Run RF

Ah the Sunday long run, staple of any training regimen.  I met Scott and Fritz at the Mt. American Credit Union with a light drizzle in the air.  Then we set out up Wasatch, still feeling Thursday a little bit.  We talked a little bit about all the important topics, religion, drugs, porn. Helped the miles stream by.  The trail at Parley's canyon was still quite a mess so we got slowed down there, but we got into a stretch of low 6's in there.  At least Scott and I were a little off today so once we added on a little bit at the end top hit 20 we called it quits.  Today was one of those days where it was just good to get the run in, we still manages 6:37 pace feeling tired and less than ideal weather.  Great start to the week, picked up some McDonald's on the way home.  It just tastes so good at the end of a long run.

Nice run out through Sugarhouse and Liberty. Saw the Highland track team doing hill reps as I ran through. I had my first ElliptiGo spotting in Utah in Liberty Park.

Right hamstring was not feeling great yesterday, stretching and stick made it more tolerable today.  No pain but still tight, I guess? It just felt off, I'll keep on it and hopefully have it all worked out soon.  Still time for a workout, with a planned tempo during the long run on Saturday I decided to do my 4 mile tempo then the hill workout of doom today, and planning on 5 or 6 by mile on Thursday.

I have put together that one mile uphill is not an ideal warmup and will be adjusting that in the future.  My times were around the norm for the 4 mile tempo, legs felt a bit stale but got going pretty quickly.  5:54, 5:29, 5:31, 5:32 then a little over a mile easy to the start point for the hills.  Starting from I St. and S. Temple did 7 intervals climbing 900 feet in about 2.5 miles including the short rest breaks. It felt very hard, but I always remember Rule Number Zero and push through.  Then jog from the top of Terrace Hills back to the house.

Garmin Route because I think it looks cool.

11.3  Fantastic day out, almost makes me forget about the terrible prior two months...almost.  Easy run up City Creek Canyon, added a mile up there to enjoy the outdoors a little longer.  I forgot to mention I saw a guy wearing an U of Alabama winter hat dressed for 10 degrees yesterday while it was hovering near 50.  Silly southerners.

4.4  Ran again to enjoy my favorite weather of the year.

11.5 Workout in Liberty Park, two miles down then 6 by mile at HM pace with 400 jug rest then run home.  After last Thursday burning me out for the better part of a week I decided to embrace more of the fast but not hard mantra.  So I settled on miles around 5:30, on the 'crete as the grass is still thawing out.  Didn't look at my watch for the first one and ended up running 5:49 but treated it as more of a warmup.  Next five were 5:31, 5:30, 5:27, 5:29, 5:33.  I was tired but not blasted after the last one, the park climbs from 13th S to 9th S, not really noticeable when running easy but during workouts it's tough. 

On my last interval two woman with 3 dogs between them managed to occupy the entire path.  I said "come on" as I negotiated my way through them and they were like "so, whatever".  After passing through I may have called them something that rhymes with witches, the pace was too crisp to remember clearly. 

4.4 Nice run in the Aves.

Felt great so I did the extra lap in Sugarhouse.  Not too much else to say, getting pumped for long run tomorrow.

Great Scott! I have enough miles to get Back to the Future!

Here is a great example of why Garmin data is a nice tool, but not the end all/be all of distance.

Met Fritz at Shopko at 7:20 to drive down and meet the Utah Co. guys. Got a call from Scott saying it was windy down there, but barely a flutter in Sugarhouse.  We drove down to Reed's house where it was crazy windy.  So the decision was made to trek up to Riverton to do the run on the Jordan River Trail.  Mike, Scott, Reed, Dan, Fritz and I started out south and did 10 out and back to the cars in 70 minutes. 

Then after fueling up we headed north for the workout portion of the run, five miles into the wind at 6:00 pace then whatever we could muster coming back.  Fritz and Scott took off and Mike and I worked our way back up to them to get some of the wind break.  Fritz and Scott did a lion's share of the work while Mike and I helped out when we could.  Ended up running 5 miles out in 28:18 (5:42, 5:44, 5:38, 5:36, 5:38). Took a short break then headed back, my legs were extra sore the first mile and Fritz and Scott ended putting a few seconds on me in the three miles out hard.  My splits were 5:22, 5:25, 5:25 then we eased back and while it felt like 7+ minute pace ended up running 6:11, Mike caught back up with about 1/2 mile to go and we started picking the pace back up and the last mile was 5:45 with the last half a lot closer to 5:00 pace. So the last five was run in 28:08. Great workout and couldn't have done it without everyone there, not time to have some pizza and beer and watch some basketball.