Dave's Addiction

Now here's a fun race. Gain 2300 feet in 6.5 miles, with some decent cash on the line. I'll give that a try, sounds like a good workout! Which it was. I had no idea the Salt Lake valley went so far.. West.. but I still made it with 5 minutes to spare before the race started. I warmed up by running from my car to the checkin van, got my number, and off we went! I was out front like usual but keeping up with me easily was Mr. Salt Lake Track Club guy and Mrs Olympic XC Ski Team member. They slowly pulled ahead after the first quarter mile, leaving me alone with my thoughts about the nasty hill to come. Without warning my watch announced the end of the first mile, in 6:58! A sub 7 uphill mile? That's crazy talk. But there it was, 217 feet gain. And the second mile was almost as good - same gain, 7:29. The third mile came in at 8:01 as the hill started to steepen a little (263). Then I started to feel it with miles 4 and 5 - 400 feet in 9:54 then a brutal 500 feet in 11:11. I probably should have kept running more but I had fallen barely into fifth place, and it was pretty tough. The sixth mile was also 500 feet at an 11:22 pace, but then the tailwind really picked up and was able to do the last .55 (200 feet) at an 8:30 pace for a total time of 59:21. The first two had come in 8 minutes (!) earlier and were on their way to Tooelle. After chilling in the 30 MPH wind at the top for about 10 minutes I decided I had better get moving on the return before I froze so off I went, a very pleasant 40 minute jaunt back to the bottom for the full half. A really fun race, definitely recommended. Although they should probably start the bikes 10 minutes earlier to be fair.

EZ to/from gym and treadmill with a .25 14 MPH throuwn in, felt really strong today, had to go to 80s on the dumbell press

Great ladder workout on the TM this morning, I tried to make it hard but the TM is so much easier than the track. But it did feel pretty challenging except I would have liked to run the 220 and 440 at 16 and 15 but the TM only goes to 14. Here it is

.25 warmup, long rests between the intevals

.18 at 14

.25 at 14

.5 at 13

.75 at 12.6

1 at 12.3

.75 at 12.6

.5 at 13.1

.25 at 14

.18 at 14

A little cold so I split the run into 3, gym, 3 so as not to freeze the dingleberries.

Nice tempo run on the flat course, paces were 5:48, 6:02, 6:05, 5:58, 5:55 for a 5:58 average. Pretty close to record, not terribly difficult.

Easy run with some hills thrown in

Fun run with the Hokas, I might need to pick some up. My feet told me that I had failed to work out today.

Easy run in the wind, loads of fun

Standard pre-race strides except I did a hill run on the treadmill to prepare for tomorrow's VO2max test

EZ run to and from gym in the morning

VO2max test in the afternoon. It was pretty disappointing, as Icould not get my heart rate over 163 for some reason. I only got 58. Had to stop at the 11.0 level. I just wasn't feeling it.

EZ run around the neighborhood. Felt oddly light on my feet.

I have Discovered Something. Bugged about my test still, I remembered that no matter how fast or slow I breathed, the oxygen uptake did not change and the RER did not improve. In fact, the only thing that determined my oxygen use was heart rate. When it went up, the O2 use went up. So I decided to run a progressive treadmill (start at 9.1, .1 increase per minute) and try to up heart rate the whole time. I concentrated on my heart and the place in my brain that lights up when my heart rate increases and pushed. Hard. Before I knew it I was at 20 minutes (11.1) but still breathing 2 in 3 out! 22, 24, 25 - usually I really start to feel it here but no problems. 2 in, 2 out, no hard breathing, totally easy. Even minute 29 (11.9) was a nothingburger. I took minute 30 to 13.2 and it was still Easy! (well not easy but not the desperate run it has been in the past) I immediately jumped off the treadmill and grabbed my neck to check heart rate and it was 180! But after 5 beats it fell to 160 right away. Also my heart was very jittery all morning until I sucked energy back out of the place I pushed earlier, then it returned to normal. I can hardly wait to try intervals on Monday :)

I tried for a long run but left too late, the snow became too much and I cut it.

I think I had foodpoisoning yesterday, felt like crap for a while and still a little weak today.

Tried for the overdrive today, couldn't even finish the second VO2max mile. I must still be nuked from Sunday. Oogg.

Tried for 6 EZ on the treadmill but I couldn't take it any more after 5.  Got up to 10.2 without going into effort at all.

Tried for the overdrive today but I could not find it again. I have to find out how I did that last Friday. But I still had a gread normal workout, 1 mile each at 11.8, 12.1, 12.5, then .73 at 12.8 then .27 at 14.0.  Then I was feeling so good I ran home from work in the afternoon (3.7 EZ)

Intense run up and down the Y, had Asthma the rest of the day and I don't even have Asthma.

Long run on the Mapleton bench, looks like the new trail segment is holding up very well! I ran back the last 4 miles at 6:20-6:40, tried to keep it easy after all the speed this week.

Just trying to run an easy tempo on the treadmill, kept pushing it to 30 minutes, got to 10.9/11.0

Chilly McDonalds run

I hate winter

3 strides before the race tomorrow, flat, TM, hill

So I came to this race with one objective - engage the overdrive again. It has been really hard to find after that first time, but I had hopes. I lined up at the front on the slightly chilly day and we were off! And I do mean We, as it seemed like everybody in the whole race was doing a 4:30 pace to the west. I just hung in there and kept going. A single person jumped out front, folled by a giant pack which I was a part of. About .6 miles in my first mile is free superpower started to gutter out as usual and the pack started to pull away. So it was time to try for the overdrive. Will all the concentration I had I pushed at the back of my head and heart and boom! It kicked in. With the heart rate skyrocketing, just a few seconds of lactic clearing and I was right up in the pack again, right next to captain elbows AKA Benjamin who was looking fine except lacking about ten sandwiches. And now I felt like I wanted to go around the pack, like they were going too slow. I resisted the urge though since this was a new level. Without warning the 1 mile mark flew by and I checked my watch. 5:07. I was so shocked I lost concentration and fell out of overdrive back to normal levels. I tried mightily to regain it but it was to no avail, the rest of the race was spent with a normal clearing profile, struggling and sometimes succeeding to stay under 6 flat. Sasha passed me in mile 3 with his latest prodigy, looks like he has added about 5 inches of circumference to his quads. I guess that's what happens when you run 80 mostly slow miles per week :) All I can say is that I am going to spend a lot of time working on this new level this winter and see if I can stay in it with something less than every bit of concentration I have. About 18th overall, they haven't posted results yet so that is a guess. Toni may have pushed me into the 20s, hepassed me with 10 yards to go racing somebody else who he beat as well.

Ran 10 miles down the canyon from the shooting range in my jeans. It hurt a lot later, yesterday's fun is pushing the mechanical systems.

20 bike up and down Hobble Creek canyon with the buy so he could find the FitBit he lost