Wheeler Farm Loops

AM - 10.5 miles w/ the JAKJAF crew. Nice loop from SHP to Holladay and back.

PM - 3 miles, then a handful of drills w/ Andrea.

After running this morning Andrea and I went up to Alta - now that the lifts are closed for the season, we can ski there! :-)  We did a very mellow tour up to the Sugarloaf/Baldy saddle. Things are melting out fast, but I think we'll still get in 1 or 2 more Sundays of good skiing.

AM - 10.7 miles. Usual warmup (2.2 miles w/ accelerations) then 7.5 mile tempo run in 39:53 (5:19/mile avg). Splits - 5:18, 5:26, 5:24, 5:18, 5:21, 5:15, 5:18, 2:33. Cooled down a mile w/ Andrea, who was doing a quick shakeout run. Good run to start off the week. 

PM - 6.2 miles. Ran w/ Andrea while she was warming up for her tempo, jumped in for a little over a mile with her, then ran home.

Here's an interesting little nugget that I discovered last night - the time difference between Andrea and I in the five 5Ks we've both run in the past year: 2:07, 2:05, 2:08, 2:07, 2:06. Needless to say, we are very consistent! And if there was a handicapped race where she got a 2:06 head start on me, it would probably be a very exciting finish.

AM - 7.3 miles up to work.

PM - 7.5 miles. Ran 4.5 miles from work down to the track then did a short speed workout - 3 x (400-200-200) + 4 x 200 [30 seconds rest b/w reps, 90 seconds b/w sets]. I averaged 67.5 for the 400s and 31.8 for the 200s. Cooled down a mile with Andrea. A good session to get the legs turning over, 2 miles of total reps at Mile/3K pace. Then we went to TCBY for the 5th time in the past 2 weeks (lots of expiring Groupons). I would call tonight a success!

FYI - If anyone is interested, we're doing a longish run (15-18 miles) on Saturday at Jeremy Ranch, and then planning on breakfast at Ruth's Diner afterwards. Thinking we'll meet around 8:30am and then drive up there in as few cars as possible. If anyone wants to join, let me know. We can pick a convenient meeting spot later in the week. Ritz, Rupp, and Farah are likely to be up there as well, although no one is required to try and hang w/ them :-) 

AM - 12 miles. The usual JAKJAF crew (we're still looking for more letters to form a better word). Nice run, easy pace, and we didn't do the Tanner Park death loop like last week.

PM - 5.2 miles, horsepark loop. Saw a new, very cute puppy. Hot out!

AM - 5 miles, nice & easy.

PM - 10 miles. Met Andrea and Kevin at Highland for a track workout. The plan was cruise intervals (8-10 x 1K w/ 200m recovery) at goal half-marathon pace (I'm hoping to crack the 1:05 barrier in Duluth). We warmed up 2 miles around SHP then got going. I ended up running 8 x 1000m in 3:05 average... so right on pace. It was windy and I just didn't feel like I had my "A" game today, so I didn't feel the need to force the issue and squeeze out 10 reps. I got what I needed out of this. I've had 6 faster sessions in the last 10 days so I need to make sure I don't go over the line and put myself in a recovery hole. The three of us slowly jogged the perimeter of the park again for a cooldown.

Running 15:25 5K splits (x4!) for a non-aided 1/2 marathon seems intimidating on paper, but I feel very confident that with another month of training, I should be able to do this.

AM - 7.3 miles up to work. Andrea joined me for the first part.

PM - 5.5 miles, from work down to SHP, meeting Andrea along the way. Finished with a mile on the track -  fast on the straights, jogging the turns - so 8 x 100m in 15.0 seconds average... starting at 15.5 and working all the way down to 14.7 :-) I'm no David Rudisha... baby steps to getting faster. Then we did our form drills... trying to keep doing these multiple times per week.

Jay Johnson's post about honesty and race specificity is worth a read, especially the last couple paragraphs. 

*Meeting here at 9am tomorrow for a run on the Jeremy Ranch road. We'll probably run to East Canyon Reservoir and back.

AM - 17 miles on the Jeremy Ranch road. This is probably my favorite place in Utah to run... love it up there. There's no better place to build strength. Its just rolling hills the whole way, and since you drop about 450 feet on the way out without really realizing it, the return trip to the cars is extra fun! Andrea and I met James, Kevin, Chad, and Mark and we got started at 9am - it was surprisingly warm by that point. We had a great run - out to the end of the dirt road and then another mile or so to East Canyon Reservoir, then back. Saw a moose a few miles into the run! Casual pace for the first 16, then I ran the last mile faster (5:03), which is actually pretty good considering its an uphill mile at 6300 feet and was into a headwind.

Another lesson learned today - don't start doing all the variations of the Arrested Development Chicken Dances while running uphill at altitude. You'll loose your breath, guaranteed! :-) 

Then we went to Ruth's and got some big omelets. Fantastic day. We'll be repeating this one next Saturday for sure. 

PM - 4.5 miles, horsepark loop.