Blake Bennions running

Long run with Jake. Rainy today. We're both feeling the mileage. I'm just going to try and stay above 40 now this next week. Maybe do some marathon pace runs and hills if we take a break from track workouts.

Warmed up and ran a mile time trial with Jake. He killed it, ran a 4:24! I had a less successful attempt, ran a 4:50. I started with a 68 and then kind of just cruised and couldn't get back in gear. Laps 2 and 3 felt too easy and lap 4 hurt but I think could definitely have ran it harder. Splits were approximately 68, 74, 75, 73. I feel like I could have gone a lot faster. Good to get a race in though. I really need to get some new spikes.

1.1 miles at home

Easy stroller miles, felt really good. Nice to have some warm weather.

Warmed up a couple miles and then did 1600, 4 mins rest, then 8x600m with 2 mins rest.

Splits were 5:12, 1:54, 1:55, 1:58, 1:59, 1:59, 2:00, 1:59, 1:55. Averaged of 1:57. So about the same pace for the mile and 600s. If this is indicative of 5k pace then I'm very happy, if it's more of a 2 mile pace workout then that's not quite as exciting.

Either way, it was a good tough workout on sore legs in the wind.

Easy stroller miles. Also walked about half an hour. Good core and yoga session tonight, have been slacking on these lately.

Ran with Jake the first 11 miles or so, lots of technical hills and off trail exploration. Very fun day. After he had to go I ran up 500 and did a downhill mile at half marathon pace, I just let gravity pull me along- I could have gone faster without trying any harder if I'd just leaned into the downhill more but for some reason I thought that if I ran the downhill a little slower it would take longer distance wise and I wouldn't have to run back uphill as far. Obviously I knew that wasn't true but it was hard to convince my legs. Ended up being 5:42 over 230 feet elevation loss, felt super easy which is encouraging. I need 13 of those downhill miles at 5:34 pace to get a free entrance to Saint George, I think I could do that this month honestly.

Tempted to run a few more miles today, if I hadn't burned a hole in my sock and worked up a need to poo I would have kept going on the canal road for a few miles.

1.6 with a similar amount of walking with Becca and Whitney over to the park. Mostly on flat grass. Legs are tired. Considering trying for my all time high monthly mileage of 250 in March and try to do my first 20 mile run as well.

Easy run on the grass

Very cold today, too cold. 8° with wind-chill. Also very windy. According to our AI overlords 10° makes you run about 27 seconds slower per mile. Averaged 5:57 on the 5 mile tempo and that makes me feel a little better about having to take a second to loosen up and relax and recover after mile 3. Couldn't get into a good smooth rhythm at all today, just a continuous fight against the elements. Not really even my legs or lungs, just my whole body felt tight and seized up the whole run.

Another run in the cold. Good I'm getting better at forcing myself to go run when it's like this outside or I just don't feel like it or it's dark and feels too late... just a couple more weeks of February.

Also Monday's post was actually Tuesday's run. On Monday we met up with my parents at the natural History museum for their state legislature and families night. Whitney loves dinosaurs so she had a lot of fun. We also went to the same kind of thing for the draper aquarium a couple weeks ago, I gotta say the aquarium had much better catering- but both were highly enjoyable.

Little under 3 with Whitney and the rest on my own. Very snowy today, new levels of respect for Whitneys chariot- that thing is amazing.

Short shake out. Hate these conditions.

Ran with Jake. Started with an uphill mile and 2 of the first 5 miles were through like 10 inches of snow. Hopefully it clears up soon.

Treadmill today. Warmed up a couple miles and then did 5 miles at 10.1 miles per hour. Felt hard. Need to get more used to this pace. I also need to work on not overstriding when I speed up and increasing my turnover instead.

Gully long run in somewhere between 42:55 and 43:15, I can't remember what the marker for the end was. It was fairly icy/slushy today, I had to go pretty slow down at the bottom of the gully. I sped up the last couple miles and closed in 5:35 for the last mile. Felt pretty good today, pretty sure I could break 40 in good weather at a race effort right now.

Did 4 hill repeats afterwards and then cooled down a bit after those.

Felt great today and this was pretty confidence building. It was a fairly spontaneous gully run, pleasant view/harrisville area has like 8/10 inches of snow all over but my parents neighborhood has pretty much no snow... I figured I'd take advantage of conditions down there when I went over to visit my parents.

Didn't have much time today. I ran up as far as the roads would let me go in pleasent view and then I bombed down a 5k. Tried working on a little higher turnover and shorter strides. Ran 16:47 for the 5k, my goal was to average sub 5:35 so 5:24 was great. Got some work to do before my quads will be able to handle that for 13 miles.

I haven't done a true easy run in too long, I'll take the rest of the week easy. Might do a shake out tonight. Tomorrow will be hard to get out to run.

Kind of a funky down week but I enjoyed it. Time to get back into middle distance workouts.

Haven't signed up for Saint George or the drop 13 yet and am now considering doing big bear and a trail race instead. Been addicted to finding bargains on shoes lately, got a pair of new balance ld-x spikes for $30 and I'm going to get some $140 Adidas trainers for $60.

Easy run with a couple minutes at marathon pace. Felt good.

8x3 mins on 1 min off with Jake. Sped up throughout the workout and averaged somewhere between 5:29-5:32 depending on who's watching was more accurate. It really does make such a huge difference to stay loose and relaxed when running at that pace. Ordered some new trainers that I'm hoping will help me prepare to run in the endorphin pros.

24 minutes at about 34 minute 10k pace felt pretty good, I'm confident I could break 34 at Des news rn. I think my goal will be sub 33 and then however far below that I can get the better.

Ran over to the park with Whitney and helped her do all the stuff on the playground. Was just going to run home because I was feeling kinda pooped from yesterday but ran into Jake on the way back. I accompanied him for the next 2-3 miles and then went home and dropped Whitney off with Becca.

I did the last 2.75 miles on my own in my new Saucony tempus shoes. Felt really good, I'm a big fan. They have some of the super foam stuff and it definitely makes a difference. I sped up for a mile at estimated marathon effort and ran a 5:57.

Ramping mileage back up for a big mileage month in March.

Easy stroller miles. Big workout tomorrow.

Warmed up a little over 2.3 and then ran

4x800 with 1 minute rest

4 mins rest

4x 400m, 30 seconds recovery, 400m

800s went 2:39, 2:35, 2:38, 2:36

400s went 69, 70. 69, 71. 73, 73. 71, 69.

So I averaged 2:37 for the 800ms and 70.5 for the 400ms. Honestly pretty good.

The tempus shoes feel amazing, 5:15 pace for those 800ms felt super good. I think I could have done over 10 reps at that pace with a minute rest. Very confident I could run low 16s for a track 5k right now.

Bad news on the ld-x spikes front. They felt super awkward not great for a heel striker. I'm not sure the carbon plated spikes are for me, good thing I only had to spend $30 on them. I switched into them before the 400s and switched back out after the first rep. Maybe I just need to spend more time trying to make them work for me.

I think I'm in like low 4:40s mile shape and low 16s 5k shape right now. I'm not feeling super excited about running a 1500m but I think I'll at least try to break 4:20 for a 1500... Just not sure what shoes I should even wear for that because track spikes feel so awkward for me nowadays.