Kerry's Running Blog

An interesting run this morning. Lloyd N. called me last night and asked me if we were still running on Monday mornings. I told him we were and invited him to join us. I missed Richard last week, but apparently he came down (I waited until 5:50 and then figured that his knee must still be giving him trouble). The three of us took off heading south along the trail. Richard was actually running quite strong, but needed to walk for a bit after about a mile. We continued on to Highland Glen Park and then Lloyd and I headed northeast along the road behind Lone Peak HS. He said he'd signed up for TOU and needed to start getting serious about training. After reaching 48th West we ran north and caught the golf course trail and followed it to the mouth of American Fork Canyon. It was then that I realized that I hadn't restarted my watch after parting from Richard. We ran up the canyon a little ways to add on a mile and then ran up the big hill on Canyon Road and down to the grain silos. I felt OK for the most part, I wasn't breathing very hard and my legs were all right, but my throat was really sore. When I got home I told Laureen about it and she said that her throat was sore as well and she felt sickly. I'm not sure what we've picked up, but I'm hoping it's fairly minor. I've felt a little more tired that usual this afternoon, but the sore throat is pretty much gone. I'm hoping I can get a good seven mile workout in tomorrow.

Ran a little different route this morning because I wanted to cover the stretch that Lloyd and I ran yesterday to see how far it was. It was almost exactly what I estimated. Had a nice, challenging uphill run along the golf course (with a stiff headwind) and then amazingly had a headwind when I turned south to run up the big hill on Canyon Road. Near the top, the wind changed direction and gave me a little push. I ran hard on the downhill section all the way back to my house. Next time I may extend the downhill section by turning south on 40th instead of going straight. I was happy to find that I didn't have any sore throat this morning or any sickness to speak of. Laureen and my youngest daughter were both feeling sickly all day yesterday. 

 We're still trying to decide what to do about the Cedar Hills 5K on Saturday. Amelia really wants to do it, but as she's not been feeling well (and hasn't really trained), we'll have to make that decision later in the week. If none of the family can run it, I'll probably just go for a longer run that morning.
 

My left knee was very sore this morning when I got up so I decided to wait until lunchtime to run. I'm not sure what the problem was, but it didn't bother me during the run or after. The temperature was around eighty with mostly cloudy skies, but the humidity was higher than normal and I felt fairly sluggish the whole run. As I finished up I saw Patrick Felsted coming up the road just having returned from a run. I really didn't recognize him at first as he was wearing a hat and sunglasses, had grown his hair out long and had lost a lot of upper body weight. He said he'd seen me just as I was starting off and I asked him how far he's been running. I kept thinking, how come I haven't seen this guy before...a fairly serious runner (he was wearing a Salt Lake Marathon shirt) that lives in my neighborhood...it didn't make sense. I was about to ask his name, but he seemed to know me, so I kind of hesitated. It wasn't until I got back to the house that I could confirm with my wife that that's who it was (she'd recently seen him with his wife and knew that he had lost a lot of weight and had grown his hair long).

I had a related experience on Saturday when I was in Subway buying some last-minute sandwiches for a Activity Day's picnic. A guy next to me in line said "Hi Kerry!" which kind of startled me because I didn't remember ever having seen the guy before. I said hi back and he smiled and said "You don't remember me do you?" I lied and said he looked somewhat familiar, but then he laughed and said his brother-in-law put him up to it and pointed to an SUV parked just outside. It was Jason Taylor that I'd worked with at Novell for a number of years. I laughed and said that was definitely something Jason would do.

There are probably many occasions where I pass somebody in a store or on the street that I just don't recognize. People often dramatically change their appearance over just a short period of time. I have almost no chance of recognizing most people that I went to high school with. Karl Rove (President Bush's former advisor) is a good example. He was thin, looked much younger than he actually was and wore big glasses. It didn't occur to me for several years that he was the same guy until he mentioned in an interview that he graduated from Olympus High School. I'd imagine people would have the same trouble recognizing me. 

I was feeling a bit tired and aching starting off this morning, so I decided not to do the hills today and run the Kohler's Loop instead (the uphills and downhills are mostly very gradual). After a couple of miles my legs felt pretty good so I starting picking up the pace, especially after I spotted another runner ahead of me running on the opposite side of the road. I caught and passed him without too much trouble and just kept up the same pace after turning east and heading towards the mouth of American Fork Canyon. After turning at the light I spotted a couple of runners about a half mile away. At first I couldn't tell which direction they were running, but when I determined they were going in the same direction I took off to see if I could catch them. By the time I reached the high school I had closed about half the distance, but would have to hurry to catch them before I made the turn to head home. As I was closing in they turned in the funeral home and stopped. It must have been the Warenski's that live there. I kept running hard until I reached the seven mile mark and then slowed a bit for the final mile. Felt pretty good afterwards.

Temple Loop this morning. My left knee was really sore again when I got up, so I went downstairs to work for a little bit. After moving around and sitting for a half hour it felt fine so I headed out. Didn't feel particularly energetic, but held a decent pace through the long uphill section. Average pace was 8:45.

Ran Lloyd's Loop this morning. I was a bit tired, but the legs felt pretty good. I left a little late to get back in time to watch the Cedar Hills 5K.