Every Race is an Adventure!

I ran six easy miles (9:20/mi) with Larry this morning then the Lake View 10K loop (8:05/mi) with Tom and Nathan at noon. Fortunately , Tom had run 14 miles in the morning, and Nathan had run 8 fast ones, so they were willing to slow down to an 8:05/mi average pace so I could keep up.

Karen made me a tray of peanut butter bars for Father's Day yesterday, even though she had been sick all night and still wasn't feeling well in the morning. I hope eating peanut butter bars is good preparation for running the relay, because I'll be eating them whether it is or not. What a sweet way for her to tell me she loves and appreciates me, almost as sweet as the homemade cards with heartfelt messages that my three youngest daughters gave me. My three adult children showed their love by being there, and by allowing me to watch the "My Turn On Earth" DVD Karen gave me instead of the first half of the NBA Finals game between the Lakers and the Celtics.

I skipped my morning run with Larry and Wayne because I wanted to help Karen and the girls get off to camp this morning. I saw Larry and Wayne both as they started and as they ended their run, and I missed being with them. I wanted to hear about Wayne's experience at the Teton Dam Marathon on Saturday (he doesn't blog...but he should). I did hear that it was a very hard marathon. I think he said the overall winner was barely under 3:00. His goal was under 4:00 and he finished in 3:45. He's come back from his sever health problems over the winter very quickly.

I finally headed out for a solo run at around 8:00am. I decided to go longer today as I'll be tapering later in the week for the relay. I ended up running from my house up to Bridal Veil Falls, almost exactly 7 miles one way.

My splits on the way up were 8:27, 8:34, 8:05, 8:14, 8:10, 8:47, and 9:05.

I averaged 8:19 for the first 0.8 miles on the trip back then started a 3 mile uptempo run starting at the start of the Army National Guard's 2 mile run that is just after the rise out of Nunn's Park (says, "Hooah" on the start line). My splits were 6:56, 7:19 (some uphill), and 7:20. The third mile would have been faster but I stopped to pick up some toys that some toddlers had been dropping from their strollers. I had passed two young mothers going the other direction, each pushing a stroller. I saw the first toy and kept going, but then saw another one 20-30 yards farther along the trail. I decided to double back and return them to their presumed owners. On the way back I found a third that had just recently been dropped. As I caught them and presented the toys I noticed they had plenty more they could have dropped. I thought of Hansel and Gretel dropping breadcrumbs but quickly decided the mothers didn't look like witches so I returned the toys and resumed my run. My average for that mile had dropped to 7:33 (I think) at the point I resumed but I managed to pull it back down to 7:20 by the end.

The 3.5 miles from there, up the hill on 800 N and back home, were very hard for me (8:51, 8:48, 8:53, 9:33/mi for last 0.5 miles. I was pretty tired and it was getting pretty hot (around 80 degrees). The overall average pace for the 14.3 miles was 8:19/mi.

The forecast highs for the relay are 92 on Friday and 96 on Saturday. I think today's run was good mental preparation for running tired in the heat. At least during the relay I'll have my van mates giving me plenty of water to drink and cool down with. I can't believe it's relay week again already. It's going to be awesome!

Larry and I ran the water tank hills at a very easy pace this morning. My legs were a little tired from yesterday's hard run, but they loosened up good and felt great by the end of the run.

We stopped once to talk with a woman who had an Aussie shepherd like Larry's dog Ozzie. We stopped again later to talk with Cheryl Harper and another runner (Bruce I think?). It was a beautiful morning and a relaxing run.

I'll probably run 5 or 6 easy miles tomorrow. I'm at about 32 miles so far this week. That will put me at around 38. With the roughly 16 miles I'll be running in the relay on Friday and Saturday that should put at around 54 miles for the week. I'm hoping to make the relay miles fast miles (at least moderately fast I hope) so this should end up being a good training week for me.

I decided to back off and only run a few easy miles this morning. Wayne showed up to run with Larry (he didn't know if I would be running today), but Larry never came out so the two of us went out for an easy 2.8 miles. He's still recovering from the Teton Dam Marathon last Saturday so he didn't mind the short easy run.
 

Leg 6 - 6.9 Miles - Very Hard - Summits Avon Pass then descends into Ogden Valley.

We started at 3:00pm. I watched our first four runners valiantly battle the heat. Tom and I got a little break with some shade and cooler temperatures up and over Avon Pass, but we had other challenges. Tom valiantly conquered the relentless uphill run climbing 1200' to an altitude of over 6200'. I took the baton from Tom and began my leg with energy. After over 4 hours of watching my van mates, it felt good to finally be running. The leg begins with a 1.5 mile ascent to the 6500' summit of Avon Pass. It wasn't very long before I began to feel the affects of the climb and the altitude. I was glad when the descent began. I had seen the WSU runner (Weber State ladies "has beens") head out a little before me and hoped I could catch her. The dirt road was pretty rough and I had to be careful as I tried to take the brakes off. I made good time on the steep part of the descent and managed to pass the WSU runner and a few other runners. My pace slowed considerably as I reached the base of the mountain and the road flattened out, but I still felt like I was running pretty well and continued to pass other runners. One young, tall, fast runner passed me in the last mile or so. Overall I feel like I worked hard and ran the leg pretty well.

Splits: 8:10, 7:09, 5:48, 6:00, 6:36, 7:02, 7:06/mi for 0.9 (Avg. 6:50/mi)

Leg 18 - 5.2 Miles - Hard - Difficult uphill road climbs to East Canyon Reservoir.

I started this leg about 1:52am, with cool temperatures, a nearly full moon, and a strong headwind. The leg climbs from 5300' to 5800', with some ups and downs along the way. It was a perfect run...if you subtract the hills and the headwind. Similar to the first leg, I felt like I ran this leg pretty strong. I think I passed 8 runners and was passed by 2 runners from elite teams (one was from the Runner's Corner team). I caught right up behind a 9th runner just before we climbed the last big hill. He didn't seem to want to let me by and we both pushed hard up the hill. I think the sprints into the exchange point are a little dangerous, and usually meaningless, so I was content stay behind him as we both pushed hard to the finish.

Splits: 7:56, 8:04, 7:55, 9:11, 8:22, 7:15/mi for 0.2 (Avg 8:17/mi)

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Leg 30 - 3.6 Miles - Easy - Flat leg through green pastures to Middle School

I started this leg at 10:23am. It had started to get pretty warm, but I knew Van 2 would bear the worst of the heat today so I didn't complain. The first half of the leg is on a narrow dirt road with team vans parked along the right side. I started out pretty fast and was soon zipping past a slow moving team van on its left side, both of us going the same direction. There was about 3 feet between the van and the left side of the road. Just as I was approaching the driver's door she apparently spotted a parking spot and felt she needed to swing left a little before entering it. I yelled "Hey!" (not very informative, but I didn't have time for "Excuse me! I'm running here and you are about to push me off the left side of the road and into a fence. I would rather not have that happen. Would you mind letting me pass?") I fired my adrenalin-fueled thrusters and tried to squeeze past the mirror and escape the danger before becoming a story for other runners to tell. I'm not sure if it was my "Hey!" or the sound of my shoulder striking her mirror, but she finally noticed me and stopped. Luckily the mirror was movable and it didn't really hurt me or even slow me down much. I still managed a 6:40 split on the first mile (maybe adrenalin-aided), but my tired legs couldn't hold it. I slowed a little through the middle part of the run but still managed to pass other runners and not get passed. I fired the final fuel in the thrusters for a pretty good kick around the final curve past the crowds and into the exchange. It felt very good to be done.

Splits: 6:40, 7:04, 7:39, 6:57/mi for 0.6 (Avg 7:07/mi)

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My overall average pace was 7:22/mi (8.1 mph) for the roughly 15.7 miles. I feel good about my efforts and performance and think I performed about as well as I could given the race conditions and my current conditioning. My legs are pretty stiff, especially my quads.

Our "2 Slow 2 Win 2 Dumb 2 Quit" team finished 35th out of 545 regular relay teams. We took 2nd place in our Men Sub-Masters division. The 1st place team finished nearly 3 hours ahead of us, well out of our reach, but the 3rd place team was only 5 minutes behind us, with four other teams within 40 minutes. It took the combined efforts of each team member to give us the final edge.

I'm still trying to figure it out, but even with everything going so well some of the magic of past years seemed to be missing for me.

I had awesome van mates and team mates. We got along well and worked well together. I thought things went pretty smoothly logistically. We had a couple of hiccups (as usual) but we responded to them well.

I think I ran pretty well. I passed a lot of people and only got passed by 4 or 5 elite runners that were obviously out of my class. As a team we finished a little slower than last year, but the course was a little longer. We finished 2nd in the Men Sub-masters division instead of 1st, but it was still a very respectable performance against so many quality teams.

I thought the race was well organized, especially for how big it was this year. It was cool seeing so many runners and teams spread throughout the entire length of the course.

The weather was hot at times, but not really too hot during my legs, and it was hotter last year. The nearly full moon for the night legs was nice.

Everything went pretty darn well. Still, at various times during the relay I felt like I was just going through the motions. I wasn't feeling the excitement and fire, the "Spirit of the Wasatch", that I've felt in the four previous relays.

One thing may have been that I overestimated my 10K pace, resulting in all of my projected estimates being beyond what I was capable of doing. Even though I think I actually ran pretty well for me, I was always slower than my estimated pace. Tom did the same thing, and he beat himself up pretty badly for not performing at the very aggressive level of the estimated paces. He ran very well, but seemed to feel like he'd failed. I think his disappointment may have affected me more than my own. I think in future years we both need to estimate our "flat 10K pace in Salt Lake City" pace as a "flat 10K pace in Salt Lake City when running three 10K's in 24 hours with very little sleep". It might result in more reasonable and achievable targets.

Another thing was that I didn't seem to feel as much camaraderie with the other teams in the relay this year. I'm thinking this had to do with there being so many teams this year. In past years it seemed like we'd chat more with the other teams at the exchanges, and even with some of the volunteers. This year every exchange seemed to be so crowded and busy. It was more of a "busy big city" feeling than a "quiet rural run" feeling for me...the being alone in a crowd sort of feeling at times. Everyone else seemed to be having a good time though, so maybe it was just me.

Every time I kiss my wife Karen it isn't magical (most of the time but not always), but that doesn't mean I'm going to stop kissing her, because when it is magical it's...well...magical. Rather than kiss off the relay, I think I'll embrace it again next year and keep the love alive. (Insert your own relationship metaphor here.)