my makeup may be flaking

Ran 7 miles kind of easy. There was a pretty sweet storm that passed over the valley while I was running. I love being from Seattle. I was running through the neighbourhood shirtless verily humming to myself while all the other runners I saw looked miserable huddled in rain jackets.

AM Did two loops of Sugarhouse. Typical of the last couple of days, I felt a little sluggish to start and much better. I've been having some shin/calf tightness that bugs me a little to begin with.

PM Did a 4.5 mile loop on campus probably faster than necessary. I also signed up for St George although I'm not sure I want to do it this year. If I get in that would probably mean either no Boston for next year or I'll have to not take St George as seriously as I've taken other marathons.

Ran through South Salt Lake, Sugarhouse, by the zoo, research park, Liberty Park. Nice scenic run. Ran the last 7 miles or so at about 6:30 mile pace (pretty downhill).

AM Finished my last school assignment today! Sheesh, I'm 23, I shouldn't have "homework" anymore. That's going to be a requirement for next semester, no "homework" just "work". Anyway didn't really get enough sleep but got myself going with 5.5 in the morning with a few hard strides at the end.

PM Didn't drink enough water during the day because I forgot my water bottle. I should have gone home but I wanted to do a trail run from school. It was me vs the mountain bikers and I'm happy to say that I destroyed that them, but its not really a fair fight up a trail that steep. I ran on the shoreline trail going north from the med school, turning around where it meets up with City Creek trail and black mountain trail. Felt pretty fatigued afterwards, muscles are OK, just generally wanted to rest. Just got to try to squeeze out a couple more tough weeks here and avoid falling off the razor edge.

So I just realized I've been skimping. I've been leaving off .1 miles from a bunch of my runs. I could be out 4, 5 maybe even 6 miles for the year! I always knew something was up. I would think "that sure felt like a long 10.5 miles" now I know it was really 10.6! Anyway. I did 10.6 today thinking "marathon pace" to myself. I ran 62:11 which is 5:52 per mile. This includes quite a bit of climbing and grass, so that makes it better obviously. Again, fastest I've ever done this run by about 20seconds and I felt pretty good.

Did three loops of Sugarhouse Park pretty easy. I felt pretty good for the whole run, averaged 7:10 pace.

Well Goodness! I did it again. I set out to try to conquer this run in under 2hours and managed 1:58:54! I ran from my house all the way to the turnaround at the top of the City Creek road. That's an elevation gain of 2000ft! I pretty much hammered my way up there. I had a tough time getting myself to really get going fast on the really steep section. I was maxing out on the hills at 6000ft without really putting out a lot of "effort". Reached the top in 66:49, first time doing it under 74mins. Ran from the trailhead to the top in 42:38.

Coming down, I really had to concentrate to keep the effort high as it was all downhill. I took a gu at the turnaround and again to top up as I was going through memory Grove. I found that on the nicer parts of the downhill I could come close to 5 min mile pace without too much effort (good downhill runner strikes again!) but it took alot of mental energy. I kept it going on the last little bit through downtown averaging a pretty steady 5:27 pace on the way down. I was very pleased that I could maintain 5:35 pace on the flat at the end. In my upcoming marathon I'll have a nice downhill from mile19 to mile 21. I have to be prepared to use it and then hang on the last 6 miles. I'm beginning to think I can break 2:30, which would be nuts!