Clyde's Comeback!

Pushed Myler around the inner B-hills loop. It was hard to get out today. I was so busy yesterday (got up at 4:20 a.m and in bed after 10 p.m). So this morning I was dragging. Once out I wasn't really into it as I mentally counted down the miles until we finished. My legs are a little sore from the long run yesterday. 

I hope to get out again today but will have to see. It's our 9 year anniversary today. So after the busy work day Mik'L and I hope to get out for the evening for at least dinner. Anyways I'm really thankful for such a sweet little lady to spend eternity with. Like I always say she's a Trooper.  

River loop. I was a little sore in the quads through the first 5 miles this morning but they loosened up and I ran fairly well the last 3 miles. It was a nice cooler morning before the day starts to heat up. It will be upper 90's today with temps over 100 coming by Friday or Saturday for the first time in 2010. I'm not ready to deal with it. But on the flipside this has been a cooler spring (windy too) and normally we'd have already seen temps at or over the 100F mark. 

River loop this evening. High of 96F today but when I went out at 6 it didn't feel too bad. There was a comfortable breeze and a slight overcast. At first my legs felt pretty good and within 2 miles I was striding a long fairly quick. But shortly after that the legs turned into 1,000 lb weights. I couldn't get things going to save my life. I could only focus on trying to maintain good form and made my way around the loop.  

Pushed Myler around the River loop. Legs felt pretty good and twas a pretty good run. Picked it up to 5:30 pace for a half mile or so to try and catch a runner up ahead that I thought was Bishop Thompson. But he didn't turn into Jedora and then I realized it wasn't Bishop. 

8.5 miles tonight with the club. It was 96 when I pulled into the parking lot before the run. We started out by running up to the gas station and back to wait for any stragglers. Then went on to run the Bloomington loop. For the first 3-4 miles we kept saying "it sure doesn't feel like it's 96" "it's not bad at all". By the finishing 3 miles it felt like it was over 100 and getting hotter every step. I was so dehydrated by the time  I got back... it was ugly. The pace kept getting faster and faster too. I think we just wanted to get done. I guess summer is finally here.  

River loop this  morning with Paul H. and Logan. We just ran chatty pace and that was perfectly fine with me. I feel trashed and will be taking the rest of the day off from running. It was coolish this morning but is projected to be 100 today so no running this afternoon won't hurt my feelings. 

Didn't run today. The hammy was a little tight on Thurs and Fri so I wanted to give it some time off and try and be fully rested going into the marathon next week. It felt great to sleep in to 8:08 a.m. 

Got up early and ran over to the Flying J and then into Bloomington and back around. I wanted to go longer than regular and a little faster as to kind of work any junk out of my system after not running for the last 2 days. I was a little awkward the first 2 and then settled into around a 6:20-6:40 pace for the rest of the run. It felt pretty good and I hope to do a shorter run tonight with some solid core stuff all week. Looking forward to this weekends race with a scared anticipation.... 

Did the same loop this morning as I did yesterday. Logan joined me and we kept a steady push around. It was warm 77 F so we stopped at all 3 drinking fountains along the way. Nice to get out and watch the morning roll in. I decided not to run last night and won't do any afternoon or evening runs this week. I think running in 100+ degree temps will do more harm than good this close to the race. Mentally I'm not really very tuned in to race so hopefully I can get a little more confident and jazzed as the week continues. 

River loop. Waited until 7:30 and it was already 76 when I left and 87 when I got home. Running is such a fun sport in the summer here in STG. Weight is in the right spot for race week so hopefully the legs and brain will follow along. Busy day with a thousand little things to get done while trying to keep track of Myler.  

Did the middle B-hills loop. 2 mile warm up, 2.5 miles at 5k pace, 2.1 mile cool down. I wanted to see if the legs were still there and give them a little wake up call for Saturday. So I took the warm up nice and slow then really powered through the tempo. I thought durning the warm up that if I was racing a 10k today I think I'd do pretty good. Felt pretty strong through the tempo staying under 5:30 pace. I would have liked to be a little smoother but when running at 5k or faster I don't run smooth... it's more robotic. Then jogged it in and did a solid ab workout. 

T minus two day until the race- here is where my nerves start to get frazzled.  

Around the Knolls and back. A short little run before we head up north. It was cloudy and a little cooler and it felt good. I can tell I'm tapering because everything hurt. I can't wait to have this marathon behind me. I just need a positive outcome under my belt so I can focus on a solid summer of training before STG. 

Wow what a day. Up at 1:40 a.m this morning. I had set the alarm for 3 a.m but Myler thought I needed to get up a little earlier. Finally home in STG at 6:30 p.m. Here's what happened in the middle. 

Dave and I stayed at my uncles in Orem. We left his house at 3:20 a.m to make the rounds and pick up James, Steve H, Walter, and Paul P. Got on the bus at 4 a.m and road up to the start. It was nice up at the start but wet from lots of rain. Had 2 good potty stops and then one more 3 min's before the race stared right off the road before the gun.

I've been running Garmin-less since mine kicked the bucket so I wore my wife's Timex and I failed to get most of the splits. Thats why I like a garmin because it thinks for you....

First 5 miles in 29:03. I'm in like 20th place trying to hold back and just run easy. A big pack went out faster and then there was a smaller second pack of Steve A, Holt, Walter and a couple other guys. I actually was falling off this pack. But my plan was to just run easy until at least the half. No race mode just try and get some muscle memory back.

13 miles in 1:16:52. I'm not sure what the half spit was but guessing like 1:17:20. Up to here I had run just as planned. Didn't worry about the race. Didn't care how far back I was from everyone else. But the legs were just heavy. From mile 6 they got heavy. Never cramped just felt like steel beams. Plus we had rain from the start to about mile 14 or 15. Sometimes heavy pounding rain... but luckily no wind to speak of. 

20 miles in 1:58:37. From the half to mile 20 was a weird section. I caught up to Dave somewhere a long the line and it was good to be working together for a while. I told him my wife was at mile 19 and that if things didn't change I was thinking about DNFing and just getting in a solid 20 mile workout. He jumped on the bandwagon and by 17 announced that "he was done and stopping". I said lets just run to the mouth of the canyon where Mik'L was and then decide. So as we came around the corner out of the canyon I could see the girls and said "what do ya think"? Dave said lets just finish but it's gonna be ugly. I agreed and said we'd be real lucky to even break 2:40 since the "downhill" was done and we were approaching the long straight shot through Provo.

23 miles in 2:16:49. Something changed as we stared running on the flat section. Dave started to pull away from me and I started to feel a little groove. I think at 20 I felt it was safe to finally turn it on and finally start racing. So I started clipping off even 6 min miles when I thought I'd be lucky to hold 6:30's. Along here I pass Steve A. and am settled into a smooth stride for the first time all race. 

24 miles 2:22:52 ran this mile in 6:03 and was tuned into 6 min pace.

25 miels in 2:28:55 ran it in 6:02- Finally catch the "white and blue shirt guy" just before the overpass and he just waves me by without a fight. 

26.2 miles in 2:36:20- Happy to have ran the last 10k in a decent fashion. It seemed it was going to be much worse from early in the race. 

Overall I was really happy with the race. All I wanted was to come up and have a positive running experience and tune out some decent tempo miles. I didn't want to "race" from the gun and try for any money. Just to have something positive to get me going again before a summer of good training. I was please to work through the heavy legs bug and turn out a 6 min avg marathon knowing I've got a lot more to give. It will be really good to start doing more tempo runs once a week or so and that will help as I've been running 7 min pace for about 16 months now. 

It was a great course. I'd love to come back in real race shape to see what could happen. I'll run it again for sure. It was totally fun to have dinner with some friends the night before and see others at the race and stuff. It got me really excited to be out competing again. When's the next race?  

Pushed Myler and the dogs on a short little run here in Little Valley. Legs were sore but runnable. Actually it felt just as good to run as it did to walk. Still I'm not in a rush to hit mileage and am going to give myself a real recovery week with no stress to run anything more than a short little jog.  

Did a family bike ride over into Bloomington Hills and around. I pulled the trailer with Myler and the dogs while Mik'L road her big girl bike along side. Riding the bike was a nice way to work the legs out without the impact of running. I kept changing the gears as to have to keep peddling the entire ride and pushing the legs. Felt ready to be done by the time we got home. 

Didn't get out to Hurricane today but did the inner B-hills loop at 5 p.m and it was HOT. I ran pretty good all things considering. I didn't have a watch but I think the pace was under 7 min. Actually too fast but I kind of got in a groove and wanted to get out of the heat. Legs feel pretty good 3 days after a marathon. 

River loop this morning with Paul H. He agreed to take it easy on me and we just had a nice mellow run around the loop. I had some tummy issues and had to hit the bathroom in B-hill and was glad it was there to hit. I spent most of the run trying to convince Paul that he's a 2:40 marathoner and too get signed up for some races to keep his fitness. Good run and glad that's all for the day- recovery is coming a long but no need to rush it. 

Pushed Myler out and back to the bridge this morning. I just wanted a shorter run to kind of help the legs sharpen up. Then I'll go to club run tonight. Legs are feeling ok, but it's hard to tell pushing the baby jogger. Both hammy's were sore but not (injured) just sore. Got home and worked in the garden for a couple hours. The wind basically destroyed my tomato plants and did a number on everything else too. So I had to prune everything back past the damaged area. 

7.5 miles tonight at running club. We just hit the standard Bloomington loop nice and easy the whole way. Bill told us at the end that we ran a 7:10 avg and I was surprised to see that it was that fast. Had a major bathroom stop at the finish to get rid of all the junk today.  

River loop this morning. It was cool as the sun was coming up. 57 F is a great temp for the middle of June... even though it will be at or close to 100 today. I did  a little extra to try and help a guy with some little dogs at the park. There were some bigger loose dogs out and starting to chase the guy with his little dogs. So I ran over and drove the big dogs away. The right hammy is sore (not my injured one). I need a good overhaul from Mik'L using the stick and foam roller. 

Morning club run out around my old stomping grounds. We left Bill's old house and ran up out of GS to the water tank then down through industrial and around Middleton back to Bill's. On the way back we saw a house on fire (sad). Then the whole group stayed to help Bill move into his new house. With everyone there it was a pretty smooth process and I was home by 11 a.m. 

A.M.

River loop. Legs felt really good. No soreness and actually they kind of wanted to "go". But I resisted the temptation and just ran nice and relaxed until the bathroom at mile 6. There I had to make a pit stop and then kind of picked it up for the rest of the run. Looking forward to kind of ramping back up the mileage this week. Not going to hit anything amazing but somewhere in the 80 mpw range. I've got to go to Park City this weekend (thurs or fri) so I'll try and hit the fist part of the week a little harder to give myself a break on the days while we are up there. 

P.M.

Mik'L got me a new Garmin 405 for fathers day so I finally had a reliable unit to run with again. So that being the case I went out into the fields then back around Stone Cliff to the river trail and in to B-hills then back home. It was a version of a run I did last summer. Highlights of the run was that it was freaking hot. Really hot and thats going to be hard to deal with this summer. Then once I got down to the golf course I was going over to the water to get a drink and I got stung in the had by a wasp, hornet or bee. It came out of no where and drew blood on contact. I think that is the first time I've ever been stung. Ouch! It really hurt. So other than the heat and being stung it was a fun run playing with the new Garmin. Hopefully I can get as many miles with this one as the last one I wore out.  

A.M.

Logan and Steve came over early this morning for a run. We went up by the new airport and around the fields loop. It was a great morning. Temps early have been nice- even cool. Pace was slow and chatty. Nice run to start the day. 

P.M.

I didn't want to brave the heat today so I ran on the treadmill. It was good because I finished watching Valkyrie. A pretty good movie but what a crazy real life story. I just wish the bomb would have got Hitler and all those guys would have not be executed. So my blood was pumping and the time flew while on the machine.  

Started out with the river loop and then at mile 6 I looped back around B-hills and the Knolls to extend the run a little. I slept horrible and woke up feeling dead. So I thought the run was just going to be a bummer. But once out I just worked on form and it wasn't too bad. Still slow with a 7:33 avg but it wasn't as physically hard as I was expecting. After I got home I went and worked on the ditch bank where I'm attempting to level off so I can eventually put a nice chicken coop there. But it was physically harder than expected and now my hands have blisters... and I was wearing gloves. 

4 miles this evening on the treadmill. Just logging some miles. Nothing else really to say.  

Ran this morning with Paul H. We did the same loop out around the fields and Stone Cliff that I did the other day. Another beautiful morning out before a hellishly hot day. We had a great run and even ran into Steven Abraham Lincoln and his barefoot running buddies doing some Webb hill repeats. 

Club run tonight at my house with the lads. We did the middle B-hills loop. It was hot and no one was really into it so the run was shortish. Steve dropped early with some stommy issues. Then the Holt's and I finished up to find him on my front lawn. Then I made the boys work and help me move my new chicken coop around. The sucker is heavy. But now it's pretty well all set up I'll just have to do some fine tuning next week after we get back from Park City. 

Regular River loop this morning. The whole run felt undaunting. I'm dead. Haven't slept much this week- I think it's the full moon. Maybe I'm a werewolf. Anyways just slugged through it. Maybe the only run I do today. We are driving up to Park City this morning for the weekend so I might run tonight up there or I might not. Looking forward to getting out of the heat.  

I did an out and back run from our room north on the Olympic trail. The first 5 miles were downhill and I just tried to relax and enjoy the cool mountain air. I went out at an avg of 7:09 pace. Then on the way back it was all uphill and I decided to make a little game out of it. Try to negative split going back with the uphill climing. Came back in a 6:59 avg. Not anything crazy fast but with the uphill and the elevation it was worth calling it a Tinman effort.

Then after I got done running I did a mutha of a mt bike ride going out and back on the mid mountian trail. It was basically a 4 hour workout ontop of the run. Won't count any mileage as I didn't wear the garmin and don't know how far I actually went. I will say that I was SO trashed when I finally got back to town. I went to Burger King (because I was starving) and ordered like 7 things off the dollar menu and was still hungry. Then road back to the room. Fun ride and I only went over the handle bars 3 times... but none of the wrecks were that serious however I will be super sore tomorrow.

Around Stone Cliff then back around the Knolls. Nice 7:10 avg pace for the run. Felt ok for  a Monday and hope to keep the ball rolling through the week. I'll be out of town for the weekend so I hope to get ahead of the count early in the week so I can relax up in Torrey. 

5 slow miles this evening with my uncle out in Hurricane. It was pretty hot and he's just trying to figure this heat running out. After we finished the weather turned ugly with high winds and a little rain.  

Bigger workout this morning with a biggish group. Steve, James, Logan and Paul showed up at my house at 6 a.m. We did basically the same loop I did  yesterday. Out around the fields and Stone Cliff then down to the Dixie Center then back through B-hills and around the Knolls to the  house. We started off with a slow easy warm up for 3 miles. Then the plan was to do around 6 miles at Tinman tempo (6 min pace). We started off and we were fast from the git go. As we made our way down to the Dixie Center Logan laid down the hammer and I thought he must be feeling antsy. But there was a communication flaw and he only thought we were doing 4 miles of tempo. So just over the bridge by the freeway we called it at 4.1 at an avg of 5:47 pace for that section. Then the guys rolled in running very well collectively and we just cooled down the remainder back to the house. 

Felt pretty good all things considered. I think I'm still a little stale from UV and this morning was pretty hot. 76 F at the start and it just kept getting warmer by the second. I'm kind of glad we ended the tempo at 4 miles because next week we can just add one mile and work our way up. Anyways I guess this officially starts my "real" training up to STG.  

P.M.

Did the River loop at 5 pm. There was some nice cloud cover which made things a little more doable than out in the direct sun. But I was still dead and overheated. But now I'm glad the miles are in the bank and I can relax until the morning.  

Out and back into B-hills. It didn't cool off much last night because of the cloud cover. So it was warm and muggy this morning. I felt like death last night after the run and expected this mornings run to be horrible. It was a little better than that and maybe even just bad. I'm going to spend the day trying to hydrate well. I dropped to under 150lbs this morning. The scale said 149lbs for the first time since the summer of 2008. So good and bad. Good to be down to a faster running weight bad that I'm basically dehydrated to pull it off.  

4 miles this afternoon on the treadmill. It was overcast but then the sun came out and I didn't want to deal with it. My garage was still 97F. I had big fan set up in front of the treadmill and it was blowing what felt like blow dryer heat in my face. Fun stuff.