What ever it takes!

I tried to give myself affirmative affirmation this morning that I was feeling better.  I think it worked for the most part.

10 mile progression run in 1:11:13  7:07 avg pace.  Last 3 miles in the 6:30 - 6:18 pace range.

I went to the shoe store and found the exact same shoes I was replacing on the clearance rack for $50, so I replaced my old shoes with the exact same shoe and threw the old ones in the garbage can so I wouldn't be tempted to wear them again.

Long story, but I'm going to tell it anyway.

I took my car in to get new brakes and tires yesterday morning, well at 3:00pm last night I called to see if it was done and they told me I needed new shocks as well, and that my car wouldn't be done until 7:00.  Well that did me no good since it was Britt's birthday yesterday and we were planning on going out to dinner, so I caught a ride home with a co-worker.  I could have got a ride back to work this morning with the same co-worker but that would have totally messed up my workout so I decided to man up and pull the ol' bike down.  Charged up all the batteries last night, (yes my bike has lots of batteries to charge) took it for a spin to make sure everything was working, and got out all the bike gear.

This morning the thermometer said 38 degrees, not bad for running, but biking is different.  dug up as many cold weather clothes as I could fit on and headed out.  Wasn't too bad, but in the summer going over the point of the mountain I always have a nice tail wind, this morning it was a massive headwind.  I wasn't too cold except for my fingers and toes.  I definitely need to figure that out if I ride to work in the cold again cause my toes were really miserable.  I took it pretty easy because I'm paranoid of wrecking, and going downhill fast was way to cold, but man some of those uphills kicked my butt, running fitness and biking fitness for some reason aren't the same.  I was suckin' air pretty hard going up the hill from 13th to Wasatch.  Anyway, made it to work in 1:25, I think my best time is around 1:12.  I don't feel bad about missing my run this morning at all.  I was suppose to do 1200's but really at this point is not doing a VO2 max workout really going to change my time in Boston?

Oh!  one last story.  I had no clothes stashed at work so I had to carry a backpack with clothes.  I rummaged through our closet and the best backpack I could find was Britt's hiking Camelback, problem is it's bright pink.  I asked my 9 year old if he thought people would make fun of me if I had a pink backpack.  He said "nope" I said "why not" he said "cause it's better than nuthin',  I think they would make more fun of you if you didn't have any backpack" I have the smartest kids on the planet.   I wore the pink backpack with pride.

Perfect morning run along Wasatch Blvd with Fritz, we had a great time except for him almost getting ran over crossing Wasatch.  I'm sure I slowed him down a bit but that's to be expected.  I felt pretty good, my hamstring slowed me down a bit on some of the uphill, but the downhill with a tailwind was fun.

P.M.

20 laps around the track during Bradin's soccer practice.

Good day for a recovery day at the gym.  20 minutes on the elliptical, 6 miles in 48 minutes on the treadmill, 30 minutes of weights. 1 hour drive in the snow to work.

Felt like garbage when I woke up this morning but I felt bad about my slacker day yesterday so I had to force myself to make up for it.  Took some Imodium AD and some ibubrofen. and headed to the gym.  By the time I got to the gym I was feeling quite a bit better, probably from the OD of drugs.  Ran an 8 mile progressive run, then I did 8 X speed intervals at 12.1,12.2....12.8mph.  Followed by a 2.5 mile slow cool down at 7:30pace. 

12 miles in 1:27:19, 7:16 avg pace.

I'm really having mixed feelings, part of me thinks this has been the most successful marathon buildup I've ever had, but another part of me feels like there is something missing.  I'm just not feeling as good as I have in the past, part of it I think is passion, I used to crave to run fast, I used to love the feeling of pushing my body to the limit. I'm not sure if it's fear of getting injured again, or if something else is different.

Boy, I'm sure glad I didn't bail on my speed intervals after all this speed interval talk today.

This morning I did something I don't remember ever doing before.  I got in the car and started driving down to meet Ryan for our 21 mile run, he called me and we decided to cancel due to the blizzard, I then started to drive to Lifetime for a run on the treadmill,  just before getting on the freeway I thought to myself, this is stupid and I turned around, went home and climbed back in bed. 

But I made this pace chart for the Boston Marathon so my morning wasn't a complete waste.

 http://goo.gl/abp4V