I am in Phoenix (well, actually Scottsdale) for the week for a 4 day seminar / training. I am in class all day long, but I do have a racquetball court at my hotel so I was able to have some fun this evening.
Dan, Mike and I went to a local park for some frisbee golf. We ran home the 4 miles, but I got bored with the slow pace and did a 2 mile out and back section at 6:30 pace. Dan schooled us at Frisbee golf.
I actually got up early enough today to run before being confined in class all day. I enjoyed the sunrise while running on a canal trail (all packed dirt). It was flat and the air was full of oxygen.
7 min pace
Traveled home late in the evening. Sort of, as I stayed in SLC for the weekend with the family.
Probably the toughest self-inflicted 6.5 mile I have ever run. Ever since high school I have wanted to return to the Mount Olympus trail head to go after my un-official record of summitting and returning to my car in under 3 hours. Today was the day. Perfect weather for an 8 am start. I was not prepared well since I didn't plan on staying in SLC for the weekend and so I didn't have my trail shoes nor my watter bottle. Oh, well its not that long of a run.
I started off pretty aggressive up the mountain but was quickly slowed by the lack of oxygen. The trail is pretty rocky and steep. It starts at about 4800 feet and tops out in about 3.25 miles at 9000 feet. That works out to roughly a thousand feet per mile. Steep. I had a blast running until I was forced to a hike. The final mile before the saddle kicked my butt. Once I hit the saddle (1 hour 3 mins) I get to scramble up rocks the final 500 feet to the summitt. I took my time here and didn't rush it. I signed my name in the mail box 1:21 into the run. I took 5 mins recovery to enjoy the view before making my way back down. The top part was again slow going as I still value my life but once I hit the saddle, the quads were in full use. No diggers today as I managed to stumble back to the car in exactly 2:10. (49 mins down) New record by close to an hour. The garmin measured 6.5 miles, but effort wise, it was a 20 miler.
A highlight of the trip up was seeing Mike Doleac (famous Ute basketball player from late 90's) and some other tall dude hiking down the hill. He said hi. I also ran into an old neighbor friend from my younger years. I stopped to talk to him on the way down, but almost fell into a bush as my legs were shaking uncontrollably for a minute after I stopped. I also had a few (20 or so) people do the "what in the world is that crazy guy doing?" comments.
Big Double Digit mileage day! Its getting out of control. I might actually call it training.
I was able to make it up to Paul's house for a tour of the many canal trails around his home. They were a great mix of hard/soft/flat/rocky/snowy/tree-limb-encased/and muddy. I liked everything but the snow. Could've done without that.
10 - Providence and Millville hills. Med to Hard effort for most of it. I was sweating buckets in 20 degree weather. 3 shirts, tights, shorts, wool gloves and hat. Too much.
Today I braved the light snow to run up to just past 2nd dam via canyon road. It turned out to be a decent run, though I am feeling out of shape. I guess taking it easy for 2 months will do that to you. I was working way too hard for the pace. 61:30 up and 56:30 down.
I was grateful today to be able to keep up with Paul on our run this morning. He took it easy on me, since it was a holiday an all. 9.5 with him, .5 more to make it an even 10. Now to stuff my face!
Today was a bonus trail run for the year. You certainly can't count on any trail being runnable this time of year, but we lucked out. We headed up to the BST from Paul's house and did a 2-3 mile tour of Hyde Park Canyon. It got pretty steep and Paul started whining so we turned around and headed down. This is where I floored it and had a blast coming down. I was in heaven. We joined back onto the BST and headed south mostly following the double-track road, but did a small amount of exploring on our way to Green Canyon. We made it the whole way and marveled at the new fishing pond at the start of Green. What? Weird. We decided to make our way home the fast way and hit some roads and lots more canal trail back to Paul's . A perfect run in perfect winter weather. Just a shade under 2 hours for 15 miles. Not bad considering the few thousand feet in elevation change we covered. 155 ave HR
