Wheeler Farm Loops

AM - 20 miles. Did my standard long run loop for when Jeremy Ranch is too cold... down through Holladay to the mouth of Big Cottonwood Canyon, then back along Wasatch Blvd. Kept the pace relaxed (~6:40 avg)... surprisingly didn't feel too tight after a lot of time sitting in the car and airplane yesterday. It feels good to be ramping it up a bit again. Time to make some repairs to my aerobic house.

PM - 4 miles easy. 

A couple pics from Thanksgiving in Connecticut. Somehow my cousins and sister think I'm less dorky now (despite the fact that all evidence points to the fact that I'm more of a dork), so we ended up having a ton of fun. My sister also brought her boyfriend, who I liked a lot... we jammed out on Friday night (he played guitar while I handled the vocals)...

AM - 6.5 miles easy.

PM - 7 miles easy. First 3 w/ Andrea. 

Talked to Fritz and Scott and we're thinking of a big group long run this Saturday. Maybe meet somewhere b/w SLC and Utah Co? I'll post details once we get it ironed out a bit more.

AM - 8 miles up to work.

PM - 6.5 miles. Down to the track w/ the last 2 miles starting at MP effort and progressing a little - 5:10, 4:55 - then 8 x 200m in ~34 seconds.  

I read Running with the Kenyans on the plane back to SLC the other night. It was entertaining... not really something to read if you are looking for inspiring training, but it does provide a nice glimpse into the simplicity of life in that part of the world. There is a great part when the author visits Emmanuel Mutai's camp - the guy is fairly wealthy, but he essentially lives in a shack to "keep his edge." My favorite quote was when the author spoke to Brother Colm... "You people come to find the secret, but you know what the secret is? That you think there's a secret. There is no secret." I swear I made the title of my blog before I read this book!

AM - 8 miles up to work.

PM - 9 miles home. 

Long Run - Saturday, 8:00am - Riverton JRP. Meet here. I'm guessing we'll do something like 17-20 miles and it won't necessarily be slow.

AM - 13 miles. 3 up, 2 down, 8 mile AT* Tempo in 43:00 (5:23/mi avg). Splits - 5:26, 5:25, 5:23, 5:23, 5:26, 5:18, 5:20, 5:21. I had 6-8 miles @ 5:20-5:30 pace on the schedule, so I'm happy that I was on the longer/quicker end of the spectrum, while keeping the effort level where I wanted it to be. I would have been perfectly happy if this morning's workout was 5:30 average... I've got a long way to go from here, but I'm not starting at a bad place right now.

PM - 30 minutes of pool running w/ Andrea. 

[*I'm using "AT" (Aerobic Threshold) instead of "MP" (Marathon Pace) from now on... its mainly just semantics, but I feel like it does a better job of capturing what the workout is really about. Marathon effort can be 5:05s on downhills and 5:45s on uphills... that's a big range, so you aren't really always running within that +/- 5 seconds of goal MP. I really like the way Mark Hadley classifies different types of workouts.]

Got a good night of sleep on our new mattress. A couple weeks ago Lindsey D suggested two ways for Andrea to break out of her injury cycle - have a baby or get a new mattress. Needless to say, I became a big fan of shopping for mattresses immediately! Between the new mattress and the inversion table that now takes up a large portion of the living room, I really should NOT have any back problems in the future! :-)

AM - 12 miles up to work.

PM - 4.5 miles down to the track, then 8 x 100m strides.

The USATF meeting is going on right now in Florida. Of major interest is obviously the new Olympic Trials standards. Rumor has it that the Men's "B" standard is coming back, but its going to be faster than the "A" standard has ever been. Probably 2:15 / 2:18 for the guys, 2:37 / 2:43 for the ladies. We'll see...

... and its confirmed:

Men's A = 2:15  B = 2:18, 1:05

Women's A = 2:37  B = 2:43, 1:15

Qualifying window opens August 2013. Game on. 

AM - 21 miles. A big squad (15-20 guys, plus Devra - the lone female mixing it up with the dudes) met down in Riverton for a longer run on the JRP. Our total for 21 miles was 2:12, so ~6:17 pace average. Pretty amazing to be wearing a t-shirt in December... some guys were even shirtless towards the end. Had only planned on running 20, but Fritz and I stretched out the second out & back to mess w/ Kotter :-)  Last mile was an inadvertent 5:15, which coincidentally USATF just decided is my new marathon goal pace.

Really great morning... its so easy to get in the LRs with a group of great runners like this. The conversations make it fly by... and you always have to be on your toes because you never know when Matt decides its time to throw down a 5:05. Its awesome to see how excited everyone is about the spring marathon season - the enthusiasm with the group is contagious. Let's keep doing this all winter! 

*Got home just in time to watch the Foot Locker West Regional - Conner and Kramer both made it to Nationals!!! So exciting to see those two guys both up there in the front!!! 

Here's a PSA - 50% of Fro-Yo at the 21 & 21 Yogurt Stop!