Rhett

It was a beautiful still morning in Lake Havasu City. The sun started to rise a couple miles into my run. Birds were chirping as I ran through the park towards the lake where I saw people getting out on their kyaks and gliding over the glassy water. As I approached the docks right before I reached the London Bridge, the ducks were out swiming and quacking.  I passed by a few walkers and then crossed under the London Bridge. About half mile later the sidewalk that runs along the channel runs out.  That is my turn around point.  As I turn around I can see the sun coming up over the horizon right behind the London Bridge. It is a pretty sight to see.  On my way back towards the bridge, I had to hurdle a little yippee dog that was on too long of a leash.  The own laughed, I just kept moving heading along the channel back towards the park.  My watch beeped...mile 6. I did some quick math and realized I had averaged 7:15 for the first 6 miles... way to fast for an easy run. I consciously switched down to more of a recovery effort for the last 4 miles continuing to enjoy the beautiful morning. I passed some more walkers and a runner or two then I was climbing back up the hill back towards home looking at the mountains that surround the city until I hit 10 miles and the fun was over signifying I had to start the rest of the day.

AP 7:23

I woke up this morning feeling really tired.  All my seminary students were tired as well, but we survived class. I changed at the church and headed straight to the island for my fast running day.  I sure could have used a little caffiene, but didn't have any so I drank a sip of water and started my warm up.  I did a 2 mile warm up along with my usual running drills I do on fast days, butt kicks, high skips, running backwards, and bounding.  I do 3 sets of each during the warm up run.  My two miles was up and I wasn't feeling too much better.  I decided to give it a go anyways. 

The plan 2 x 3 miles (goal 19:30).  The first mile of the first repeat felt ok, but the second one felt horrible. I was about to call it a day about 3/4 the way through the second mile because I was so tired. I even took half a walk step and reached to stop my watch, but before I hit the button I changed my mind and decided to go for it and see what happened.  I ended up finishing the first 3 mile repeat in 19:16. I was spent though.  I took my half mile recovery very slowly, but it went by way too fast.  Then I starte on the second repeat.  It actually wasn't as bad as the first and I finished it in 19:19.  Then 1 1/2 mile cool down to finish my 10 mile run.

The cool thing was on each of my repeats each mile got faster. First repeat (6:28, 6:25, 6:21). Second repeat (6:30, 6:26, 6:21). Today was a good mental exercise, pushing through the will to stop and being able to still hit my goal. Hopefully it makes me a stronger runner.

10 miles at a recovery effort, nice and easy.  Another beautiful morning in Havasu.

AP 7:59

4 fun easy miles. I had a little pep back in my step today.

Then 10 mile hilly bike.

Legs are feeling fresh and ready to run long tomorrow.

Oh what a beautiful morning! Oh what a beautiful day!

53 degrees, clear sky, no wind, lake of glass, people out and about walking and enjoying life. I love Havasu this time of year.

Blake and I headed out for a nice long run. We always have so much fun running and talking that the miles juss fly by.  Through 15 we were right around 8:00 pace, then we separated for marathon paced miles.  I did the next 6 averaging 6:47 (6:42,6:53, 6:46, 6:51, 6:48, 6:42) where we met back up and did 2 cool down miles for a total of 23 miles.

Marathon pace felt so much easier this week than last week.  I was very happy about that.  One more week of hard training, then on to the taper!

30 minutes on stationary bike with a Tabata in the middle.

5 painfully slow recovery miles on the TM. (AP 8:27)

Nice easy 10 miler this morning. I kept telling myself... slow down, save it for tomorrow. I did a pretty good job of keeping it easy for how alive and energetic my body felt this morning. AP 7:45

Hopefully I will feel that good tomorrow when I want to run fast.

I woke up feeling much better than I did last Tuesday.  After seminary I headed to the island for my weekly tempo run.

I mixed in 3 sets of my running drills durning my 2 mile warm up then set off for a 6 mile tempo run...goal 39:00.  Splits went as follows: 6:28, 6:24, 6:28, 6:27, 6:26, 6:18 for a total of 38:33 for my six mile run. Then a 2 mile cool down. 

I was very pleased with this run and am glad it is behind me. I was worried if I would be able to hold that pace for a full 6 miles. It is my final tempo effort before race day. Any more fast running I do will be at mp. 

10 recovery miles keeping it easy after yesterday's hard run.

AP 7:45- felt much slower than that.

4 slow miles truly respecting the recovery run.  AP 8:25

10 hilly miles on the bike through SARA Park.

Today was our last long run before the race! Blake and I headed out on our usual route and were having so much fun running and talking we kept having to slow ourselves down because we would keep creeping the pace faster and faster on accident.  We ended up doing the first 15 around 7:50 pace. Then we split as we moved into some mp miles.  I averaged 6:48 over the next 4 miles. I thought my legs felt tired this morning, but once I got into mp they felt really good.  Then a 2 mile cool down for a total of 21 miles, AP 7:40

Bring on the taper!!!!!!!

20 minute stationary bike with my last Tabata of this training cycle

5 recovery on TM @ 8:27

Legs felt tired at first, but by the end all felt good.

8 easy miles with Blake on a beautiful morning.

Right at the end of my run yesterday, my right calf tightend up and then was sore all day yesterday. I could still fill a little tightness in it this mornig walking, so I decided to take the bike out for a ride.

20 miles at a fairly hard effort.

I will probably ride again tomorrow just to be safe that it is healed all the way.  Since I'm tapering, the lack of running but still getting in some good cardio may actually be beneficial.

20 more miles on the bike.

Calf still mildly sore this morning. That means tomorrow will not be a run day either.

Rest day with some core work and some calf therapy.

Calf felt great this morning. I warmed up with some active stretching, did the foam roller on the calf, then a little more active stretching.  I then hoped on the TM at 10 minute pace and tried to run.  Unfrotunately it didn't feel quite as great running, not terrible but bad enough I didn't want to risk running on it this close to race day, so I jumped on the elliptical and took my disappointment out on it with a good hard 90 minutes of elliptical work.  I think my calf feels even better after doing that.  I'll cross train again tomorrow and see how the calf is doing Monday.

I'm in Phoenix for the weekend at my cousin's wedding. They got married in the new Phoenix temple. It is beautiful. I had time to get in 30 all out effort minutes on the elliptical before the day's activities began. 

My first week of taper has definitely not gone as planned, but I'm not so sure if I might be better off having done a lot of really hard cross training than I would have been with the usual shorter easier running that I usually do during taper. 

Let's start with the good news.  I was out of town eating out all weekend and I actually lost 2 pounds down to 150 which is the lightest I have ever been for a marathon.  Also, I ran this morning and the part of my calf that was hurting all week felt 100%!!! Yea!  The bad news though, unfortunately is that a different part of that same calf strained a bit this morning 3 miles into my run.  Taking no chances, I stopped immediately and walked in the last mile of my run. It is much less of a strain than what I did last week, so I think I should be fine by race day. I just would really like to get in a few running miles before the race.  This has been the weirdest taper ever.  Especially after what I think has been one of my very best, healthiest training cycles up until I started the taper.

My totally unusual taper continues.

30 minutes stationary bike at moderate effort.

Another 30 minutes on the stationary bike.

Trying to stay positive about being 100% healthy on race day.  Calf does feel much better today!

Nice easy 20 minute spin on the stationary bike.

I wanted to do an easy warmup run this morning, but with still some mild calf discomfort I figured another 24 hours of rest would be more benificial. 

Rolled my legs and some easy stretching.

Anyone religously inclined, I could use all the prayers I can get for my calf.

Phoenix Marathon 2015

Friday after lunch, Blake and I headed to Phoenix.  We stopped and picked up some new running shoes at the Sketchers Store, went and picked up our race bibs, and then checked into our hotel.  Blakes wife and kids met us at the hotel and we then headed out to get some dinner at Sizzler where we ate plenty of carbs.

After maybe my best night's sleep before a marathon ever, we got up around 4am, got ready and went and caught the bus to the start.  It was high 50s, cloudy and a real strong head wind.  After the Star Spangle Banner which included some fireworks, we lined up for the race.  My calf was feeling pretty good after all the rest over the last 2 weeks.  I hadn't even tried to run for about 5 days, so I didn't know if I'd even be able to go once the gun went off.  To my pleasant surprise, I started off pain free and settled into a real nice comfortable pace pretty quickly.  I had settled in with a few other guys and a couple gals running my pace.  We were runnning mostly single file since we were heading right into a strong wind much of the way.  I had a really nice mental focus and rhythm going and was thinking how great it was that I was running so well and it was feeling so easy when I passed the 11 mile marker and BAM, might calf did it's thing.  I stopped immediately getting a few looks from those I'd been running with, and I knew my day was over.  

I didn't even attempt to run another step and I'm glad I didn't.  I walked about 20 yards to the aid station that was right there and asked to see how I get picked up to be taken to the finish.  No one had any idea, so I borrowed a voluteer shirt (mostly becasue I was getting really cold) and started cheering on the other runners.  I made friends with some of the voluteers after about an hour and a half of cheering when one of them told me they had to leave and would give me a ride to the finish.

He was really nice and we had a nice conversation on the way.  He lives near the Gilbert Temple and I was able to talke to him about the importance of temples and how families can be together forever because of the ordinances performed in the temple and other things that are a lot more important than me having finished the race. 

I am greatful that I was able to run a marathon paced 11 miles.  I averaged exactly 6:45 per mile for those 11 miles and felt great.  I'm also greatful for the experience I had after stopping.  I really feel like I am in shape to go sub 3 right now and I figure after a few weeks rest from running, I will be able to pick up this huge running base and fitness and pick right back up on my marathon training, so I signed up to run Utah Valley Marathon on June 13th, last night.  I had a blast this weekend in Phoenix and I'm excited to head up to Provo to run in June.

Blake ran a 3:25 and change getting a 23 minute PR!!!!!!!!