Why Not?

Park City 5k for 5 kids. This race was actually 3.60 miles, apparently they don't know what a 5k is. Park MEadows Loop, PC

19:38 for 2nd place on a pretty tough, hilly course. I felt like crapola. 5:20 for 1st mile. 11:05 at 2 (uphill)

Mayors MArathon (Half Marathon), Anchorage Alaska

1:18:37 (6:00 Pace) 4th Place

Ran with some guys from University of Anchorage-Alaska

Felt pretty darn good. Ran 6:00-6:10 for the first 10, then dropped a 5:34 and 5:42 on 11 and 12, and hung on to outkick a collegiate guy for 4th overall. Good run for being on vacation!

6 easy, just back from Alaska and tired!

10 miles in PC.

Lost Prospector Loop and back. Around 68:00 or so. Felt okay, not great.

6 miles easy around Round Valley. Uphills were not fun.

6x800 workout -- was planning on going 2:30's but not quite...

2:32, 2:31, 2:23, 2:21, 2:17, 2:34 (this one I backed off to try and run 2:35)

Felt crappy at the start, better as we went along.

3 Miles in the PM with Sammy Dog

4 easy miles

5 miles with some hills at Sundance.

Park City Mountain 5k 16:48 5th Place

Felt like crap the 2nd half. Not in very good shape.

Ran 6 miles post race.

AM: 8 miles rather hard around PC, Old Ranch Rod, trails, etc.

PM: 5 easy on the trails up Mirror Lake with Sammy.

AM: 12 miles, 2 alone and then 10 with the PCCC team -- Lost Prospector Loop.

AM: 6 miles by the Jordanelle Dam, Provo Watershed Trails, felt pretty good,lots of bugs and overgrowth though.

PM: 6 miles (2 with Sammy).. Road the bike for about 12 miles also/

12x400 on the grass at North 40 Fields in PC (took the GPS and this course is about 12 feet short)

69,68,68,67,67,68,68,67,66,65,63,58

Felt okay, pretty darn good at the end. Better at the end than the start actually. The last 4 were barefoot, which is why they were speedy.

PM: 4 miles with Sammy. A great night for a run, cool weather with a nice breeze.

AM: 10 mile run from the Jordanelle Dam to Dutch Trails and back down River Road. Hills, trails, and pavement, it had it all. I was dying in the heat for the last 2, need to wake up earlier in the morning. About 67:00 for 10.

AM: Graveyard Hill in PC x4  yuck. Legs hurt.

Followed up by a 8 mile Mt. Bike Ride.

Long Run Day -- planned around the canyon to canyon 1/2

Got their at 6:10AM. Ran for 40:00 warmup on some ATV trails before the race. Changed shoes and ran the half. Felt terrible 3 miles in and wanted to turn around, but decided to gut it out. By mile 5 I was okay. hit the first half (6.55) in 44:45.

Either the way back was more downhill or I got some sort of second wind. I felt much better, to the point at which, 10 miles into the run, I was running 6:00 pace and feeling great. I had a PowerGel at 6, that might have helped. Ran the second half in 41:20 -- over 3 minutes faster, which the last 3 being the fastest.

Concluded the day with a 2.5 mile cooldown and my legs still feeling okay. I could have went more today even, but 21 was enough considering my LR before was somewhere around 13.

PM: Biked 12 miles on the roads with Erica. Legs still okay, though I wasn't really pushing it.

6 easy at Dutch Hollow with Sammy Dog. It got hot at the end, but there was some breeze and some shade. No real ill effects from Sat. yet.

AM: Lost Prospector Loop out and back up Chatham. the first 30:00 went by really fast, the last 40:00 not so much. I was hurting at the end, and was slowing down. Now the question is, Des News or No News?

PM : 3 miles easy with Sams 

Sick sick sick all day 3am til I went to bed at 10. Felt a little better at about9. Couldn't even walk the dog around the block. Maybe food poisoning?

AM: 5x800 with PCCC.

2:33, 2:30, 2:25, 2:25, 2:22

Felt okay, still a little nausea from yesterday lingering. And I didn't eat any food yesterday, so I was a little weak. Legs felt great though, no problems at all.

6 total in the AM

6 hot miles in NOLA

10 miles in NOLA

11 in NOLA

3 miles in NOLA before flight.

2 in the AM with Sammy Dog.

4 at night. Legs felt great

6x600 on grass

1:51, 1:50, 1:47, 1:47, 1:47, 1:48 Pretty solid. I felt great for the last 3. Plenty of rest, ran on a 5:00 cycle. DesNews on Friday.. Yikes

3 miles easy. Des News tomorrow

Des News Marathon

I signed up last week on a whim. I wanted to get something long in, and I decided that I would use a marathon as training, and take it easy - you know -- like run 7:00 pace and feel okay.

7:00 pace certainly wasn't happenin once I got going. The first 4 miles are downhill, screaming downhill, and I was easily putting away 5:40's  for the first 3. (5:35, 5:39, 5:41). I let the lead group get away (after all, I was taking it easy). My plan was to just pick up people as they fell off the lead group and run with them a ways. This, also, did not happen.

The first 6 were pretty friendly, I slowed down for 5 and 6 and was 34:44 at 6. Then came the big hill and I obviously slowed down. I was hurting even, I picked up 3 guys moving into 6th place and was dead at the top of the hill. I didn't remember it being that hard when I ran it a couple times last year. I wanted to recover over the top, and I did somewhat, but by 9 miles I wasn't feeling great.

I took my 2nd PowerGel around 12 and kept chugging along. By this point I had settled into 6:10's or so. Honestly, it was the longest 10 mile I've had in any marathon. Generally, I fly through 10 and don't even know it. This time, by 11,12,13, I was feeling it. 6:10's were still coming along but I knew it was going to be a long day.

By 16 I was still running, but started to slow down. There were a couple hills in there that took it to me and now I was worried about the field behind me as I knew 2 guys weren't far back. The runner in front of me dropped out before 16 so I moved into 5th.

By 18 I had 8 of my toughest miles. Each one was rougher than the previous. I tried to eat some gel and drink some gatorade and managed a little. I somehow made it to 20, then 21, then 22. It's easy to type, but these miles were incredibly, incredibly hard. No idea on pace. Erica kept giving me gatorade and water and I kept putting one foot in front of the other.

23 was shambles. At 24 I was sure I was going to get passed. I must have been running 10:00 pace at that point. 25 was pure hell, I was ready to walk about 50 times. 26 was worse, I walked a few steps, turned around, saw I had about 200 yards lead, and decided I couldn't just throw it away.

Final time was 2:46:43   Halfway I was 1:21:20. The splits seemed a helluva lot worse than they were. I would have guessed I slowed down over 10 minutes. Instead, it was only 5. 

I was really happy with my time and my effort. On my training, there was nothing more I could have done. Only 1 week over 70 miles this year, a lot crappy weeks, etc. So I am more than pleased, and was happy to get 5th.

Now we'll see if I can walk tomorrow. 

Bike for about 25 miles

Biked some tough hills, about 50 minutes. Still can't run.

Legs are feeling much better. Biked about 15 miles easy today. I will try to get in some miles tomorrow.

8 easy with Sammy... Hammy still hurts

10 easy in Yellowstone. Hammy getting better.

10 miles easy. Hammy still improving

3 in the AM. Still feeling some hammy pain, but we're improving.

AM: 9 miles up Prospector and back. Hamstring was tight at beginning, but got much much better.I can go up and down hills w/o pain now. Might start running twice a day today.

AM: 14x400M The first 8 were all 73-74. Taking it easy onmy leg. I didn't know how many I could do. It's still sore, but still getting better. Dropped to 72 for 9-12 and then hamstring started yelling on #13. Ran the last 2 in about 74. I was happy with the workout, less than 2 wks after DesNews.

PM: 3 easy with Sammy

AM: 8 miles Rail Trail then back up Prospector.

AM: 5x1000M with PCCC.. Ran with the girls team, averaged about 3:35 per K on a tough, hilly course. Felt great, but the pace was pretty easy for me. Ran 3 mile cooldown

PM: 3 miles with Sammy Dog

Ran/Walked for 2:30 up Mt. Timpanagos to Emerald Lake and around there. It was a very tough run, I probably walked about 30 minutes total, and ran the rest, some parts slow. The views were awesome, but the weather got too cold for me up top. I didn't go to the Summit b/c of the weather, I only had a short sleeve dri-fit and running shorts.

Legs felt good all the way except the last couple on the way down.

I think the elevation gain was somewhere in the neighborhood of 4000-4500 feet or so. It was a bear. And I'm glad I did it but probably won't do it again.

6 miles around MIrror Lake Area at 9500 feet. Felt okay.Sammy felt better than I did though.

10 miles fairly hard this morning with PCCC. Ran down East Canyon from Jeremy Ranch and then back up the same way. Definitely more downhill on the first 5. Hit the 5 mile in 32:37 and then ran back pretty hard. Total time was 65:40 (33:03 coming back). I was happy with the time, especially since I'm still sore from Saturday.

7 miles from the HS up to Deer Valley and back. Nice downhill run for the last 3.5 after getting there. First day I didn't feel the hamstring. That's good news.

12x400

AM: 2 easy

PM: 5k Baumans Running in Flint, MI 16:28

8 miles

10 miles mid mountain trail from Stein Erickson Lodge and back

10 miles Old Ranch Road  1:03:25... 31:20 on the way back...upill

6 easy

2 later with Sammy Dog

8x600 on a slow, wet, sloppy grass course at North 40

2:01, 2:02, 1:57, 1:54, 1:52, 1:52, 1:48, 1:46

6 miles with some sprints, played some games with the kids.

45:00 run around PC. Hot

3 easy with Sammy at 5:30AM.

8 miles around American Fork and at the Grass Relays.

Really no idea on the distance. Was going to run Mid Mountain from Sun Peak area to Deer Valley. Somehow ended up on the Ridge Trail and ran it all the way to Guardsman. The first 1:00 was almost all straight uphill, then it was bearable with some tremendous views.

Ran for a total of 2:29:52. I am calling this 19 miles, with the effort of about 22 or 23. Yikes.

9 miles easy Old Ranch Road then up through Park Meadows

IT band hurts. ick

Provo Half. I'll get my one post in for October on the last day. Screaming fast course for the first 5 or so, then it settled down. Ran with Walter for about the first 5 and then pulled away. I never looked at my watch and never saw a mile marker. Huge PR -- like 3 minutes or so I think.

Time to go to the Halloween Party!! I highly recommend this race if you want a real fast Half late in the year. Probably my last race before Vegas Dec. 6.

Steve