cheryl

Some of us from the group met at Michelle's house at 5:45 and ran 8 miles.  Those there:  Julie, Cheris, Peggy, Debbie, Lisa, Nancy, Aaron and his friend Siddaharta (I guess that's his real name, that's what he told us. He goes by Buck also.)  And of course Michelle was there.  We split up pretty early and I ended up running (or trying to run) with Peggy and the guys.  I kept thinking I shouldn't be running Peggy's pace, it's too fast, but I couldn't help but try.  I'm sorry, I guess Steve's right, I just try to push it on every run when it would be better to take things a little slower.  Anyway, they gradually pulled away from me, but I was able to keep them in sight.  We ran by Peggy's house to see her new sod; it looked really good.  Peggy was nice enough to slow down and run with me the last two miles or so.  Total time for the run was 1:13:04; we did stop for a light for at least a minute it seemed, so maybe total running time was really 1:12, which I would be very happy with.  Great morning to run!

Today was not a great day.  I met with our Bingham group at 5:30 and we started by running a 25 minute warm-up that felt too hard the entire way.  The pace was probably about 9:30.  Then Peggy had us do some speed where we ran half mile repeats.  I just didn't have it today, I really struggled.   Makes me wonder whether I ran too fast yesterday and was feeling it today, because I did push the pace a little yesterday, averaging 9 minute miles when Steve told me I should be closer to 10 minute miles on my easy days.   Or was it a recovery issue, maybe I didn't recover fully yesterday.  I want to be able to run well on most days, I don't want to feel trashed, so maybe I need to make my easy days even easier.

Today was my treadmill day.  I first did about a 10 minute warm-up of walking/slow running.  Then I did about 15 fast one minute sprints and one minute recoveries.   The "sprints" weren't overly fast, but faster than I usually run.  Then I ran a 5K on the treadmill in about 22 minutes, with the treadmill set on a decline, so I did get some help with running slightly downhill.  I used to do these 5K runs a lot when I set my St. George PR last year, then I struggled with some injuries early this year and seemed to really slow down, so with my advancing age, entering that time of life (you know what I mean), I almost believed I would never run a 5K on the treadmill that fast again.  So needless to say I was quite happy with the effort today.  Isn't running great, you can feel great all day after a good run (of course, if it's a bad run you try not to have it ruin your day.)

We met at the River Front park by the East pavilion.   The plan was to take it easy because of races tomorrow.  Once again, I struggled.  I'm thinking now my main problem  is I'm too tight in the hamstrings, hips, glutes and back area, and that makes it hard for my legs to stride out well.  I'm spending too much energy fighting the tightness. So once again, I will make stretching a HIGH priority.  Check back to see if this works.

This year started out promising, I hit PR's at all the Salt Lake Track Club Winter Series races in January and February, and then for some reason I got lax on the stretching and by late March I got hit by some serious sciatica/piriformis issues that really slowed me down.  Since then I have consistently hit PW's, the slowest 5K and half marathons since 2003.  So I knew today would be a PW in the 10K and seriously debated whether I even wanted to run it and have to see the awful truth.  But I decided why not, a race would probably be good for me.

So yesterday I stretched and stretched A LOT, trying to get things to loosen up.  I had been really tight in my run yesterday and wondered if I could possibly get things better for today.  I think I figured out I need to do more hip exercises for flexibility so that's what I concentrated on.  Josse told me the pigeon was a good yoga stretch, so I've incorporated that into my routine.  Last night I went out with my dog to see how I felt and ran a little and felt pretty good, so I was more confident for today.

So I definitely felt quite a bit looser during the race, which was a good sign.  My time was a PW (in the last five or six years) but just the fact that I felt better left me somewhat encouraged.

Our Bingham running group did well, several placed high in the race.  Peggy won for the women, Lynette was 3rd, Jessie 4th, Michelle, Julie and Cheris did great, Debbie won her age group, I think Nancy M. did also.  Hope I didn't forget any of the women.  The men I won't mention, too many to mention.  Now our coach STEVE ASHBAKER won the race overall.  Yea Steve!!  So I'm glad I did it, it was fun.  I warmed up before hand and then cooled down, so that's where the extra mileage came from.

We (speaking of  me, Debbie, Cheris, and Michelle) met with Steve today at the Jr. Parkway Trail at 126th So.  The idea was to run a recovery run after yesterday's race.  Right when we started running I felt like the pace was too fast and it wasn't true recovery, but hey, we were in a group and I wasn't going to be the one to tell them to slow down, so I just plugged away, trying to keep up.  Eventually things got easier as I warmed up into the run.  Steve talked to me about why I'm struggling with running right now, he thinks my hips are weak and I spend too much contact time on the ground, my cadence isn't fast enough, I don't pick up my knees enough, I shuffle too much, I look tight, I look weak, I slouch too much... but besides that my form is ok.  So I guess I have a lot to work on.  He suggested doing fast uphill sprints to help with strength and knee lift.  He also suggested doing squats and other strengthening exercises.   So all that was very informative.  Right when we had about done 10 miles, we passed Julie and a different Michelle and they said they were going 13 miles, so I was afraid everyone would want to go 13 also, but we stopped at 10.  That was just enough for me.  We talked for a while as we stretched, and of course the conversation was interesting as always.