C Mantz Running

    5 mile tempo.  26:32 overall, with 2 miles cool down.  My feet hurt a little on the steep downhills(possibly time for new shoes. I've switched off between 2 pairs since the summer, and one was a nike pair, which typically don't last as long.), but felt good on the uphills.  It was really cold, or atleast cold for this year.  20s with a windchill.  I could feel the mileage from last week.

    3 miles easy in the dark with lots of snow.  Pretty fun.

     Long run with a lot of the Sky View guys.  Ethan, Kyler and I went all the way up to the campgrounds in Smithfield canyon.  On the way up, it was snowing pretty bad, and our faces were white. Near the campgrounds, we were running in a foot of powder for about a mile.  My knees were covered in snow!  It was fun, but that mile took 10 minutes!  Ethan and I averaged 7:15s, so it was pretty relaxed.  Kyler sped up and tempoed it down the canyon, and Ethan and I extended some more.  Legs felt tired.

    6 miles.  Over three with Joseph and Alex, then I went to the . .. . Treadmill(terrible right? but I didn't want to do this in the snow!).  I did 2Xmile at 5:00 with 2% incline.  It felt really easy.  I race on Friday, so I didn't want to push myself too much.

    pre-meet-5 miles.  Easy with Joseph, Ethan and Cody(for the first mile).  It was cold outside.   Colder than it's been in a while.  And really wet.  Hurray for all you who wanted snow, but for people like me who dislike cold, this sucks. 
 

    I'm not sure on the time, but I think it was 4:19-21.  I watched Claire's race, where she PR'ed by 7 seconds(5:37!) and won her heat.  She's still dropping a lot of time for this early in the season, but I expected her to be 5:40 shape during XC season looking at her workouts.  Anyway, I then hurried and got my warm up in.  It was faster than usual, because I didn't think I had enough time. The race had plenty of really good competition in it.  I'd been beat by many of the people in our heat, so it was going to be a competitive race.  We got to the line(except for Kramer.  We were all looking for him, but he he didn't show up), everyone was joking around, but ready to race.

   I got out okay.  Austin took it out pretty quick for the first 200m, then Isaac yelled "what happened to 75"(apparently they had joked about running the first lap in 75 seconds.) Austin slowed down a little, not because what Isaac said, but just because none of us could handle that pace for the rest of the race.  I went around the pack and I went into the lead. I went out at a good pace to make sure I could handle it.  64 was my first lap.  It felt good, not like I could hold the pace for the rest of the race though.  Next lap I heard I had 5 meters on the pack.  I pushed it a little more to get a gap going.  At 800m I was about 2:10 I heard.  I pushed it a lot on this lap to make the gap big, because this is where everyone struggles the most.  I heard I had 20 meters on the pack now.  This was a problem, because I was hurting, and Isaac or Skyler could easily catch me in their last 400m.  I came across 1200m at 3:16.  I tried to run my last lap in 1:03, but I don't know if I did.  I worked on pumping my arms faster and harder, but that hurt.  Last 100m I saw I'd won it if I didn't slow down, so I pushed to the finish.  I crossed the line, then Skyler Willams did, then Justin Sheets had a big PR(6 seconds).  Then the rest of the pack came in, and it seemed like a lot people ran well.

     I cooled down with a bunch of those guys.  I'm happy with my race, it didn't go as expected.  I felt better and more competitive in this race than usual.  It was more fun I thought.  I think I wasn't doing as well last track and xc seasons because it wasn't fun near the end(the races or the workouts, but mostly races).  I was planning on running the 3200 tomorrow, but something came up, so I'll wait until Simplot(which will probably be best).  

     Long run. I wasn't able to be in Kearns today, so I didn't run the 3200m.  Legs hurt for the first few minutes due to the long car ride. St. George weather was great though.