Sock tans

Today was a short speed workout. I felt okay when we started, so I hoped the speed would go well. The hills felt fine and the warmup was fine too. When we started the speed part I started to not feel so good. We did an 800, 600, 400, 400, 4x200s. In the 800, 400 into it I already felt awful. My stomach didn't feel great in the warmup, but I can usually run through that so it didnt worry me. My legs started to feel heavy after the 800, but I can work through that so it was alright. But what is still slightly new to me, what I wasn't expecting, was my asthma to act up. My asthma sort of went away after I don't know what age, but certain things, I realize now, trigger it. Indoor track last year I remember it was a problem. But today was the first day since that it has come back. Could it have been the elevation change? I don't know, but it was a really scary feeling. After the 600 and first 400 especially, I felt my throat start to close and panicked a bit. I was more careful after that, tried to control my breathing better and it seemed to help a little. My times were 2:45, 76, 81, 37, 37, 37, 37. Then did 5 minutes of cool down.

Today we did 2 grass laps warmup staying low, then 2 laps of speed changes, and then we did one 400. 69-70 was my time. Then we did 2 more laps of speed changes. Then two more grass laps cool down.

State!

I warmed up with the Varsity girls and did strides and such, really didn't feel in the race mode until right before the race when we were lining up. I got a great start, almost too good to be true, I had been fretting that I was going to get boxed in. It looked like I was in the top 25. LOTS of elbowing, some girl jabbed my side along the straight after the first hill. We came along the flower beds and I used the downhill well, was doing great. I had thought that today was my lucky day. If I could just keep it up I would have a good time. But then a girl behind me followed too close and kicked my feet out from under me and I fell, her falling on top of me. I really hurt my hip, and it took a lot   More effort than it should have to get back up and start running again. There went my good start. When I started again, my hip hurt so bad I was on the verge of tears, the choking feeling did not feel good going up state hill. I tried to calm myself and just focus on my race, but couldn't focus again. Not with everyone now passing me. My mile mark was 6:26 including my stupid fall and state hill. Yeah I forgot to turn off GPS but whatever. I felt like I was just running the last part. Really slow. Some parts like poker hill felt like above 10 minute pace. I tried to pull myself together, but it was like after I tripped I flipped a switch and everything turned negative, plus my hip hurt a ton. I literally thought in the middle of the race "Well XC junior year turned out a failure." And it did. Couldn't even pull off a good race at region let alone state. I wanted to quit so many times in the race. I forced myself to finish though. i also fought the urge to walk. man i havent felt that urge in a really long time. At the 2 mile mark i heard Tomy and Natalie screaming at me, and Bill yelling to pick it up. I tried, I really did. I focused on my arms and tried to get myself moving. Arou the pond people started passing me again, I tried to match but lost it when Olivia passed me. She was nice enough to talk me through it and tell me to go with her. I tried to kick with 300 left going towards the track. I let everyone down and everyone was disappointed in me. I went from freaking top 30 to 107th. Of course I had to do bad at the most important race of the season.

On my own today. I can't tell if my hip is feeling better or if it hurts the same because of the soreness in my calves. I can feel it but my calves hurt so bad that I hardly notice it. What the heck? I didn't even do well yesterday, why are my calves so sore?! I can barely walk! Or sit for that matter, I hope my hip will heal soon. I think it is better than yesterday though. Fun fact, my whole run today was faster than my last 2 miles of racing yesterday. (Sub 8 minute pace). Nice relaxed run. Now to get back to the enormous pile of papers that make up my homework...

Today I had a test so I completely missed the meeting, but I think I know what it was about already. I got there in time for the run though :) we went up legacy bridge way to the drinking fountain, then adventure run to Shriners. I got confused because I stopped at the drinking fountain to stretch my incredibly sore calves and saw the group keep going up, like they were supposed to, but somehow thought that maybe we were supposed to o up to the fence and back. So I went up to the fence and realized that I wasn't supposed to but oh well. Then came back down and went the right way. Probably added about a mile. I felt a little out of place running through the U campus with my BYU shirt i won from the BYU race... My legs couldn't take too fast of a pace today. Good news though, my hip is starting to feel better, I think icing it helped.

I wanted to get at least 9 today, but it has been busy. So many things to do. Just did my version of thunderbird flagpole run. Each day I slowly start to feel better, I'm not quite as sore anymore which is good. I've set some goals for myself for track, so hopefully I'll do better in track than I did in XC. It's weird to think that this year I could break 5 in the 1600... That's a scary thought. I'm still used to thinking about trying to break 5:20, cause I only did it once. That's the nice thing about running, even if people around you are doing better than you, you can set goals for yourself in your times and still feel satisfied. Wish I figured that out sooner in the year.