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.
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