The Renegade

AM: Went to Logan XC practice and did about 7.5 easy on the canal trail, then strides. 7:05 average. (Paul and I picked it up at the end). I think I'll just try and go to these practices every time because it's people to run with and I gotta drive my brother there anyway. 

PM: 2 easy to Woodruff and back, included jogging on the field and a tetherball match. It was raining for like a minute while my watch was loading but then it stopped, I was super bummed about that because it was still pretty hot. 

Woke up and did a workout that involved chasing CRs on some fairly popular segments on the river trail. I had my brother by me on his bike with a speaker to keep me turnt. We started at 8:30 and it was already hot out. The segments were a north one and a south one on the OG river trail, which were .8 and .7. I had to beat 5:44 and 5:14 pace respectively. Relaxed too much on the first one and ran 5:52 pace for it. The next one I really went ham but hit 5:20 pace. Those bridges really mess up any rythmn you  might have going at that pace. Then jogged over to the Icon trail and ran .9 of it. I had to be under 5:16 pace and I was 5:14 pace so I did get one CR. Fun stuff. Getting CRs is another good form of motivation if you don't let it take over your training.

Slept in today and went out for a three miler to willow park at noon. Kept it shorter because I had a job interview at 1:30. Felt pretty good actually. 7:12 ap.

In the evening I ran almost 5 miles to get 8 in the area north of center street and west of main street. Drew something with my GPS. :) Didn't feel too great but I had my bro with me. 7:28 ap.

At about 10am I drove to Logan Canyon and parked at the second parking lot a little bit before 2nd Dam. Took the upper trail and since I parked so far up I got to the rocky area about 3.5 miles in. From there on it climbed at a very rapid rate up Spring Hollow (900 ft in a mile) so I did a lot of power hiking, but it was really pretty and stuff, there were alot of quaking aspens, which you don't see naturally at lower elevations (below 5.5K ft really). I "ran" a 14 minute mile before I turned around. Going down on that part you couldn't go fast at all because of all the rocks. Grea run and it got me the majority of my weekly vert (1600/2000). Maybe I'll try to get a lot of vert next week since I'm not doing any workouts. 8:46 ap!

AM: Went to the track and was going to do my warmup with the XC team but I barely missed them so I did a lap around the school then 4 laps on the track for a 2 mile warmup. The workout I did was pretty easy, I just wanted to get some turnover and combine it with slight fatigue. So I did 8x200 at a pretty hard effort with a 200 jog, and then went right into the next one, so 2 miles of continuous running. I went by feel and didn't get the times but I can tell you the fastest pace I hit on each one if that helps: 4:06, 4:47, 4:33, 4:16, 4:17, 4:16, 4:09, 3:57. So I guess they werent that fast but I was trying to stay relaxed on most of them. By now kids were getting back from there run so I changed shoes and jogged out towards the river trail hoping to meet Paul, Kalin, and the coaches and it worked out perfectly I met them a mile out. Then jogged one more mile with Strand. 

PM: Headed to Bountiful during the day to spend the weekend at the grandparents and be close to SLC for the race. After watching a parade which was reeaally hot I ran 3 miles at 8:30, which was out to Bountiful High, jogging around there and running back. Felt pretty tired but the pace was actually faster, 6:54 ap.

My dad took me to pick up my packet at like 1, saw Collin there at the Utah Run stand shoutout to him. Then we drove the course (would have run it, but it was hot and I did not want to make my dad wait 45+ minutes for me). So we parked at Liberty Park and I did two laps for 3 miles. I really love the woodchip trail they have around the perimeter, the canal trail in logan needs to be like that. Didn't feel too bad and there was a lot of shade. Negative split for a 6:51 average.

Really looking forward to this race because if I feel anything like I did a the Turkey Trot than I will obliterate my PR because I am alot fitter than I was in November, it'll be 75 degrees vs. 29 degrees, and the course is downhill vs. very hilly. My goal is sub-35 (5:37 pace) so hopefully I can do it.Based on the Freedom Run if I did a 10K down BSF canyon then I would run sub-35 so I should be good. I'm just bummed I don't get to race Eugene. We would have duked it out like crazy! Maybe some other time.