Blake Bennions running

Signed up for the elite heat of the Spartan race in July today. I've also made a commitment to increase my mileage and start blogging here again.

The past few months I've been running about 10 miles per week and lots of strength training, haven't put on too much weight which is good. Also this semester has the potential to be my first 4.0 ever!

I will be in Romania and Italy (Germany a little) for all of May, so mostly I will be running and doing core there.

I've been doing pretty well at benching, my typical workout is 3x10 at 185, 175, 175. Once I get up to 3x10 at 205 I will stop increasing weight and just maintain and maybe increase reps at a lower weight, but I started at 135 so I'm almost there. I've also been doing pull ups, rope pull, ab workouts, and this awesome jumping machine at my gym.

Going forward I plan on doing more core, and giving myself less rest between workouts at the gym. Also I'm staying in cedar city this summer and will be doing an intership for the school.

Good day of training, monkey bars, pull ups, rope pull, abs at gym with running before between and after.

Ran to the gym and did pull ups monkey bars, and some abs. I was about to do rope pull but I noticed my hands (which hand been pretty blistered) were in pretty bad condition, one of the blisters had popped and they weren't feeling good at all so I washed them off and ran home. Later went rock climbing with my Wenda, hands still beat up but were better. I should invest in some good workout gloves to prevent my hands from getting too nasty. Tomorrow is probably rest day as I'm gonna be pretty busy, and its probably good for my hands. Might go for a run if I get some time.

Also learned that the Spartan I signed up for is gonna be pretty intense, it's on the national championship circuit so all the pros will be there. So top 10 chances definitely take a hit with that but we'll just see how things play out. I mean most the pros are ex trail/mountain runners and I've had some success with that so if I can get up my mileage, and keep working my upper body, I think this might be a really good fit for me. Regardless of how I finish, I'm really liking the new challenge and am looking forward to the race!

Ran to the gym at 7:00 pace and did bench, some other arm workouts, monkey bars with a lot of different stuff and pull ups, rope pull, and ab workouts. Then I ran back averaging 6:20. Pretty good workout. Hands are still pretty torn up, I have gloves which make it easier on them but they still burned a little today.

Solid workout day, ran to the gym and back and later ran home from Wendas to get some extra miles.

Super busy week this week, today went to the gym before going to kramers reception.

Ran half a mile with Wenda and then ran to the gym, did my usual workouts, I'm realizing more how large a part breathing and technique of doing some of these workouts for longer reps. So I will figure that out, monkey bars are easy though and that's probably the hardest Spartan workout, well the weird handle monkey bars, fortunately my gym has a good simulation for that. But I want running low 6 minute pace to be recovery over 8 miles by the time of the race, and I want to be good enough at the obstacles that I don't even feel them.

So training shall continue, and when I get back from Romania I'm going to increase the load to every day, maybe one rest day per week. In Romania I will concentrate on running and core, and burpees.

I also worked out with Wenda tonight and we did a 5 minute burpee challenge at the end, I did 77 and she did 55. Spartan burpees include a pushup so it's a good leg and arm workout, I guess. Certainly was pretty tough. On the list for males my age the categories go hire a coach, do more burpees, healthy, and Spartan fit. Healthy is 70 and Spartan fit is 85 so I got right in the middle for my first time. When I come back for Romania I will try again and so over 85, and the next time I do it I will get 100 in 5 minutes.

In Rome, tried running to the pantheon but Google maps was going crazy and my phone died so I just found my parents and walked with them. Pantheon was amazing, kind of wonder what it looked like before the Catholics got to it too. It was raining, which was really pretty, they had the middle of the pantheon closed off so people wouldn't slip on the wet marble.

5.3 miles in Siena, spent the past few days in different cities throughout Umbria, that area is so pretty! Its much much cleaner than Rome, Rome was incredible and full of amazing food, structures, art, and history. But like any city its size (especially with it's amount of tourists) is also full of street peddlers, litter, hectic roads (more so than anywhere else I've been), and smoke, so getting out to the beatufiful countryside has been that much more a breathtaking change.

Out of all the great things I've seen here Trevi fountain tops everything else in Rome for me, and in general so far, it blows away all expectations! There's so much in Rome though, wow, we stayed just a couple hundred meters from the colosseum and forum so that was really cool to walk out of the apartment to.

So I will be here in Siena again tomorrow and and then its on to Florence, Ravenna, Venice, and Milan before I head to Romania for the study abroad section of Europe. I imagine it will be easier to run in Romania but we'll see. I've been doing some core, especially pushups and hand stand pushups, I've run a little over the past few days but not a ton. Most I ran on any one of those days was maybe a mile, but I have been hiking around 5 miles a day through these hilly cities.

5 miles of running while my parents biked in a small town next to Siena, long name, but a nice biking town. Averaged mid 6 minute pace and that felt pretty hard, not a good sign of my fitness haha. To be fair I was speeding up to low 5 minute pace at many times to keep up and at other times had to slow down so probably a harder way to average that pace than keeping a nice steady 6:30 or so. But these past two days have had good runs, and I'll have to do some core before I shower. Tomorrow I will be in Florence so I'm not sure what running options are or how much time I will have.

2 miles in Padova, didn't run in Florence and was distracted in Ravenna so didn't there either.

Good run today, 4.7 in 30:00. I felt like I was at a fast pace but it wasn't hard. And that's 6:20s pace so it's a good sign. Also went to Venice today, favorite part of the trip so far, the feel of that city is incredible. Its really pretty and I just had a lot of fun there! Found some cool stuff for Wenda too!

Ran in the Dolomites today, woah it's really beautiful up there. Had a lot of elevation gain today, long steep inclines that dropped me to a slow pace, but I didn't walk which is the goal when it's like that.

But.. On the way back I came across some really pretty horses and at first I just stopped so I wouldn't startle them. But then I took out my phone and started taking pictures, I took a video and was just messing around so I bowed to the horse like Hargrid says to do in Harry Potter with hippogriffs- and the horse (who had been standing a couple meters sea immediately came up and started sniffing me and nudging me with its head and letting me pet it! And then it's friend came over and I just hung out and pet them for a while, they were so friendly and cute! So I got some awesome pictures and videos with them and then finished my run. That was a really cool fun experience though and definitely goes down as one of my favorites, running takes you on some cool adventures over the years. I think trying to come back so fast after my mission coupled with the really intense training program at suu kind of burned me out along with the frustration of injuries, which I'm pretty sure are all healed.

So I'm on a good fresh new start with my running, and I've been doing strength training so I'm bulking up a bit. But that will help with Spartan race and I like lifting and being strong, and I like running fast, so I'll just find a good balance that I enjoy and get better at both! My primary focus of exercise is on enjoyment and health, not competition anymore, but that's no gonna stop me from trying to knock off some pros at spartan at the end of July. I'm feeling strong and fast this week and I'm relatively out of shape compared to where I plan on being in 10 weeks, so those spartan guys better watch out!

Got stranded out some place in cluj so I just ran back instead of figuring out buses/taxi. Glad I did as I got to the hotel a full two hours ahead of my roommate.

4 miles in Romania, miles went 6:59, 6:26, 6:26, 6:25, 6:54, hiked up a steep uneven hill to get back to the hotel the last part of mile 4 and past to get to 4.25.

1480 steps up Poenari castle, it took me 11 minutes, so over 2 steps per second! Good workout amongst 7/8 hours of bumpy driving.

Awesome run in a small and pretty Romanian city, had some incredible mountains and I went to the peak of a small mountain/hill with my run, got a couple good pictures too! Will write more about Romania in once I'm home.

Solid run this morning in cluj. Ran out 2.1 and back. I have to check out of the hotel at 12 and my flight isn't until 6 so I'll figure out things to do and maybe look at more shops while I wait. Will be back in Utah tomorrow night, which will be like 7am two days from now for me. Learned a lot and saw many amazing things this month!

Woke up and had an amazing breakfast in Frankfurt. Then I left the hotel to find a good place to run, I found a nearby trail that went through a bunch of fields. So I took off and tried to map out a good mile time trial route, what I found wasn't perfect but it really pretty. The trail started out fairly uneven and took me downhill which wasn't ideal because that meant my time trial would be uphill, it also took me across a road that seemed empty when I first crossed. I went out an extra quarter mile to make sure I would have enough space coming back. The trail looked much better the farther I went but I only had 30 mins until I needed to be back by that point so I just turned and started.

I went out strong and the first third of a mile went by fast! I was on pace for like a 4:50 so that was good, then I ran into the road I needed to cross but unfortunately there were like 6 or 7 cars that came through right as I was getting there so I had to slow down and run on the shoulder for a second waiting for them to pass. It got a little steeper after that but I kept a decent pace and then kicked the last 400m. My time was 5:04 but I'm pretty sure I would have run under 5:00 for sure if it weren't for the traffic, and definitely had it been flat.

Overall a good workout the morning I'm flying out of Frankfurt! And now I have motivation to run another mile trial tis weekend at the Brighton track, gonna start speed now as I'm 2 months out from the Spartan race. So the plan is 6 weeks of hard workouts, hopefully will start at 25-30 miles per week and work my way up to 40-50 per week in July. Then the last two weeks I will run 5-10 miles per day and do light speed to taper. I will be in salt lake most of the next couple months I think so probably no retro fitness :/, will just have to use the rec center. Not ideal but if there's a will there's a way! I will also do upper body workouts with benching, curls, pull ups and other such things, and some good ab workouts.

I ran up to the rec center for 2 miles as a warm up and then did a good workout with pull ups, bench, curls, squats at 205, abs and such. Some lady came and unracked the bench and started using it for squats while I went to get water after my 2nd set and had been using the machine for 5 minutes so that was annoying, especially cause there's a machine that's dedicated for squats that was empty right next to it and the rec center only has one bench machine.

After that I ran over to the Brighton track but found out school is still in session for the kids there so I didn't use the track and ran around through the neighborhoods to get up past 5 miles. Then I did another set of bench at 185, curls, and pull ups and ran back home. Increased mileage day feels good and I still feel fairly strong! Definitely lost a step with strength though, and I lost 5-8 pounds in Europe so I will work to get that back. We'll see how well I can

Decent run today, it was warm. Tomorrow I'm going to weights and a track work out, not sure if I'm gonna do a ladder or a mile time trial, or both. Both sounds fun. Also I'm going to start my decision process between going to work in Texas or working at snowbird.

Ran to the track and did a workout, I did 2 hard 400s and was feeling like death, it was hot and didn't realize I how out of shape I am with track workouts. It was the middle of the day so there was no shade. I had that feeling where your body is dead and overheating and you kind of want to lie down and die. So I just recovered and did 2 more 100m sprints with plenty of rest and jogged back to the rec center and did weights and core, still sore from last time. I was still feeling pretty dead until got home, geez I think tomorrow I will work out during the night so its cooler and maybe try to another track work out. I'm certainly in different shape than I've ever been in, we'll see how all this work starts paying off soon.

Rough day, rough past month in some ways. But now its time to move forward. Didn't run today, that's ok, tomorrow I will run fast and hard.

The first day is always the hardest. Felt like crap but got out and ran to the gym and did a good workout and came back. I have the cutest niece in the world, there were good things about today.

Today started out pretty hard but got better. I had lots of ice cream, I'm going to play basketball with my old friends Nick and Hayden soon. Probably gonna see Devry again too, haven't seen him in 3 years!

Tonight I played tennis with my brother and then ran the cottonwood heights 5k course and back home. My pace was 6:45 so not too bad considering I was going pretty easy. I also did a bunch of pull ups and oh up bar workouts in between tennis and running. Pretty good stuff. Tomorrow I'm going to keep looking for jobs, work on study abroad stuff, study for the gre, and do gym and a track work out. And I'll find sometime to watch ntg as well, oh and more time with my niece and family will be awesome!

Today is the 6th anaversary of the first time I ran a mile in less than 5 minutes. My hip was feeling weird last night/this morning so I hot tubbed and stretched and now its good. After hot tubbing I benched 3x10 at 185, felt really strong, curled 2x10 and 35, also felt good, did pull ups, and some back workouts. Then I went home watched some tv and did some writing. Then I went back out for my run, I ran up to the rec center and did the 5k loop, then did 10 pull ups, abs, and ran home. Arms are sore, going to do some burpees before bed, perhaps the type Wenda showed me with weights.

Ran to the park with my brother, did pull ups and a ton of monkey bars, and more hand hold swing things. Maybe this isn't a bad place to train for Spartan.

I'm sore from yesterdays bench workout, that's good, workouts feel a lot more rewarding when you know you'll get stronger due to them. By the end of the summer i want to be benching 3x10 at 225, we'll see how that goes. Next week I mifhrbmove up to 205 for a set and see how it goes. Also want to do more back workouts, will probably do dead lifts. And runningwise I want to be up at 40 per week by July.

Also helped Kiley surprise Jake for his birthday which was so much fun!! Hopefully will go for another run tonight.

So I did go for another run, I decided to run a mile time trial. I'd eaten way too much food today, I was feeling really full by the end of the 2 hour lunch at rodisio grill, then we had desert, then I had a hot pepper, then I ate an entire bagguette. Then I went home after we hung out a little more and ate dinner and desert again. So when I went upstairs my stomach felt like it was gonna burst. So I was like, huh I should work this off, and for whatever reason I decided the best way to do that was a mile time trial.

I went to Brighton track and did a little under a mile warm up and some strethces and then just went at it. The wind was about 20 mph going against me on the backside of the track, so that was rough. I havn't raced in a long time.

I went out and it was feeling hard, I decided if what I was running didn't come in on pace I should probably just do repeats. It ended up being a 70 so that was good, but then I slowed and ran 80 and 80 for the 2nd and 3rd laps, I let the wind hold me back the last lap and then kicked for any chance I'd have but I finished in 5:04.

So not a perfect time trial, my throat is really bugging me now, bleeding and really irritated. I drank some Gatorade and that tasted like blood and my nose feels like death, so I need to lay off the gluten if I'm gonna start this again. Not perfect conditions for a fast time, but 5:04 isn't too bad, I bet next week I can run 4:50. But before then I have some workouts to do.I think I will try to do 2 more mile time trials in June.

After that I will do a pair of 5ks for the 4th and the 24th before the main race pen the summer.

Ran while my parents biked, they got a 20 second head start on the route cause my gps was starting. But I got to the top faster and had a big lead, they caught me going back down with a little under a mile left and probably got home about a minute before me. I averaged 6:20, my last full mile was 5:27 and I kept around 5:30 pace to finish. So next time I should go harder early on and try to bring that pace down to sub 6 if I want to get back home first!

I'm pretty happy about today's workout. I ran up to the rec center and did a bench workout with a warm up set of 10 at 155, 2x10 at 185, I did curls at 10x35 in between and then I decided to try for 205 even though my arms were a little sore after all that, I did 5 reps at 205, which I feel good about for my first set above 200. Next time I'll try for 6/7 reps or maybe just start fresh and go for all 10. I did pull ups, some abs, and back workouts too.

Then I ran the next 5 miles of my workout, I stopped with a quarter mile left to do monkey bars at the park, I did 40 monkey bars and then 20 of the monkey hoop things, the little hand holds you grab onto. So that was good. I finished with 30 burpees when I got home, not sure if I was just tired cause of the long workout or what but those burpees felt hard! I'm going to have to be careful not to mess up any of the obstacles at spartan. If I can pass all the obstacles I think top 3 is a possibility. If only fail one I think i could still make top 5ish, if I fail more than 2 I will be lucky to be top 10. But we'll see, I averaged 6:40 pace for today's run and it felt really good, body wasn't asking me to stop and I felt like it would have been comfortable to pick up the pace at any point.

So I'm getting in better shape, I'm feeling strong and fast and I've still got about 50 days until the race. I'm feeling good enough and confident enough today that I want to change my goal from top 10 to winning it.

Round 2 at the gym for back, pull ups, shoulders, and. Then another ab workout wit my brother afterwards.

Not the best day didn't really feel like doing much, I decided to get out and do a shorter workout early. So I ran to the gym, my upper body is really sore, but I did curls and pull up bar work out where I swung from pull up bar to pull up bar and around to the pull up handles and then finished with a pull up and hold, I did that a couple times. I also did curls and some abs. My arms were really sore, so I decided to just run back home. Averaged 6:30s for today's run so not bad. Tomorrow I'm deciding between a track workout and a mountain run up bells canyon. Will also get back on the bench and back workouts tomorrow.

Will play tennis tonight and maybe go for another short run then.

Body was calling for a total rest day, even though yesterday wasn't that hard. I just played tennis with my brother. So tomorrow I will do a pretty intense workout, that's all that's on my agenda. I will start work next week, but fortunately I'm gonna work at a gym so that will be nice.

Started a track workout at the Brighton track, started great with a 1200m in 3:45 in 95 degree weather that gave me loads of confidence I can break 5 now, then I did 800m recovery and was about to do 4 max effort 400m but I was starting to cough up my lungs again, just like last week when I ran the mile here. It was bad enough I went and found a little shade to try and let it pass but it kept up so I just left and went to the gym. Man not sure what's up, I think its just that track. Won't go back, I'll try doing a speed workout on the roads or at the Alta track and see how that goes. Maybe the suu track. Dang that's annoying to have what was going to be a 7/8 mile say that started out great stopped short. Will let my lungs recover for a couple hours and try to run while my parents bike tonight. Tomorrow will probably go up bells.

Went easy at the gym, just an easy set of bench, curls, and some pull ups and stuff. Then I hot rubbed because my shoulders still felt a little destroyed.

After letting my lungs recover for a few hours I ran while my dad biked up to the mouth of the canyon and back, we took a different route back home this time. I always get to the mouth first but I have yet to beat him home, last time was closer than today though. I averaged 6:30, not bad I guess because my lungs are still recovering. I was having an allergic reaction after my run on my neck and shoulders/chest, not sure if its related to my throat problems at the Brighton track or maybe i ate something I'm allergic to. Not going back to Brighton for a while though.

Ran to the gym and did a workout. Shoulders are hurting a little still. Geez my body is being lame this week. I just did 2x10 for 155 on bench and a set of 10x35 curls and 10x40 lawnmowers and then a bunch of back and ab workouts and pull up grip stuff as well, need to find my gloves. I'll do more abs and maybe more running tonight. I might take Saturday or Sunday off cause my lungs are still giving me a hard time from yesterday and my shoulders are hurting a little, but I went easy today and hopefully they will be better tomorrow. I'll do burpees and push ups tonight too.

Ran to the tennis court to play with my brother, did some sprints as well.

Started the day off with some rock salt bag carries, I carried two about 100m up a hill but one of them started sliding and then the handles broke and it was a mess. So instead I just carried one of them for half a mile. The last 200m i alternated between holding it over my head and hugging it. Pretty good workout, life would be harder as a fat person. Although their weight is distributed so it's not really the same or else they'd be ripped.

Then I went and played tennis with brother and did a bunch of monkey bar workouts arte, really need to find my gloves. I used other gloves today but they just aren't that good. Finished with a run.

Up a good 5 miles from last weeks mileage, steady but slow increases will lead me to success here. Next week might be big though, I'm running with taste Monday morning before he goes off to worlds and then Tuesday I will do a 7/8 miles (possibly a 10 miler with the guys in cedar) so yeah even if I only do like 5 tomorrow I might be at 25 miles after Tuesday. If that happens Wednesday will be rest or 4 miles at most. But next week could easily be a 40+ mile week, easily could get close to 50. Which would be awesome as long as I don't overdo it. I'll be careful though, I would probably go 4, 7, 4, 7-10 to finish out the week, so maybe a 47-50 mile week. I'm ordering a spear to train with for spartan and really just gonna give it 100% and hope that's enough for top 10 next month. (But really top 5 or 3)

Ran up the mouth of the canyons while my dad biked. It was fun, didn't feel too fast. Did some core on the pull up bar at the park on the way home. Tomorrow is gonna hurt but I'm gonna keep up with Tayte!!

Great run with Tayte today. I actually felt really good for my first real long run, especially since we did 2k elevation gain going up little cottonwood. It was fun to catch up!

The last mile going up got pretty hard. And that same mile was pretty hard to keep with Tayte going back down cause man he's fast and incredible at the technical areas, they literally do not slow him down haha. But I did well and it was really fun! We did some core in the middle school field next to his house on the way back, I was already pretty beat so that was really good. Also really glad we got the run in at the perfect point in the day when it wasn't storming.

Now to drive down to cedar city and get my stuff from Wendas vacant apartment and move it to the apartment I was gonna live in. Wow its just started coming down really hard, looks like large hail too! So glad we went running earlier!

Yesterday was really long, after training with tayte I drove to cedar, moved in my new apartment, saw some friends and teammates and then decided to drive home and got back way too late. Today I might just rest.

No mileage today but a good day of bench, curls, rows, pull ups, back, and other stuff.

Averaged 6:32 for 6.3 miles in the high 80s/low 90s, it felt easy do it was a pretty good day. Oh and I threw in a couple quarter mile pick ups in the middle. I started with an easy uphill mile in 7:27 and accelerated to finish in a 5:39. I also stopped after 5 miles to do a good workout at the gym, I did military press, overhead press, curls, rows, a few other back workouts, and the rowing machine. Can't remember if I did anything else. But yeah it was a good workout and I felt fast today, gym felt good and I got to a lot of muscle groups. Tomorrow will be back at bench, kind of excited. I'm going to do a lot with bench. I'm excited to see where I will be at the end of July.

Ran to the rec center as a warm up and did a lot of sets of bench, free bench, squats, curls, rows farmer carry with 2 45 plates, abs, back machine, rowing machine, pull ups, more abs, who knows if missing something. Anyways then I ran down to the park and did 20 monkey bars forwards and 20 monkey bars backwards, then 10 monkey handles forward and 10 backward. Then I ran 3/4 more miles in the heat and was dead. Full workout was 2 hours, I went easier on the running and averaged 7:15 today. Still was really dead by the end there. I'm getting a healthy change up of doing the bulk of my running done before and after my lifting. It's definitely more tiring after you've already been working out for over an hour.

Evening- did push ups, abs, and tennis with my brother. Then carried a rock salt bag for over half a mile and did burpees and Wenda burpees. This weekend's sub 17:00 attempt is a little ambitious, especially because its supposed to have a decent amount of uphill and I haven't don't that much speed and haven't raced in 7 months. It will be good to ease back into things, sub 17 feels like a really good goal for this one. It feels really good having gotten all the stuff I wanted to do today finished, it was a large list! These days where I spend 3-4 hours working out give me confidence I can beat or at least with the pros at Spartan. My hands keep getting best up from all the pull ups and weights, I have gloves now but they're still being beat up. Tomorrow will be a fairly easy day where I will spend more time concentrating on gre prep and do a practice test.

3 easy prerace miles with Jake. Its been good to catch up my best friend! SUU certainly seems more empty heading into this year without him. But if I'm lucky it could be my best year yet!

One should never concentrate so much on hypothetical future events or unreachable past events that they lose sight of the present and enjoying what they have. That's some thing I need to work on, I'm always very concetrated on the future trying to achieve a specific outcome or situation I have in mind, but in reality I'm a very small piece in a giant universe and no matter what I do, things will take their course and I can't predict or even full prepare 100% for the future, and I certainly can't control it. When I look back at this last year, it was such an amazing experience with Jake and Wenda in the fall and Wenda in the spring, it was the perfect situation. Yet at the time, in the fall I was too concentrated on something I never should have let bother me, and in the spring I was too concentrated with the future of how things were going to go. I was happy but I should have spent less time worrying and thinking about things I couldn't do much about. Now it's summer, and I'm concentrating way too much on the fall and what's going to happen then. But I'm taking for granted that I get to live and spend time with my parents and my brother and his family, I can spend 4 hours a day working out and goof off a ton of the time. In 50 years I'll look back at this summer and regret not spending every possible second with my family making more memories and becoming closer to them. I need to concentrate on the people I'm with and on the present, some day I will wish I could be here again!

So the course we raced today was not conducive to a sub 17:00 attempt, apparently what used to be one of the fastest courses in Utah got turned into one of the slowest this year. They started us up a giant hill for the first mile which resulted in no one breaking 6 the first mile and being gassed for the 2nd. I took 3rd behind Jake and Ben Vanbeekum, i beat Christian Corver who is a fast guy from my graduating year who's on the byu practice squad so that was really good. And considering Jake and Ben ran 15:20 last year on what this course was supposed to be and ran 17:20 and 17:45 this year I'd say my low 18:10 wasn't too bad. I think in a flat 5k I probably could have made sub 17 considering those guys ran a full 2 mins slower on this course. And I mixed it up with some really fast guys so I'm feeling pretty good about the race despite the slow time. Not much you can do when you've got a course like that,but yeah i had a lot of fun, it took me until about half way through the race to get my legs back under me after that huge hill.

Ran to the mouth of the canyon with my dad while he biked and then back down. I ran 5:31 for mile 4 and I felt great, last quarter of mile 4 was downhill so that helps.

I stopped at the park to and did 20 monkey going forward and 20 the other way. Then I did 10 monkey handles forward and back, on the exchange from one side to the other I banged my knee on a pillar pretty hard, I finished the 10 back and then walked over bad sat a table in the park for a few minutes while I let my knee recover and examined it. It seemed fine, just kind of a hard hit. So I got back up and did 10 pull ups and a few side wide pull ups with some side lifts for the obliques. Then I ran home and my knee was hurting so I went slow and eventually just walked in the last bit. I averaged under 6:20 for the run so good workout.

Will do abs later, hopefully my leg is all healed up by tomorrow, if not I will hot tub and swim, maybe bike. And tomorrow will be a huge upper body day. I'm excited.

Ran to the park and did monkey bars and then to the gym and did a very intense workout, spent an hour and a half working out there. 3 sets of 10 of Bench, curls, rows, pull ups, 3x500m rowing, pull downs, 40 leg lifts, pull up side lifts, 40 inverted crunches, wide grip pull ups, 3 minutes of farmer carry with 2 45s at max incline on tread mill, I did an oblique machine. Who knows if I'm missing something. Oh yeah I did 3 sets of squats with 135 and 155, those was pretty easy but I wanted to be careful with the knee. Man that was a long work out, after that i ran the 5k course and 2 more miles home with burpees to finish. So getting in 5 miles at a decent pace that I wasn't pushing at all after a huge workout was good.

Later I will hopefully do abs with my brother, push ups and a rock salt carry. My hands are still really beat up so that's frustrating.

33 days until Spartan. This weekend I'm coming up with a custom made race to simulate what Spartan will be like.

Later- Felt like I had some more in the tank so I went back to the gym with my dad and I did 3x10 of squats at 185, 205, and 225. Those all felt good, not too hard. Legs are feeling powerful, I want to 3x10 at 305 to be comfortable by the Spartan race, then the 400 pound tire flip will be nothing, I'm really not sure how hard its gonna be, but you only have to lift half of it up so.. Can't be that bad. Guess we'll see. Really wish I could find one to practice with. Then I did 2x10 dumbbell bench press with 50 pounds each. After that I did the oblique machine for 2 sets each side and another leg raise ab workout. Then I did some more pull ups and stuff with that. I tried doing a pull up with 45 pound dumbell between my feet and that was hard, I got all the way up but my hip started spasming so I dropped it and went and finished with some more rowing. This week my goal for running is to run over 40 miles, if I run all 7 days then over 45. Tomorrow I will make it up to Alta to run with the team and that will help with mileage. Strength workout wise I will continue just going by feel, it's working out pretty well so far. Tomorrow will be an easier day for strength training though.

Ran with the Alta cross country team making it 7 consequetive summers I've run up at Albion basin! I'll have to come again in a couple weeks when the road isn't blocked off. I ran with Tavin and Aj, Aj and I did 3 laps at the campgrounds, but on the 3rd some construction people had blocked off the bridge with trees they'd been chainsawing down. So I thought it best to turn back and call it a day. Had a nice finish to the run, and its always a great feeling to have chocolate milk at the end of an Alta run.

Then I went to be gym and ran another mile and a half with pull ups throughout, I did 5 pull ups holding 25 pounds between my feet and that felt pretty good. I'm really sore from yesterday though. I think the rest of today I will just rest, maybe set up the training spear for spartan, and then tomorrow will be another huge day. Looking forward to it, hopefully my muscles will be ready. I'm starting to feel my aerobic base coming back finally and that's a very good sign.

Wasn't feeling great today so I just ran up to the gym and did bench at 165 and 175 for 4 sets, curls at 35 and 40 for 3 sets, skipped squats, did a few pull ups with 35 pounds in between my feet, did wide grip pull ups. Oblique machine for 3 sets, abs. I did 3x10 dumbell row with 50. I did pull down machine and rowing machine 3 x10 at 100, 115, and 130. I did dumb bell bench for a set with two 55s. I did 3 shoulder workout lifts cause it would be good to get my shoulders stronger. I think that was about it before I ran back home. So nothing crazy today, we'll see how tomorrow is.

Realized I hadn't taken a day off where I didn't work out for at least an hour in weeks, and that along with feeling like crap the past two days led to me taking today off. Tomorrow will be a big mileage, big workout, big meals day and I'm excited for it.

Ran to the gym, I do obliques and abs and then pull downs, curls, dumbell rows, dumbell bench, 3 different shoulder lifts, squats 3x10 at 225, 245, and 265. 265 felt like a lot of weight on my back, my legs and butt felt a burn but they could have handled more. I'll have to see how much they can handle. I think I can do 305 but we'll see, I want to be careful. Then I did some more abs and finally got my turn on the bench and did 3x10 at 165 and 175 with more rows in between, my arms were pretty tired at that point. Then I did 10 wide grip pull ups, 10 pull ups, and 1000m of rowing. Then I ran around the long way home and stopped by the park and did monkey handles and monkey bars. My arms were fairly dead. I sprinted down the hill home and then ran a little more to cool down. I should run more today but I'm just not feeling it and I had been working out for 2 and half hours and needed to eat. Now that I've eaten I'm still not really feeling mileage, maybe a track workout but the track has been screwing with my lungs. I'll see if my brother will go with me and give the Brighton track a 3rd and final chance.

Had that surge of motivation to go break 5 and went to the track with Adam, I was gonna do a work out of 1600, 800, 400. I ran a 70 for the first lap of the mile, then I followed with a 78, then a 76, and finally a 74 for a total time of 4:58. I'd say it was like a 90-95% effort on the mile. I definitely could have gone harder the last 3 laps, my lungs felt a off but not nearly as bad as the last two times, still to be safe I just finished with a 400m in 60 seconds. Lungs feel kind of crappy but I'm not coughing at all so that's good news, I can probably train at the Brighton track. Ended up being quite the good day for training. Tomorrow will be really good too. This won't be my last mile time trial of the summer, I want to run under 4:45 during July.

2000 feet elevation gain going up a trail in Milcreek. It pretty steep and very technical, especially once I got above the treeline, it was terrible, there were really thick bushes and the trail was so overgrown you can't see where you're putting your feet and there are rocks and roots all over, there are places where there are no footplacements. So after getting tripped up and stubbing my toes into rocks and roots I couldn't see for a mile or two I decided to call it a day. Solid run though, good training. This will help a lot for the skyline half and Spartan. Which is 4 weeks away!

I don't know if I'll have time to go lift tonight. I will do core for sure though, and tomorrow I will have a great lifting day.

A new fresh month! Started it off on a solid note with running up to the gym, getting in a good workout, didn't feel as strong as I usually do and was a little tired, I kept at 165 for bench and 35 for curls, I did 50 for dumbell rows, I moved up on the oblique machine, pull downs happened. I did 10 of each of the 3 pull up variants that I do, I did my simulation of the twister for Spartan. I rowed for 500m. I did abs. Just kind if hit up all upper body, oh I did rope pulls too. Can't remember if I did any other stuff. I let squats go until later because my legs were feeling beat up from the past two days, my right hamstring/quad/hip is feeling a little weird, not bad though. I ran 4 more miles after gym, I also stopped at the park and did monkey handles and then monkey bars and then more twister simulation stuff. I ran a little at the park too, like half a mile. Then I ran home and finished with a hard kick/near sprint and then cooled down a little. Will do abs with Adam later along with burpees most likely.

Other good news!!! Draper days is July 14th so I can get my fast 5k in without having to worry about it being too close to Spartan.

It feels like my body isn't building back the way it should be. Today I ran up to the gym, I was already feeling beat when I started the run, I worked out for a while at the gym but my body wasn't feeling very into it and kind of telling me to rest on lifting. I did a decent amount of stuff but not crazy and then ran home. Body is tired, I think lifting a ton and running a good amount is hard for the body to adapt to. I'm going to run more later tonight and probably get up to around 7 or 8 miles. Then tomorrow I will go low on running and high on lifting if my body is feeling well enough, and then Wednesday I will race and get in mileage but no lifting at all. And then Thursday will be mostly lifting with like 4-7 miles. But I also have a new rule that I need to take one day a week off/easy and that will just be by feel.

Pre-Race run at around 6:50 pace. Felt easy, tomorrow I'm just going to go out with the leader until I die or win.

Warmed up 3 quarters of a mile and then raced a good race, I went out hard like I planned and fought for the lead for the first mile and then this other kid came through as the other guy started gapping me. I got caught by two other guys pretty fast and a 3rd a little later, there had been a group right behind I was slowly getting swallowed by. I was racing pretty hard and did a good job keeping mentally strong, although I feel like maybe I could have been a little stronger trying to stay with the last guy who passed me, I gave him too much of a gap to get him back. Brandon was coming up behind me and I wanted to catch the other guy so I picked it up but the gap had grown too much, I surged to the finish a little extra when I saw I was close to sub 17:00 but didn't quite reach it. But this is the best time I've had on this course which feels amazing and overall it was a really good race with some strong competition! This is 30 seconds faster than last years time on the same course which is a big confidence booster, draper days will be good too and I think my goal of sub 16:30 on that faster course is certainly in reach after this. Will do a few miles later with Adam.

Later- 2.5 miles with Adam. Body is feeling that nice wake up call to racing when its been a good while. But I'm in good shape, good sign for Spartan, don't think the gym is open today but I will do core and such.

Worked out a lot, bench, curls, curl machine, rowing, weighted rowing machine, back machine, obiques, abs, dumbell rows. More bench. Wide grip pull ups and hang. I think that was it.

Ran 5 miles while my dad biked after dinner, also stopped at the park for monkey bars with 40 monkey bars going into some pull ups. Averaged low 6:00. Tomorrow will probably be long run with rest upper body.

I also did a solid amount of core with Adam and again later at night with some shoulder and back workouts.

7.5 with 1700 feet elevation gain at the top of Milcreek canyon, went there with my Mom while she hiked. Pretty good run, did it in just over an hour (minus stopping at the top to take pictures and enjoy that for a bit). I got up to the top of some lookout, there was a peak over to the left but no trail so I just trail blazed up to the top to get a better view. It was pretty cool! Today is going to be a rest day for strength. 7.5 isn't that much mileage but since it was in the mountains it's a better and longer work out than that would typically be. I might do a few more miles tonight, who knows.

Went for a light jaunt to the tennis court because I wasn't feeling that good tonight. Once I got there I decided I wanted to go farther and ran up the hill. Got in about 2 very light miles, like incredibly easy. Felt a lot better afterwards.

3 miles at the Brighton track with Adam, we ran a pretty easy pace, like just under 8:00 per mile I think. Spartan race is three weeks away, so that's coming up quickly. So really I only have 2 weeks of training and then I will go kind of easy the week of. I will get more running in later, 40 miles for the week will be a good accomplishment. Also will go lift for a while today, once my energy levels are higher, it was hot out.

Later went to the gym with my dad, I did bench of warm up at 135, then sets 2x10@165, 2x10@175, and then one set of 5x185 cause I'm just getting to doing 185 again. But the 5x185 felt really good at the end of all the other sets so I think I can move up to make it a part of my normal workout. I did dumb bell rows with 55s in between as well as curls with 35s, getting a little too easy. I did the curl machine at 80 afterwards and that was really hard. Then I did obliques, pull downs, and weighed rowing machine. Then I did wide grip pull ups and then hang. I also did abs. Then I ran 2.5 miles averaging just under 6:00 and then did 500m of rowing in 2:00. Tomorrow I will do a Spartan workout, not concentrating on weighs or running, just Spartan crap. Good to get 40 miles this week. Last time I ran 40 miles in a week was last July when I ran the Jupiter peak steeplechase. Next week I will get in at least one run of over 10 miles, might save it for draper days and just do a large cool down.

3rd workout at night, light job over to the tennis courts and did 12 wide grip pull ups, monkey handles with the exchange, monkey bars forwards and backwards with pull ups throughout. Then I did some more pull ups and hangs. Then I bear crawls and ran home and did shoulders and core, new additions of bridges and supermans for back and butt. I need to train as hard as possible these next couple weeks. Tomorrow I'm going to do some Spartan obstacle training and burpee challenge, outside of that its in the air.

All of me wants to go work out a bunch today again except my body is telling me it's a rest day pretty strongly. So I'll listen to that. Might go throw the spear though.

A little over 5 miles but I'm not sure because I didn't have my phone. I ran up to the mouth of the canyon while my mom and Adam biked. I sprinted down the hill to the park on the way back and did monkey bars, twister simulation, and monkey handles. I ran about a quarter mile in between each of those. I did abs with Adam after that too. And 30 more burpees before I showered.

Earlier today at the gym I did a good workout on the bench, I wanted up with 10x155, then 10x175, then 7x185, 8x185, and finished with 2x205. I was careful with the 185 and 205 because it would be bad if I messed up on those. I also did curls with 80 on the machine, and one set of 10 at 35 and one set of 10 at 40. Both felt good. I did 3x10 at 55 for the dumbell rows. I also did a couple sets on the oblique machine, abs, pull downs, weighted rows, 40s for dumbell overhead press, I also did a set of squats at 225. I finished with rowing machine and wide grip pull ups. Still to come are shoulders and some back work outs tonight.

Shoulders, lower back.

Ran up at Alta with Alta squad, I ran 80 minutes with AJ, it felt good and was a really nice run. After I ran I went to the gym and worked out a bit but I was tired and found out I was sore when I tried benching, so I will take today easier with that.

Kind of a low day, didn't go to the gym. Ran at the Brighton track with my brother, lots of people today. I ran a hard mile in the middle, 5:07, didn't feel great, and my throat/lungs had trouble afterwards. Hopefully tomorrow will be better, I will just go to the gym and get to benching. I'm thinking pull ups are going to be my main priority, I'm going to 100 throughout the day.

I only did weights and they went well, today was pretty busy

Ran with my brother at the track, tomorrow will be a big day for mileage after the race along with a gym day. But first things first, my body should be ready for a fast time tomorrow and I'll take care of workout buisiness afterwards. Hasn't been a crazy hard week for working out but I will get to 30 miles for the week and put in another really good strength day to cap it off. Then Sunday I'm going to do the 100 pull ups with 5-8 miles. Then Monday will be a long run with arms rest, Tuesday will be intervals and weights and I will go from there.

Race day! Not a bad race, felt like death and pushed through it. My throat and lungs felt really messed up, like they do after I run at the Brighton track, and I ran there yesterday so figures. But getting my brother out to run is important.

Anyways the pace started out pretty fast, 3 guys broke away a little and then there was a group of 5 of us that kept together until the last mile. This is the first time I've gotten boxed in in a road race.. But I'm sure I also played a part in boxing in other guys unfortunately so its fine. Anyways I dropped off the pack first as that bubble of death in my chest/lungs I feel in bad races was really bad today, but I kept a good distance on the next guy in the pack. I surged with half a mile left and caught the guy with a bandana and tons of hair and then I lost power and was having trouble breathing and he caught me back, I let him get away, the finish line was farther away this year, they lengthened the course.

But then! I saw the clock and saw I was close to sub 17 and realized I had enough kick in me to catch him if I killed myself with 200-300 meters left so I busted out my kick and ran him down and got in around 16:57/16:58, he was a solid 20/30 meters ahead so it was a good kick, and I was so dead when I finished that I had to go lean over against some rail and sit down for a while. So I give my effort like an 8 (mile 3 could have been a little better), and how I was feeling about a 3. Still feels good to go sub 17:00 for a full 5k, the finish was about a hundred meters past where I remember it being, I wonder if the course is longer or the starting point is different. I also ran into a guy who used to run for suu after the race, mark! Also my old teammate Robby Lee was there so caught up with him a little. I also ran into Sasha at the starting line. I was going to cool down around 7 miles but I was coughing up my lungs so I decided to go easy and get mileage in later tonight. I also ran into a girl I took AP world history with like 5/6 years ago during my cool down so that was cool. Good race, don't feel great about this weeks mileage but I will get to 30, its not the end of the world and I will be in really good shape for Spartan in two weeks.

Spent all day doing my essay for study abroad, when I finally finished I went for a refreshing nighttime 6 miles with man pull ups and twister simulation.

Went to the gym and did 2x10@55s for dumbell bench, 2x10@55 dumbell rows, 1x10@80 curl machine, 1x10@35 curls, 1x10@40 curls. 2x9@185 bench, there was a guy who was about 6'3 and must have weighed 250 of more using the bench before me and he was benching 185 too. But that felt good to be benching as much as a guy that big, I mean he was kind of fat but his arms were big. I also dead lifted the 185 a couple times because I had to adjust the hold to a lower position than the tall fat man had it and I didn't want to take the weight off. Anyways I also did 1x10@60 dumbell rows. I did 2 sets of pull down machine and 2 of pull back machine. I did 2 sets of obliques and abs. I think that was all at the gym today. My bench is coming along nicely, I will move up to 195x10 after Spartan. And hopefully by the time school starts I will be able to pull off 3x10@205. Oh after benching at 185 I did 20x135.

At night I ran to the park after it stormed and did a lot of good stuff,on key bars, monkey handles, twister, a new thing with the rope bridge thing, pull ups, bear crawls, more bear crawls, more pull ups. Lots of good stuff. I'm feeling ready for this Spartan. I need to get in 10 more good days of training and then trust in the work I've put in, I'm stronger than ever, I'm faster than I've ever been during the summer, and I'm ready for this.

Good day and a good run. Ran the first 3 miles with my brother and then continued on, I got a solid 1000 feet elevation gain during today's run and I tried to run as much on the grass area as possible on the sides of the road to try and simulate Spartan. Tomorrow will be a big one, gym, Tully long run, and park workout. Probably going to be my last 3 workout day before Spartan, but should be great. I finished pretty fast for today's run.

Did abs later.

Ran the gully in 43 minutes, it was 97 degrees today so that was a good effort, it was hot. I also got in a lot of spear throws today, I'm successful about half the time from 20 feet away so not bad, hopefully will get to like 9 times out of 10 by the time the race arrives. But I also think the Spartan target is bigger than my cardboard box on toip on a plastic bucket. So training is going well overall.

My wrist has been hurting just a bit so I will be careful at the gym today and not do anything that hurts.

Gym went well, the only thing that made my wrist feel off was the curl machine. I warmed up 10x135 on bench and them did 3x9/10/9@185 for bench. I finished with 20@135 as that's proven to be a good workout. In between those I did 3x10@60dumbell rows, one set of curl machine at 90, 1x10 curls at 35, 1x10 curls at 40. I did two sets of obliques and abs. Then I did 2 sets of pull back machine and a new one which I.will just call pull aways, they were pretty good. I think that was it, later I will go to the park for monkey bars/handles, twister, other Spartan training. And abs, back, and shoulders also to come. Tomorrow will likely be a mountain run, we'll see!

Park workout was good, wide grip pull ups hurt my wrists a little bit so will rest on those until I'm feeling better. Race is getting close!

Wrists are a little messed up, not bad though, just some minor pain. So pushup, wide grip pull ups, and curl machine and most curls are going to be take a rest. But I benched 3x10@185 which was great, I wanted to do 195 for the last one. I also did 10x135 to warm up and 20x135 to cool down. I did 3x10@60 for dumbell rows and I did 2 or 3 sets at 40 of hammer curls because they don't hurt my wrists. I did 20 regular pull ups and they felt fine. I did 2 sets of obliques with abs and then pull backs once and pull aways twice. Pull backs machine was being used and I figured pretty similar to rows anyways.

Will run 3-5 miles maybe with some speed as well as do core, back, and shoulders tonight. Tomorrow will be a longer run.

Ran with my brother and stopped at the park on the way back to do monkey bar stuff, that went well. Solid elevation gain, I'd say almost 1000 feet. Long run tomorrow.

Ran 6.5 in just over 40 minutes, averaged 6:15 so that was solid, 500/600 feet elevation gain. If I can keep a low 6 pace next Saturday that will be great. Well all I can do now is get some nice runs in the next few days, and then 3 miles on Thursday and Friday. I'm going to look at the week leading up to my state championship race.

Day off completely, I believe this year is going to be ok no matter what happens, I just need to get my grad school checklist in order, nail the gre, and look for good opportunities at school. Tomorrow will be a nice long run and good solid weight lifting day, nothing crazy.

3 sets of pull a ways, 3 sets of pull backs, 1 set weighted rows, 3 sets obliques and abs, 1 set dumbell rows @65. 1x10 dumbell bench press wit 2 55s,then 2x10/9@185, my hands/wrists felt it a little on the last two of the 2nd set so I just finished. Want to be extra careful this week. Then finished with a set of 15@155. 2x10@40 hammer curls in between bench sets, don't dare do other forms of curls with my wrists right now. 3x10@60 dumbell rows in between each bench. Then I did overhead press@35(2), and various shoulder lifts with 20 pound dumbells.

Ran the first 2 miles with my brother and did some monkey bars and handles. Then I ran 6 more miles and did another obstacle thing and bear crawls, rolls. Then finished home. There a few obstacles I haven't really been able to prepare for in the Spartan race but I Wil have to trust my fitness and just go after them. Getting kind of nervous, first race I've felt like this about since high school! Abs and back workout.

Ran up at lake Blanche today, ran for about 50-55 minutes. I twisted my ankle near the top and was worried it had sprained, I felt/heard a pop and it hurt to run and felt weird. I pulled over in a shady area and examined it, wrote the alphabet with it, it seemed alright after that. But I decided I needed to be more careful the week of the race, still a good final mountain run before Spartan. And I always have a weird but insignificant injury leading up to a really good race, like when I ran into the rail outside the gym going for a cool down the day before my massive pr at byu my junior year. It's a good omen if anything. Tomorrow will be a fast but short day, nothing too intense, likely just a couple fast miles during a 4/5 mile run. I will also do a decent strength workout, easier than usual but enough to get a good workout. Then Thursday will be 3 miles easy, maybe some pick ups, and some light strength. Then Friday I will do another easy 3, the only strength training I will do will be at the open house for the course if I go.

Will fill in previous days later. Today I ran 3 miles in 20 mins on treadmill and checked out the course. I really tore up my hands sliding down the rope climb, so I've been tending to that. Nothing I can do now but put some mole skin on tomorrow morning under my gloves and go at this race with reinvigorated intensity.

Started off really strong, I made a move into the lead 20 seconds into the race and held onto it for a few minutes, I held onto it up the hill after the first obstacle, then we took a dive into the barbed wire crawl. They had artificially created a muddy area to crawl through by spraying water all over, I let one of the pros ahead of me so I could follow his lead and take a better route. That was a mistake, people began passing and I had a knee thrust into my side and someone swiped out my arm and I ended up with a face and mouth full of mud. I exited the barbed wire in about 20th/25th and started picking people off again but the trail suddenly got really narrow making it very difficult to get ahead of anyone, I made small progress here and there but it was taking me a long time to get back up to the lead pack. My gloves got ruined in the muddy crawl and my rope burns opened back up pretty early on in the race, wasn't gonna let that hold me back though. Unfortunately in mile 5 just as the trail started opening up again I sprained my ankle, it twisted and popped and I felt a tear as i went down. My race was over, nothing I could do now. As the pain began to subside I lay there watching the field pass my by, knowing there was no way I was going to run anymore that day. It was a frustrating moment, all the summers training had built up to this. I was going to fail, not only not take top 10 but not finish the race.

I remembered why I was doing Spartan in the first place,I got up as soon as my ankle calmed down enough for me to feel what was going on with it, I couldn't move it around much but it supported my weight alright. I decided to make my way through however much of the last 3 or 4 miles of the course as I could. As many of the remaining obstacles couldn't be done with a sprained ankle, I had to do over 200 burpees. It was really frustrating and annoying, my hands and leg were in really bad shape and the rest of my body was cut up everywhere. It took a long time to get through the last few miles of that course on a sprained ankle but eventually it happened. It wasn't what I was hoping for, but it was an exceptionally difficult race with some very crappy and unexpected difficulties, and I got through it. I can't control everything that happens in a race, but I can control my attitude and the effort I give. Today might not have been as fast a race as my body is capable of when healthy, but I did my best and when the goal switched from qualify for worlds to finish, I accomplished that goal. And in the end pushing through all that physical torment was a rewarding experience, I didn't have to look back on the race with regret and disappointment afterwards, I can say I'm proud of my effort and proud of not quitting when it may have been far easier to have done so.

Ran with my brother to test out my ankle and then biked with my dad, pretty good workout! Ankle is feeling good eenough I think I will go for 4 miles tomorrow, also will go see what I can do at the gym, might not do much.

2 on the treadmill and weights, well weights that my hands would allow me to do.

Ran a hard 5 with my dad while he biked, then ran 3 easy with my brother. Ankle still swollen but its getting there, definitely will be fine for skyline next week. What I am worried about is my aerobic fitness, I had 4 days adding up to 4 miles after I sprained my ankle and had been taking it easy before that race, so from yesterday to the Wednesday before my mileage was like 15. Probably why today felt pretty tough. Oh well. I'm just going to keep getting in strong runs and then have a fun race.

Ran 5 hard miles with my Dad to the mouth of the canyon and back, felt like the hardest effort I've given this run. Also did core. Will do weights this weekend, my wrists and hands suck!

Weights- 1x10@155, 2x9@185 bench, 1x15@155. 3x10@65 dumbbell row (highest weight at the rec center) but I'm going back to cedar in a couple weeks, retro has dumbbells going up to 100 so I doubt I'd do more than that. 1x12@35 hammer curl, 1x12 max pull backs. 2x12/10 oblique, abs. Shoulders. I think that was it, my wrists are sucking so I'm going on easy on a lot of stuff in the gym and icing a lot.

After dinner I ran 10 miles from my house up to Wasatch boulevard and down to 4500 south and back. Felt good, asthma was bothering me a little but didn't stop me from running a fast pace, I really picked it up the last few miles and on the way back in general. I also took a detour up the trail to mount Olympus, which is what took it from 9.6 to 10 (guessing, didn't have my phone) but on Google maps it said my route from home to there is 4.8. That and the 3ish minutes of stopping at lights and the minute looking out over the valley from the highest part of the trailhead means that the 70 minutes from the time I left home to coming back was a good pace, mid 6 minutes average I'm guessing!

Wow today was a steep one, went up 26 minutes and down 26 minutes because it was just that steep and technical that going down was as slow as going up. Tomorrow will be weights and 8ish miles in the gully with Davis!

Ran with Davis in the gully, it was really good to see him again and catch up, we'll definitely run again before I head back down to school. Them I ran the cottonwood heights 5k course with my brother after that. Good day of running.

Also earlier today I went to the gym and did a good bench workout of 1x10@155 then 3x10@185, 3x11@65 for dumbbell rows, 2x10@40 curls, pull backs, pull aways, obliques and abs, some shoulder workouts and pull ups. It was a good time. I like being in shape!

My best friend Jake won with a course record and I took 2nd! So very good race all around, I got two hours of sleep last night so I was kind of falling asleep on the shuttle going to the start. The race was at 6 and the shuttles left at 5:15 and it was a 30 minute drive to those so we woke up before 4:30.

I started laughing when the race started and couldn't stop until half a mile through, not sure why but it was a good time! I just kept on Jake's tail for the first mile or two and then he started getting a little ahead of me. The 3rd place guy was on my tail from mile 2 to about 9 when I decided to make a surge and ran a really fast mile, didn't see him after that. The first 3 miles were steep switchbacks, the next 7 we're down hill, and the last 4 were rolling hills which were tough after those first 10. Jake and I 1-2d the race which was awesome!

Trying to get in better shape for race next month, ran two kind of fast miles.

Ran

Ran 4 miles with Cameron, a friend from my mission. When we got back I saw Kasey on the track and we talked for a bit, I ended up joining him for his workout. He did 3x3 miles, because I'm not one the best runners in the country I ran every other lap with him.

Kasey is in crazy good shape, he split 14:56, 14:55, 14:30. And considering the 6000 ft elevation pretty much turns those 3 miles into 5ks and he's a miler, it makes that workout even more impressive!

Considering I've been running about 10 miles per week, that workout was pretty tough. I averaged 4:51 per mile on strava during the workout so that puts my average 400m repeat at 72 seconds with about the same rest. That's a good workout for being fairly out of shape! Afterwards we got recovery frosties, extra good after that workout!

I brought a bike down to cedar so I could run while Wenda bikes but it got a flat tire, so I'm working on that, I think there might be a hole but I'm too busy to concentrate on it. Hopefully Cameron and I are going to race a mile and break 5 soon.

Ran a few miles trying to prepare just a little for my annual race next week. I'm not nearly in the shape I was in a few months ago, weaker, slower, and much less endurance. But I've been going to the gym about 2 times each week and have retained a good amount of strength anyways, although I've been having to go easy on the bench. I've been doing a little running. Not nearly enough though, I'd say from September until now I've probably averaged about 4-5 miles per week on 1 or 2 runs per week. My goal for this 5k is basically keep in the 17:00 range and finish top 10. I will probably run just under 6:00 pace per mile on the first half because its uphill and then I will hopefully increase my pace on the way back and maybe average about 5:40. With a strong kick that should be enough to stay under 18:00. Not exactly the shape I was in 2 years ago for this race, but too late to change that. Today I ran 6:40 pace for the first 2 miles and finished with a 5:50 mile, my legs felt a little weak that last mile so I will try and run a few more times before the race. My goal going forward is to run 15-25 miles per week and run 3-5 times a week. I'd love to get up to about 10 miles on some of thosr runs so I can build endurance too.

Premeet at Wendas gym

Kinda slow for the race

Gonna start running a little more often, but probably not a ton more total.

Nice 10 minute run, went a bit long.

Dropped wenda off to work and ran home. Cold and I'm out of shape. Averaged just under 7:15.

Same as yesterday, still out of shape but it felt easier today. Average was 7:10.

Averaged 6:12 and opened with a 5:15 mile uphill. Wasn't planning on that, kind of surprised I ran that fast. Finals are over, glad this semesters classes are over. By far the least interesting class set I've taken in college. But next semester is going to be great, two legal studies classes, on history of psych class, bowling, astronomy, and some credit hours from being a TA.