In The Long Run

AM: 3 loops on the wood chips at Liberty. Felt surprisingly good.  Usually the day after a long run, I feel like garbage and can barely walk.  I expected today to be worse because I ran faster than normal yesterday, but instead nothing hurts and running felt springy and smooth.  Weird.  Is it possible that I've been running my long runs too slow?  Can going too slowly lead to soreness and sluggishness?

PM: Went mountain biking for the first time since 2006.  My husband's coworker lives in Jeremy Ranch and invited us to bike on the trails by his house.  I thought I was going to die. We started by climbing and basically climbed for 7 miles (1600+ feet of gain).  By mile 6, I was pretty tired and I was out of gears.  I kept praying for the climbing to end.  Well, be careful what you wish for.  Going down was so much worse.  My legs were shaking with exhaustion and fear.  I'm so happy I survived and with no falls.  

Only managed Restorative Yoga today.  Yesterday's mountain biking really worked me over good.  My whole body aches and my legs would not stop shaking in certain poses. I probably shouldn't do that again until the marathon is over!

TNT on the Pipeline Trail.  This was just one of those runs that felt great.  I don't think I have ever run that section of Pipeline (from Church Fork to Elbow Fork and back) as fast as I did today.  Our group hooked up with a group called the Waddlers and they really pushed me (and eventually dropped me) on the way back.  Despite the name, they definitely move much faster than a waddle!

SLCTC group run starting from the Capitol.  We ran an out and back on Bonneville and 11th Ave.  It was my first time running there and the views from 11th were amazing.  Beautiful night for running. 

Easy Liberty Park run with Nate and Bourbon.  Perfect night for running, felt good.

Usual Liberty Park run with Bourbon.  The smell of charcoal was in the air. I'm running the Provo 5k tomorrow.  Major goal is sub 24, but 23:30 would be really nice.  

AM: Provo City 5k. Went down to the race with Stacy. We ran about a half mile warmup then decided to hit the bathrooms before heading out for more. Well, the line was so long that by the time we were done, it was time to head to the start line. A short warmup was going to have to do.

The start was pretty chaotic where we were. Some little girl clipped me and she almost fell. There was a lot of weaving and bumping for the first  1/4 to 1/2 mile, but then everything settled out. I haven't run a 5k in awhile (nor have I done a lot of 5k pace training) so I was just focused on running hard. 

I really wish I had my garmin today. We are a one garmin household and my husband requested it today. I figured I'd be fine with a normal running watch, but there weren't any markers for the 5k. I assumed that the half marathon miles 11, 12, 13 would correspond to our 1,2, 3, but the splits did not make any sense. I then figured that the course would be short, but in the end I think it was okay.  

I think that I ran a pretty consistent pace and I seemed to be moving up throughout the race. I finished in 23:35 and I am happy with that. At the end of January I ran 25:27 at the Winter Series 5k, so I have improved. I felt good until the last 1/4 mile or so when I got that pukey feeling that happens in a 5k. Afterwards, I ran a 15 minute cooldown with Stacy before taking the bus back to the car. In hindsight, we should have just run back, it would have been faster. 

Also finally met Allie and James from the blog. Didn't run into any else, but it sounds like there was some awesome running today!