Rob Murphy

PM: Three miles of hiking from the Alta Lodge to Albion Basin and back. We Murphy's are up here celebrating out 20th wedding anniversary tomorrow but we decided to make it even more romantic by bringing our two kids with us.

Off to the hot tubs with Abby and Andy now.

Oh, and if anyone is interested, I accidentally posted some more stuff about Alta on yesterday's (Monday) entry.

Alta run.

From the Goldminer's Daughter up to Albion Basin and around seven or eight times, I lost track. Felt solid on the uphills and was able to open it up some on the downhills. I'm thrilled.

The campground opens on the 4th but they were turning the water on today which is great for the longer runs.

Went to Sprouts on the way home. Apparently Wednesday is some sort of sale day and there were a million people there. Abby was traumatized to see that they sold ground kangaroo.

Busy morning.

Took the dog to the park, mowed the lawn and did yard work, and ran 6.25 miles around the neighborhood. Andy joined me for some of it on his bike.

I've decided that Abby and I will run the Magna 4th of July 5k tomorrow because it starts at 7 am so we can get back to our neighborhood parade/breakfast at 9 and because it's $15.00 not $25 or$ 30 like all the other races.

Louis Zamperini died today at 97. 

Uff da! As they say in  Minnesota - and Norway.

Today ended my streak of 12 consecutive 4th of July races. I fully planned on racing but Jon Kotter called me last night and asked me to do a long run with him. So Ann agreed to take Abby to the race while Jon and I headed out at 6:30

This run wore me out. With the hard Alta run on Wednesday and today's hard run, I realize that hard days every other day is too much at my advanced age. I know I was holding Jon back.

We started at my house and ran up to 2700 East and hung a left at the Parley Pratt statue. Up to Sunnyside and then left at the post office through research park, Fort Douglas and The University of Utah, Past the hospital and through the Jewish Community Center grounds to the Bonneville Shoreline trail, then through Federal Heights and the Upper Avenues to the top of Mmemory Grove by the mouth of City Creek Canyon, down through Memory Grove and up the Lower Avenues back towards the U (stopped at a neighborhood pancake breakfast for some chocolate milk), past Rice-Eccles Stadium and south on Guardsman, crossed Sunnyside again and wound through some streets to 1900 East, stopped at Fritz's house to drink some water from his hose bib (did not re-attach the hose - sorry Fritz), liked the 1st place Mesquite Marathon stepping stone in Fritz's yard, then back to my house. Spent a little time talking about Jon's chances of beating Fritz at Des News. Should be a good one if they both race.

17.25 miles, pretty hilly, in 2:08. With my roundabout jog to Highland High and my march in the annual Highland Park Fourth of July parade, I give myself 19 hard miles. Good run, and the type of run I don't push myself through often enough. I'm pretty knackered now and ready for an afternoon nap. 

You can see the Sugar House Park fireworks show great from my yard if anyone wants to come set up some chairs in my yard before 10 pm. Although traffic around hear is a real bear before the show.

Happy 238th USA!

Walk/jogged to the gym and back. 570 floors on the stair master in 60 minutes. New PR!

Rest day. Lots of napping. Maybe some hiking this evening?

I did walk a total of 5 miles today plus ran some stadium steps at Highland High with Abby and Andy. 

Nice morning.

9 hilly miles in the gully in 1:10 which is a fairly decent clip. 1.25 miles on the treadmill and then 1 mile on the stair master at level 14 (the max).

PM: Weights, core and a short swim at the ridiculously crowded Sugar House 24 Hour Fitness.

I'm sore today. Need to lift at least twice a week if I'm going to do it without it killing me the next day. 

Still got a decent 8 miles in at Liberty Park in the late morning. Hot but lots of shade. Ran several long striders at the end. Felt good on them.

Because I started around 11 am today, I missed Doug Fabrizio and Radio West. If I wasn't me I'd probably want to be Doug Fabrizio. He hosts a daily show here in Salt Lake, but syndicated all over the west and on satellite, called Radio West. In my opinion, Fabrizio is one of the best interviewers working today. His daily show is way more informative than any TED talk. The reason I'd like to be him is because he gets to let his mind roam over a wide array of topics (check out his guest lists) which would never get boring. Also, he gets to educate and inform without the worst aspect of teaching - grading papers.

If you live outside of Salt Lake you can subscribe to his podcasts or listen online at KUER.org

Fifteen hard but beautiful miles up at Alta Ski Area. Started out at 6:30, ran up and did five campground loops. Then headed back down the road and through the "meadow" (Andy's term for it), passed Alf's Restaurant and up the brutal Sugarloaf trail for 1.5 miles turning around when I got to around 11,000 feet. Awesome views! Ran 10:57 for the first uphill mile past the restaurant. Then I proceeded back down to the summer road. Managed sub-7 minutes for miles 13 and 14.

15 in 2:10

PM: 2 mile walk with Abby up to the Red Box to rent How to Train Your Dragon.

Easy run in lane 8 of the Alta High track.

Picked up a new pair of Saucony Peregrine's on the way home to ease my transition into hard core trail racing.

PM: I did the Core H routine plus some push-ups and rope jumping. I'm good at that. Think I might have been a boxer in a previous life.

AM: Abby, Andy, and I walked to Chick-fil-a for breakfast. Our journey took us through the 8th wonder of the world, the Sugar House Draw. 4 miles of walking total.

Will do just an easy run later. I'm running the trail series 10k tomorrow in Park City. 

Pete Magill's new website looks like it will be a great resource.

Pretty good race today up in Park City. It was supposed to be a 10k but it was a half mile long. Great course and lots of fun. Turned out to be a good workout. Flat to gradual uphill for most of the first mile, steady climb for all of mile two, rolling with lots of switchbacks and rocky for miles three through five, and a nice downhill on wide trails to the finish. Pretty muddy in places, especially the start and finish.

A woman named Emma Garrard edged me out for third place. I was a little surprised because I thought I knew every woman in Utah who can potentially beat me and I didn't see any of them at the start. Turns out she's a pretty good triathlete. I held her off until just before the third mile but then she built a solid lead on me. I closed the gap (I think) a lot the last mile (5:56 for me) but it wasn't enough. She was tough. Big gaps. The 5th place runner was 2 minutes behind me.

PM: Went to the gym and did some weights/core. I'll be sore tomorrow.

Just an easy recovery run around the neighborhood. 

World Cup on ABC or the CrossFit Games on ESPN???? I can't decide.

Great night last night. Jake and Andrea came over for dinner and then Jon Allen spent the night after pacing at Hardrock this weekend. Jon lives in my old hometown of Greenville, SC so it was great to catch up on a lot of stuff. Good conversation.

10 miles in the gully at 6:30 am with lots of hard hills. First 100 of the summer on tap today according to weather.com.

PM: 4.25 on the treadmill. Then alternated pool, hot tub, pool.

AM: At cross country practice...

3.25 mile warm-up then 6 X 1/4 mile on the region xc course at Cottonwood Complex. We ran these along the fence line on the west side of the park which has a long, gradual downhill. The idea was to give the kids a little boost in working on some faster than race pace turnover.

My splits were 82, 80, 77, 76, 71, 68. Lots of fun. It's been years since I did a workout like this.

That's right, 68 on the last one!

Nice to have Kramer join us today. Abby did the workout with the girls and was a real trooper.

PM: Gym workout while Abby was swimming. 4 miles of eliptickling and 1.25 miles on the stair master on 14. Sweatfest!

15 in 2:05 at Alta. Eleven campground loops!

Rest Day.

20 miles in 2:32 at Jeremy Ranch.

Hard run! Parked at Mormon Flats instead of the beginning of the dirt road as we normally do. I ran down to the end past the Richy Rich House and then turned left up (and I do mean up!) the paved road towards Big Mountain. I climbed for about 3.25 miles before I turned around and I averaged about 6:25 pounding back down. Good quad workout for Des News. When I got back to my car I was at about 13 miles and it was getting pretty warm. I hadn't had anything to drink so I slurped down some GU an "nuun electrolyte enhanced drink tabs" mixed with water. I won these at the 10k in Park City last week. Feeling a little rejuvenated, I ran 7 more miles with miles 16-18 in 12:30.

Super pooped now. Long run with many hills. I wish I had started an hour earlier.

This assures I won't be tempted to do Draper Days tomorow. I'll be there to cheer for Abby though.

AM: One mile at the Draper Days 5k.

PM: Jogged to the gym and back. Heavy lifting/core in between.

So I read most of Matt Fitzgerald's new book, Diet Cults, while sitting in Barnes and Noble yesterday. I liked it a lot because it squares with what I already believe :-). You will not like this book if you are the type of person who believes your way is THE WAY, whether we're talking about diet, an exercise program, or religion. He equates the fervor with which people embrace the paleo diet and CrossFit with the same mentality that leads some people into fanatical devotion to religious cults.

You can test this out by going to an online forum and posting a negative comment about CrossFit.

By the way, what ever happened to P90X? 

I saw that Paul only ran 5 miles at 8 minute pace so I thought I'd adopt a 3 time Olympic trials qualifier as my role model.

I feel like a Mormon for a day. Went to Kramer's LDS ward down in Sandy this morning to hear his talk before leaving on his mission next week. Now we're heading back down there to Kramer's house for a farewell get together which apparently lasts several hours and involves eating. So that's good.

I'm going to miss Kramer these next couple years.

How much money does Sasha make off of these relentless Chili's adds that keep popping up and obscuring my typing?

Amazon is having a great sale on Saucony running shoes - up to 50% off if you want to choose unpopular colors. I just picked up a pair of Ride 6's for $43.00.

Great run this morning. I met Rory Linkletter, Davis, and Ashton in the gully at 7 am for a double gully long run. I added the longer run loops to the second lap to make 14 miles in 1:48. Pretty warm and windy but otherwise a good run.

7:43 pace for 14 miles in the gully is not bad.

I'm going to take it easy the next couple days so hopefully I have a little zip in my legs for Des News. The fast downhill miles are getting harder for me. My ability to run steep uphills seems mostly undiminished but ripping it on the downhills is harder. Bad News for Des News.

Easy treadmill run with 4 X 1/4 mile at 5:40 pace.

Pool, hot tub, pool after. Relaxing.

I was all set to have a relaxing evening when my wife reminded me that I have to attend the neighborhood street lighting committee meeting tonight. It should rock! I've broken an important barrier by becomming the first non-Mormon to sit on that powerful committee. Seems that my neighbor Shane, who rules the local ward and, thus, the neighborhood has always recruited members at church but it apparently occured to him this year that including the non-Mormon perspective on street lighting would be a positive step towards inclusion. Seriously, Shane is a super nice guy though and always willing to help everybody.

For those of you who live in states or cities that provide residential street lighting as a municipal service and at no extra cost to residents, you're lucky.

AM: Two easy miles and striders on the Alta track.

I just got back from packet pick-up for Des News. Let me just say that I'm not happy with how this race has evolved over the past few years. Someday I'm going to write a long post on the types of races I like to run and the types of races I don't like to run. I ran my first road race in 1978, so I feel qualified to comment.

I just looked over my race report for the 2010 10k. I went out in 5:03!

35:19. Not bad. Not sure about the results yet and where I placed. I'm pretty sure I won my age group and was second master to Walter.

Took it out in 5:13 and hit the 5k split in 16:50. This should give you an idea of how, once again, that last mile was a death march for me. I hung with a bunch of high school kids, Sarah Feeny from Ogden and a bunch of Davis High boys until about the 5th mile when our pack began to break up. I was wearing an Alta singlet and one of them told me I looked too old to run for Alta. 

The heat was a real challenge today. 87 degrees on the starting line at 6 am! Took its toll on me at the end. I have tons of respect for the marathoners out there. I ran about a quarter mile with Fritz at mile 25 and about a mile with Jon Kotter who was having one of those days but was gutting it out anyway.

Past Deseret News 10k results for me and age..

2012 (47) - 33:27 on short course

2010 (45) - 34:36

2008 (43) - 35:40

2007 (42) - 35:54

2006 (41) - 35:37

2005 (40) - 34:43 on short course

2004 (39) - 37:57

2003 (38) - 39:06

2002 (37) - 38:39

I ran 4.25 miles around the neighborhood and the Highland track when I got home just because.

PM: A couple hours of trampolining at The wAIRhouse with Steve and his kids. That was a workout!

Wow, what a difference 24 hours makes. Went out to pick up my paper this morning and it's an absolutely perfect day to race a 10k or a marathon. Or at least as perfect as it gets for July in Utah.

Too bad I can't run - too sore. I'm actually a little disapponted by that since I really thought I'd trained hard for the downhills. Plus my left knee is a bit achy so I'm going to rest.

We Murphy's are heading out of town today for a week in Colorado. I'm teaching a new class this year (AP European History) so I'm going to a College Board workshop at Cherry Creek High School near Denver. Since the district is paying for the trip, the whole family is coming. Ann and the kids will do vacationy stuff while I'm in class. We are staying in Boulder on Saturday night and I plan to get up early Sunday morning and do a 15 miler on Magnolia Road which should be familiar to anyone who's read Running With the Buffalos. Andy and I are going to a Rockies game on Sunday afternoon. I'm excited about that and it's Andy's first big leage game and my first since 2003 in Cincinnatti. 

Taking our time getting out of here this morning. The kids are exhausted after a couple days with the Anderson kids! Overnight tonight in Craig Colorado so just an easy drive today. Maybe stop by Dinosaur National Monument which we've never been to.

PM: Swim and hot tub at the hotel plus some hiking at Dinosaur National Monument.

Off to J.W. Snacks Gulf Coast Bar & Grill for dinner. Seriously.

AM: 2.25 mile walk plus core workout at the hotel.

PM: Easy 6.5 along the Boulder Creek Trail. Nice urban run with lots of fast runners. Still not as nice as the trails around the lakes in Minneapolis.

Only got two powerful whiffs of weed along the trail. I was expecting more.

Nice night at the Boulder Outlook. "The Cure for the Common Hotel".

I got up at 5 this morning and drove up Boulder Canyon (if that canyon was in Utah we'd have three or four half marathons in it) and ran Mags. 15.75 miles in 2 hours. Hilly, about 9,000 feet.

I can say "Mags" now because I've done it twice.

Other stuff...

Drove Magnolia Road and through Nederland with the family.

Took Andy to his first big leage game at Coors Field. The Pirates beat the Rockies 7-5

Ate dinner in downtown Denver.

Checked into hotel at the Denver Tech Center.

When The Congo achieved its independence from Belgium in 1960, only 12 people in the entire country had a college degree.

1.5 mile walk from my hotel to Cherry Creek High School. Scored two new tennis balls for my dog. CCHS has won 38 state championships in boys tennis and 27 in girls since 1972. That's dominance.

Cherry Creek High has a great track with a college sized stadium. Think I'll do a workout there tonight and run some stadium stems. Jupiter Creek Steeplechase this Saturday!

PM: Ran to CCHS, hopped the fence into their spiffy stadium/track (similar to a D II college I'd say), circled the track for a long time and did 20 stadiums.

People around here like their Jag-U-ars. In fact, while running back to the hotel I saw a wreck involving two Jag-U-ars. It was funny to see their two slicky boy owners in suits obsessively snapping pictures of the damage with their phones. I wanted to shout "it's good to be bad".

The traffic around Denver is insane. Almost approaching Southern California levels in some places.

Ann, Abby, and Andy went back up to Boulder today and spent most of the day tubing down Boulder Creek.

Literally not possible to run today. Third zero in the last six days. Don't feel good about that at all. 

Not only that but I'm sitting all day and eating super healthy hotel breakfasts and conference food. Just IDEAL for my race this weekend!

I need to get rid of my job and my family and be in a state that doesn't have 48 straight hours of continuous thunder storms and torrential rain.

Finally, a halfway decent run. 7.25 very early miles in the drizzle around the CCHS track.

Last day of my conference. Will drive a couple hours tonight and make it home tomorrow.

Colorado has a lot of rabbits.