Memorial Day is absolutely one of my favorite days of the year not only due to the great weather, but also due to the amount of American flags that are flying in everyone’s front yards. Running through the neighborhoods and seeing all the Star Spangle Banners makes me feel proud to be an American. In addition, as I day dream while I’m running on this holiday, I like to imagine that I’m competing in the US Olympic Trials with all the flags flying along the marathon course. This is probably the closet I’ll ever get to running in the Trials, but it does not hurt to pretend.
Anyways, in an effort to continue my preparation for the infamous Ragnar leg of the Wasatch Back, I went on another run up Mill Creek Canyon. However, this time I opted not run all the way up to the Winter Gates and instead took to the Pipeline and Grandeur Peak Trails. I ran the entire Pipeline Trail and half of the Grandeur Peak Trail. One mile (or halfway) up to Grandeur Peak, I ran into stray dog that did not look too happy to see me (i.e., I only got about ten feet way from the dog and it looked like he was foaming at the mouth). As a result, I slowly backed away and got the heck out of there. Surprisingly, I did not see anyone heading up the Grandeur Peak Trail on my way back down; however, I think someone (i.e., there were a number of bikers, hikers, and runners heading down when I was going up) must have called the dog in because I saw a cop car heading up the Canyon on my way down. Also, in order to make up the miles I missed, I ran an additional mile up the Canyon to the Galaxy Quest campgrounds before heading back down.
In addition, it was another repeat of day eleven (week 4, day 2) of the Push-up Challenge and I came closer than ever before in completing this day. This time I completed a total of 136 push-ups over five sets that consisted of 25, 29, 25, 25, and a max set of 32 push-ups. I finished four push-ups short on the final set. Lastly, to finish off my non-running workout, I did 200 sit-ups. | 