Step by step, mile by mile

5 miles in the morning. I'm not allowed to leave the hotel bc Dallas, so I had to run on the treadmill. Tried to do a tempo and failed. Just wasn't feeling it. Did some good core though.

PM - Warmed up to the nearby episcopal school, and found the track. Legs were tired from the start from 8 hours of drive/little sleep/afternoon humidity. Workout was 3×(4x400m). 2 minute standing recovery between repeats, 2 laps jog in between. My watch was dead so I had to use my phone timer, which probably slowed me down a bit. First set went 69, 67, 68, 68. Next went 68, 68, 68. At this point I noticed my phone was about to die so I decided this would be my last 400. Hit the 300m at 44-45, but then the I just hit a wall and jogged it in for 64. My phone died, so I did a mile on the track striding on the straights, did some more strides on the grass, and cooled down the way I warmed up for 10 for the day. I got some new shoes, Nike zoom structure 18's for 29.99.

8 miles warmup around. 3x200, 2x300, 1x400 of grass hill strides at the episcopal school. Jogged back down for recovery. Wind was against me on the uphill. Managed sub 5:20 pace for the 200s and 300s. Watch died for the 400 but the effort felt the hardest. Cooled down for 13. Had some real good oatmeal with some sublime toppings after. Foot hurt a little by the end of the repeats, but that's 23 miles with 2 workouts in the past 16ish hours so it's expected.

5 humid easy miles in the evening

Set my alarm for 6 AM, hit the snooze button, and by snooze I mean the off button. Woke up at 10 which was great. The run was very hot and very humid. Not fun. I'm hopefully meeting with coach Waters today.

On October 13th I will be running at the Crimson classic here at UofA. If I can break 26:20 on an 8k, I will get all the benefits of running D1 and coach waters will put me on the team. However, I cannot train with the team. Two months. Let's do this.

PM - hot, surprise surprise. Felt better than this morning. Ran around the nice dorms, to the hs track, did one lap striding the backstretch, a 400, another stride lap, back for 5. 400 was in 77. I wasn't going hard, I never looked at my watch, just trying to feel a pace. Now I just gotta do 20 of those.

If anyone has any feedback on this, I'd appreciate it.

I've been eating less than usual lately to get my weight down a bit. I'm still eating, and eating well, but cutting out pointless calories, like chips and such. Yesterday I drank probably 3 bottles of water between when I had dinner and went to bed. Had a good dinner of pasta with salmon, and a bowl of cereal. So I woke up at 8 this morning, had maybe 5 grapes. Usually I eat a little more before I go on a morning run, but since moving out of Utah I haven't. I felt progressively worse on the 10 mile run today. It was hot out, and, naturally, I was sweating. I noticed my sweat wasn't salty, like at all. The structure's are new shoes, and heavier than my other lighter trainers, but still, I felt just like crap on this run. Last half mile I had to stop a couple times because I felt just sick to my stomach, like I'd throw up, but I didn't. Managed to get back to the condo, went to the bathroom, and went to do some strides. I got two in and had to sit down, I just felt awful! completely dead. Did another two strides and jumped in the pool to cool off. This next part is tmi, but vital to the problem I think. Went to pee after, and it was almost orange. But I thought I'd be well hydrated. I'm just kind of confused. I've drank a couple glasses of water since then. Any advice would be well appreciated.

PM - run after getting moved in. Felt better than this morning, averaged sub 7 pace so starting to somewhat get used to humidity.

AM - Def could have felt better. I was up late last night. After my afternoon run my roommate Grant and I went to where my parents are staying at and had dinner. Grant and I played an insane 1.5 hour match of ping pong. After that we met up with Grant's friends Alva and some girl. Alva was really cool, we have a lot of common interests. After that we went to Target, and hung out with our female neighbors for a little while. Didn't get a lot of sleep last night. Anyway. Alva, Grant, and I were supposed to run this morning but they both slept in. I ate a bit before I went on my run and felt a bit better compared to how I have lately, but that isn't saying much. Went slower going there, quicker coming back. Did that in 11:46. Not impressive, but I'm still getting acclimated and was pretty dang tired, plus I didn't go too hard. Orientation all today, then dinner with my family for the last time for quite a while in the afternoon, so we'll see how the afternoon sesh goes.

PM - Orientation was long and difficult. And extremely stressful. I didn't have much time left when I got back to the dorm, so I decided to just run a quick 5 miles. Got out and decided to do a 3-2-1 fartlik back. Ended up getting 2 miles in 12:46, so not too far off this morning! Wasn't great work, but I know I'll have better runs. For now it's about my family.

10 miles in the morning. Felt tired and slow at the start but progressively sped up. Finished with a 6:18 mile with some considerable uphill. 6:45 avg pace, so not exactly hard, but I wasn't jogging.

PM - 7. Got 1.5 into the run and had to jump into publix and chill there bc it started to pour and I was running with my phone. Browsed cereal. After about 5 minutes it cleared up and I got back into it. First two miles were a bit slower, then I just sped up to about 6:30 pace for the last 5 because I felt really good. Hopefully I'm finally getting accustomed. I also walked about 3 miles today walking around college, but it doesn't count.

7 easy miles, no watch. Sped up at the end just a bit. I was gonna do some faster stuff today, but after yesterday I think I'll just get my 12 in today, take tomorrow easy, and on monday do some good work.

PM - 5 miles. I saw a runner in the distance after maybe half a mile who looked quite fit. So I started speeding up until I got to 5:25 pace to catch him. I do, but rather than strike up a conversation, I notice him slowing, so I just pass him. I don't need that slowing down thing in my life. Haha, I sound like Talon Hull's blog. Anyway I kept the pace pretty chill after that, sped up a bit at the end. Avg pace 6:49 to conclude a great week of training!