Blake Bennions running

Canal with Jake. Felt like poop the whole run, tried to do a 2 mile pick up and like immediately felt gassed. Could just be Friday travel day and bad night of sleep and a bunch of junk food. Not exactly sure what was wrong today. Oh well, tight lungs and low energy is better than perma-wrecked legs. Otherwise had fun.

Run cut short because I came across a duck in distress and after inspecting the scene for a moment realized her ducklings were trapped beneath a storm drain. I called non-emergency number for Harrisville and the police and fire department sent some people over an they opened it and scooped out 8 ducklings. It was like 9:30 and starting to rain after that so I just ran home and called it a day.

With Kolten and Henry, also met their friend Matt this morning and ran most of our warm up with him. Last workout before Ogden, I did 4xmile with 2 mins rest at goal hm pace. First couple I started out a bit fast but I evened out. Splits were 5:22, 5:19, 5:26, 5:26. Felt better towards the end. I think the first 4 miles of Ogden I'll probably go 5:30ish. Crossover will be really interesting, I think I should just win it if I can but with lowest possible effort. Excited for all the races I have this year:

Crossover this week

Ogden next week

Founders day in late June

Probably a 4th of July race

Des News Marathon July 24

Top of Utah half in late August

Peach days

So 7 races in the next 4 months. This fall I'll at least do cottonwood heights thanksgiving 5k and another half or full... might pace Kolten at St George assuming I've gotten free entry from my half time.

With Kolten and Henry, ran into Matt again. Ended up skipping yesterdays run because I got caught up with yard work and then just didn't want to go by the time it was 9pm and I knew I'd be running in the morning. An extra rest day isn't going to hurt me going into 2 half marathon races in the next 8 days. I'm very excited for both, although I might pull out tomorrow at mile 4/5 if it's going poorly and it looks like I'd have to truly wreck myself to achieve a desirable result. Part of me is dreaming about w world where I win both crossover and Ogden if no one like travis feeney or Kevin Kirk show up this year. 69-71 minutes could win it take 5th at Ogden.

Big confidence builder. I went out at about race effort as planned, my mentality was that if I can drop everyone on the way up I can cruise on the way down and stay pretty fresh for Ogden. I executed well but there happened to be a guy who took 84th at Boston last month in 2:21 who showed up and even at about race effort he was gapping me about 5 seconds per mile for the first 2 miles. I figured I either wasn't going to win or if I did I would be hosed for Ogden so I backed off 30ish seconds off the pace after mile 2. I think I could have maintained a 5-10 seconds/mile gap with the guy who won- hopefully that applies to road races too.

I kept my heart rate in the 150s and 160s the rest of the race and just enjoyed the run, I got passed by another guy at about mile 6 and then another guy on the way down around mile 8. Turns out it was former footlocker finalist and fast running blogger Conner Baller who passed me at mile 8. Always an impressive turnout of fast guys for this race.

Strava of the guy who ran 2:21 at Boston says his heart rate reached 180s on this run so seems like he went all out, I likely would have been within 1-2 minutes of him if I went gave max effort for this race. I think sub 70 is on the table for Ogden, even with any reduced freshness from this race a week before.

Overall I ran 30 seconds faster than last year despite running at 70-80% effort for the last 11 miles and I'm very close to being able to keep with a guy who ran 2:21 at Boston. I'm pretty thrilled!