Running is a means and never merely an end

Easter Sunday long run! 13 around Cullowhee at 7:55 average pace. I felt pretty at ease throughout the whole run today, and even hit a nice little runners high for a while there. Also just super nice to be home.

More importantly....shouts out to Jesus for taking the wrath for every screwup I've ever had (slash thought about having) and ever will have! Through his resurrection God made a way for us to be able to spend eternity with him, despite the fact that we don't deserve it. "It is finished"....that's a pretty radical love. Happy Easter everybody!

A little over 8 miles easy, first 5 with Katie. Strides afterwards. It rained pretty much the whole time but it was still enjoyable. 8:14 avg.

Raining again today. 2 mile warm up, then the workout was 9x300's alternating between 5k & 3k down to mile pace. So 5k splits were target 70, 3k were 66, and mile would be like 60. But my actual splits were a little bit haphazard, at least initially. 60(for the 5k one...whoops), 64, 68, 62, 70, 63, 68, 63, 68. That's all we had, but that was over really quickly and I wasn't even that tired, so I threw in 4x200 just cause. 39, 40, 39, 39. 2.2 mile cool down, my dad joined me for a mile of it. Abs when I got home.

Recovery run today, although it didn't feel like recovery. For some reason this run was like a level 8 effort, even though it was just an easy 8:19 paced jog. I just felt so weak and like I was trying super hard to not all but walk. Glad its over.

Side note- I've been looking around at a lot of people's blogs today because, you know, its my spring break and what better way to live it up than blog stalking, right? Anyways I feel like I could count the number of people on one hand that aren't from Utah on here. Got me wondering how I even found this site, all the way over here in North Carolina.... nevertheless, it's pretty cool feeling like if I ever head out west to Utah, there'll be some sweet runs awaiting me with some of y'all that I keep up with on here!

8:19 AP. Didn't feel good at all. 8:01 but 7:01 effort type of feeling. My legs are just tired right now I think.

Pre-meet with strides. 8:04 average. Another sucky run...man, I don't know why I am having such a hard time this week with the easy runs, even though workouts and long runs have been good. I was honestly having a hard time finishing this easy 5 miles.

We went out pretty fast, but it felt fine. First mile was 5:58, and I was feeling good, then it sort of dropped off and I got real tired real fast. I don't really know what happened. My legs were so locked up, the same kind of feeling you get after you run the 4x4 or something, except this is the 5k and they were like that for a solid mile and a half. I don't know if that's because I went out a little faster than usual or just because my legs have felt sucky all week. But maybe it's a good thing I had a good first mile to help a little to make up for such a bad 2nd mile. I think the 2nd was like high 6:30's. My last lap was solid, 88. But the whole middle of the race was just a death march it felt like. I thought for sure I wouldn't even break 20, because it felt like I was going so slow. Somehow still came out with a 19:45, but I didn't like it. Breck didn't run well either, and Mell dropped out after 5 or 6 laps. Weird, weird race.

I'm really not sure how to feel about this meet. I really wanted to PR but perhaps this isn't a bad thing, and it'll give me some extra motivation for these next 2 weeks of training before conference. And 19:45 isn't awful. Just definitely not where I want to be. I'm dying to get sub-19:30, it's just that 1 barrier I keep hovering over but am having the hardest time breaking this year. Hopefully we'll get some good hard workouts in this week.