a great race today in the middle of a very high mileage week. I really think his persistent high mileage is starting to pay off and he is really looking great for a qualifier at St. George. My race splits are below:

Mile	Split/Total	Heart Rate
1	6:12	150
2	6:03/12:15	162
3	6:04/18:19	159
4	6:12/24:31 Flat	163
5	6:06/30:37	166
6	6:33/37:10 Uphill	166
7	6:28/43:38 Uphill	173
8	5:58/49:36	167
9	6:01/55:37	169
10	5:57/61:34	170
11	5:58/67:32	173
12	5:52/73:24 Flat	176
13	5:50/79:14 Flat	179
13.15	:52/80:07	183

Overall pretty happy I was able to pick it up the last 3-4 miles and run faster than I anticipated. I never really felt like I was running threshold pace until the last two miles. It was also good to see all of the Fast Running Bloggers out and running well.

AM - Standard 10.04 Sasha House 10 Miler. James joined us for the first three and then turned back on his own. My legs are pretty sore from Saturday but still managed 7:00 average for second half of run and overall just under 7:30 average pace. Will do a little more this evening with Jared and James.

PM - Ran with Jared, James and Jordan (My Three Sons). My legs are still pretty sore and James thinks it is funny to pick up the pace on me because my legs are sore.

80 Push-ups; 100 Sit-ups; 3xsets of core exercises; weekly weigh-in at 138lbs