Wheeler Farm Loops

AM - 7 miles in Springdale. Found a dirt trail along the river and ran there.

We spent the day up on the East Rim of the park before heading home. The thing that I wasn't expecting on this trip was the stunning fall colors... exploring the Clear Creak area was awesome... the brightest red trees I've ever seen.

The drive home wasn't bad at all - once the Lion King soundtrack hit the CD player, it was basically a 4 hour sing-a-long.

AM - 7 miles around campus, back to regular life. A 3-day weekend was a perfect little break. 

PM - 30 minutes of pool running while Andrea tried to qualify for the synchronized swimming / water dancing world championships. 

Some more Zion pics... I forgot how much I love this area...

AM - 9 miles up to work. I know I'll be tempted to run home this afternoon, but I plan to take the bus and keep my streak of singles going for a while longer. Everything is feeling really good - I can't remember the last time I woke up in the morning and felt so bouncy within the first minute of being out the door. But I don't want to start making any concrete plans (although I have lots of great ideas running through my head) about next year until after the USATF annual meeting, when we'll maybe find out the new trials standards / window. So until then, just loafing around for another month or so :-)

AM - 7 miles, upper campus.

I like the website Athletics Illustrated, and I also find a lot of things Steve Magness has to say very interesting. So, Athletics Illustrated's interview w/ Magness is a good (short) read. Lots of interviews that you can learn something from on that site if you poke around a bit.

PM - Horsepark walk. Bathroom repairs. 

AM - 9 miles up to work. 

PM - 3 miles. Andrea was about to head out for a short run when I got home, so I joined her. I think that was a fair reason to run twice today. 

Somewhat disturbing article in The Telegraph yesterday about how there is no out-of-competition blood testing in Kenya (to be fair, it really applies to the whole region, not just Kenya, and plenty of foreign athletes go to Kenya to train as well). It follows an interview with Hajo Seppelt from a week ago. None of this proves anything, but it seems to be the popular topic right now. 

It seems kind of shallow, but assuming the NYC marathon happens on Sunday, I'm very interested to see how ESPN does with the live coverage, this being their big foray into the genre. They tend to be a lot more innovative that the other networks, and it would be nice to watch a marathon on TV w/out having to refresh Letsrun on my computer every minute to get splits, etc.

AM - 8 miles up to work.

PM - 4.3 miles down to SHP.

AM - 13.4 miles. Tanner Park Death Loop w/ Fritz, ACorn, Bryan, and Jon. Usually I only give this route that label the day after a really hard workout or in the middle of a high-mileage cycle, but I feel so out of shape on hills right now so its very much a death loop. Good to run w/ the guys... been a while since we've done that!

Afterwards we rendezvoused w/ the trail running team (Allie, James, Devra) and the Gallowalking team (Andrea, Amiee) for a birthday brunch @ Ruth's. 

Happy 26th Birthday to Andrea!