cheryl

I went on a bike ride this evening with my husband, you know, just a nice husband/wife thing to do together on a Sunday.  We went at least ten miles, so I'm giving myself credit for two miles of "running equivalent."

It's exactly two months until the St. George marathon.  Time to get serious!  I met with some of the group at Bingham at 5:45 and we ran south on 2200W. to 114th So., then up to Daybreak.   We saw how the temple is progressing up there.  We then ran back by 9800 So. to the high school.  I was feeling in my "mean speedwork" mood I guess and suggested running some repeats on the "hill" there in the Bingham parking lot, so we did 5 of them.  I wanted to do more but didn't want everyone mad at me.  I ran a lot of the run by Nancy and her dog Duke.  I think I ran faster just being by Duke because he didn't want me to get ahead of him and we kind of turned it into a race.  That was fun!  Thanks Nancy and Duke.

We met at Parkway Palisades today to run hills.  First we did a warm-up around the cemetery, then it was to our old familiar routes in the Parkway Palisades neighborhood.  We ran the two mile loop, and my time was just under 17 minutes.  Then we did our mile repeats on the hilly street.  My times there were 9:07 and 8:53.  I tried not to push them too hard and keep them at marathon effort.  If I can run the Veyo hill mile in 9 minutes, I'll be happy.  I don't think I've ever been under 9 for that.  Then Peggy and Debbie went to run some more miles, and at the time I didn't feel like it, but later I felt guilty about not doing the extra, so I ran on my treadmill for around 2 miles, so that's how I got my total mileage.  Felt pretty good today.  Last night I did some hamstring curls and for the first time in forever my left hamstring didn't hurt, so maybe I'm finally healing up there.

It was a bit of a  struggle to get going this morning.  Peggy and Debbie had made plans to run at 6:00am, I hadn't committed, so I had an easy way out.  I got out of bed at 5:15 and was sorely, sorely tempted to return to it, but I made myself get ready.  Once I was out and running, as is almost always the case, I was glad I had not given in to temptation!  We ran along the canal road for most of it, we added some street running in at the end.  I'm not sure of the pace, but I went for 1:12, so I'm counting that as 7 miles.  We did see Cheris, she was in the middle of a 13 miler and she looked good.  I'm glad I got the miles in.

We met with the group at 5:30am at the trailhead by 9800 So. and the Jr. River Parkway.  Jody from the blog was there for the first time, so to welcome her to the group, she got to drive us up to the top of 9800 So.  Thanks, Jody!  We then ran down; the idea was to practice downhill running, trying to get us ready for Top of Utah and SGM.  I ended up running with Jody and Cheris for most of it.  We went past the trailhead and ran up to 700 W., so we got a few hills in there also.  It was a fun run, much easier running down then up obviously.  The others there were Peggy, Lynette, Dean and Greg R. 

Later I took my 9 year old to the Rec pool.  I pool ran and did other exercises while he swam and played around.  This way I got in another workout but didn't feel guilty because I was spending "quality time" with my son.  I'm crediting myself with two more miles of running because I ran for about 30 minutes.

Treadmill day--I ran fast one minutes followed by a slow minute recovery,  total distance was 7 miles.

My 9 year old had football practice at 7:30am today, so I missed all the group runs because I wanted to be at practice.  After that I had my husband drive me up to around Suncrest, and the plan was for me to run home.  I figured if I stayed close to home I wouldn't put in the mileage, I would wimp out early.  So I took off at a slow pace and ran west to the Jordan River parkway and got on it at Spring View Farms.  I did the Jeff Galloway method of running some and then taking walking breaks.  Anyway, all went ok until I got to around 126th So. where there is a fork in the trail.  I knew if I went left where the trail would lead.  So I went right instead thinking I'd explore where that went.  That was a mistake.  It just kind of ended around 112th So.  I thought for sure there would be a dirt trail or something that would lead to 106th So., but I was wrong.  I went up into some neighborhoods trying to find a way to get to 106th So., but I couldn't find a way.  I finally wound up at 114th So., and headed east there to Wal-Mart Supercenter.  By that point I'd been running for almost 2 hours and had had enough, so I called my husband to come rescue me.  This was also about 12:30pm and it was hot and I was getting dehydrated I think.  Anyway, he came after I'd run for about 2:04.  I'm giving me 12 miles for that.

So the lesson learned here is, if you come to a fork in the road and you know where one way leads and you're not sure about the other, take the sure route--unless you have a lot of time to kill and don't mind getting lost and exploring new areas.  And always carry a cell phone when you're running alone.

Later, after doing my domestic chores for the day, I went to the Rec Center and pool ran for one hour.  That felt very rejuvenating.  I'm giving myself 4 miles for that--15 minutes=1 miles.

Happy running all.