Speed only kills if you don't have it!

We spent the weekend down in Mona and Provo with my family.  I was in Provo this morning and almost talked myself out of running because of the snow fall. We got dumped on pretty good.   I did finally get out late morning and felt pretty mediocre.  I think that my solid 36 miles last week wore on me worse than I thought it would. 

I ran a variation of a course that I used to run in Provo and Orem with the Sojourners called the "Grandview loop".  It loops though neighborhoods in Provo and Orem, onto the Provo river trail, up the hill (little Veyo) by the University mall and past Runner's Corner.  It was kind of fun to run that course, it was my first time in almost three years.  It used to be my bread and butter course!

1:01:30

I had Monday classes today because of the Holiday and it kind of messed my schedule up for the week.  I didn't lift this morning, so I decided to go on a run at about 7:00pm when we got back from Allison's soccer game.  It was dark and the traffic was a pain, but I felt alot better tonight.

I ran my Lundstrom Park 5 miler (no big killer deer this time).  It is a good little loop with some good up and down in it.  I felt good enough when I got to the last mile and a half or so that I decided to do some tempo.  I pushed the last stretch as much as I dared for the visibility that I had.  I am not sure how long my tempo was (between 1.5 and 1.6 miles for sure), I need to go clock it sometime.  9:19 for the tempo and 33:56 for the run.

This is the first time that I have done back to back runs.  I went out this morning at 6:00 am and did the Center St./River Heights loop with Old Main stairs at the end.  I like that run because it has a few good climbs, and I need all the climbing I can get for Striders circuit.  I felt okay, a little fatigued from last night, but better than Monday. 

 I had some dog follow me from RiverHeights clear until Old Main and then it wondered off after some college girls.  The stupid dog will probably end up in the pound before it makes it home.  I tried to ditch it, but it seemed to think I was it's friend even after some blows that would have ended any friendship.

50:31

I ran at 6:00am today. It was not quite as cold as it has been and toward the end of my run it got light.  I did the same Millville out and back as last week accept I turned off of 100 west in Providence and headed down to 200 west a block or two sooner.  I felt really heavy in my legs today and never really felt like I got in rhythm.  I did however, run a bit fast than last week  38:44 out and 36:33 back.
 Total run-1:15:18

Day off.  I was going to run a couple of miles and do some strides, but I am feeling a little beat up.  Played some Quadball at school.

I picked up Paul on the way down to Ogden.  It was nice to have someone to visit with on the drive down, I had my 17 month old son (Jaren) with me but he isn't much for conversation.  We dropped Jaren off in Willard with his Grandparents and made it the start of the race about 45 minutes early.  I did about a 2 mile warm-up with Paul, Cody, and Dan.  The weather was colder today than for the 5k, but still wasn't too bad for this time of year.  I stayed in my warm-ups until the race and then stripped down to tights, two shirts, and some gloves.  I didn't see anyone getting down to there signets.

Once again, there were a lot of hot-shots there for the money, so I didn't even worry too much about my place.  The course seemed tougher than the 5k and had a lot of up and down.  I didn't mind the hills, but there were a lot of small loops and very tight corners that I thought were completely unnecessary, not to mention they all had ice.  I thought they could have done a better job in mapping out a decent course with out loops and tight icy corners.  I had to slow down a lot in places and take really wide turns on corners, and on a well thought out course that would have never been the case.

I took it out pretty easy and worked my way into a decent pace.  I came up on a lot of people during the race, and the only person who passed me was Bob Henze and I caught him in the last 300 meters.  I felt okay today I never really pushed myself too hard, and probably should have because I didn’t go under 40 minutes like I wanted to.  I never paid much attention to my time after the first mile (6:55) and missed about every split.  If I would have been a bit more serious I could have at least shaved another 17 seconds off of my time.

I ended up 21^st over all and 8^th in the age, so I pretty much got blown out.  I’ll take it though for the amount of training time I have and the 5 weeks of total training that I’ve done.  40:16 total time.

I did about a 2 mile cool down.  I ended up with my mileage goal again this week.  I know that finding the time to run isn’t going to get any easier but hopefully the miles will.  45 miles scheduled for next week.

Paul (4^th over all, 34:47), Cody (17^th overall, 38:59), and Dan (27^th overall, 41:47) all seemed to be okay with the race.  Paul won the age and was a couple of seconds out of overall place and money.  Dan got bumped up to 3^rd in his age because the first three guys were overall. So Paul’s loss was Dan’s gain.