Everything Counts

AM: 9.74 miles easy with Jace and Jon out in Mariott-Slaterville and West Haven.  Nice, pleasant weather this morning.  Jace showed me a trick he uses to keep his laces tied in races after he read my race report for Ogden.

PM: 4.37 miles easy around good ol' South Weber.

AM: TEMPO RUN

We had a good-sized group this morning with Ken, Jon, Taylor, Albert, and Bret.  We met at the Dee Events Center parking lot and headed into South Ogden for a tempo run.  We did a 3.2 mile warmup that included a half-mile at 5:50 pace and three strides.  We then did our tempo on our "tempo loop" from college days. 

Everyone basically ended up doing their own variation of a tempo run/workout.  I did 5 miles in 25:45 (5:11 5:11 5:09 5:11 5:02).  Ken ran the first 1.5 miles or so before falling back a bit, he ended up doing a 3-2-1 breakdown.  Bret did 2 by 2 miles in 5:20s.  Taylor, Albert, and Jon all did 3.5-4 miles in the 5:40s.  So, it was a solid workout all around for everyone, and we got it in just before the rain started to drizzle.

I'm happy with this morning's workout.  I haven't had very many runs (or races) since SLC Half in April that have been solid.  Thanksgiving Point and Ogden were both disappointments and I haven't had any stellar workouts lately either, so the confidence needed a bit of a boost and I got that today. 

PM: 4.03 miles easy listening to AWOLNATION, The Killers, and Imagine Dragons.  I was tempted to just put "Not Your Fault" on repeat the whole time...good stuff.

9 miles easy with Jon, Taylor, Bryant, Albert, and Ken.  I felt pretty fatigued this morning on the run, so I think I will avoid a double today.

AM: INTERVALS

Bryant, Jace, and I met up at the 21st Street Pond to do some fast intervals.  It's been awhile since we've done "fast" paces, so I wasn't sure what to expect.  But the plan I wrote up beforehand was 3-4 sets of 800M/400M/200M/1,000M, which is essentially 4.5-6 miles worth of speed.

The first interval (800 meters) was an absolute shock to the system!  All three of us were breathing loud.  I was like, "Yikes, maybe we should've warmed up a bit more!"  But, we got used to the speed after the first few intervals and ended up with a solid workout.  It was hard and took a great effort each time, but the rest is sufficient enough to repeat the pain on the next interval.  Rest was 2min/1.5min/1min/3min.

Here was how it turned out:

	Goal Time	Goal Pace	Set 1	Set 2	Set 3
800 M	2:20	4:40	2:21	2:19	2:20
400 M	1:05	4:20	1:04	1:06	1:05
200 M	0:31	4:04	0:30	0:30	0:30
1,000 M	3:00	4:48	3:04	2:58	2:55

The 200 intervals were like manna from heaven!  Only 30 seconds of pain sandwiched with two and a half minutes of rest!  This workout was harder than I anticipated, but that's to be expected when you haven't gone this fast for over a month.

PM: 3.71 miles super easy pushing my girls in the stroller.  I was going to run with Amy, hence the stroller, but her back still hurts her so she immediately called off her run.  But since the girls were all strapped in and ready to go I still pushed them so Amy could get a break too.

9.37 miles easy on the South Weber/Uintah loop.  My legs are definitely TIRED from yesterday and the higher mileage this week.

LONG RUN w/AEROBIC BUILDER

I met up with Jon, Albert, Ben, and Jason Holt for a long run at 21st Street Pond.  I wanted to get a long run in with some good quality mixed in.  I thought about shooting for a 4-3-2-1, but once I got going on the 4-mile pickup I realized my legs were still recovering from Thursday so instead I did a 4-mile pickup and then a 2-mile pickup.

We warmed up three miles and then Jason and I started the 4-mile pickup.  We were on our own the rest of the run as the other guys turned around at 6 miles.  Jason and I ran the first 4-mile pickup at 5:41 5:25 5:27 5:24.  Then after a 1.5 mile rest (and two pit stops for me - my stomach was really hurting this morning) we did a 2-mile pickup in 5:13 5:06.  After that we called it good and just ran easy the rest of the run.