Psalm 91:1 NKJV He who dwells in the secret place

Ran 4.3 miles at a 6:18 pace.  I won't say much in these entries I'm trying to caught up.

9 more miles today.

I ran 8.4 miles at a 6:38 pace.

I ran 6.3 miles at a 6:46 pace.

I ran 11.1 miles at a 6:39 in a blizzard and the wind blowing against me. It was probably the hardest conditions I've ever ran in.

I ran 6.6 on the treadmill today.  Nothing special when your running in place.

Today I ran 8.1 miles at a 6:36 pace.  I was going to run only 6 because of a meeting I had with Sun Microsystems, but I took a wrong turn.

I got a brand new Dell 19 monitor today for work and its nice.  I have a Solaris 10  X86 system, Sun Fire v210 Solaris 10 sparc, Windows XP system, a Redhat Enterpise 4 system,  and a HPUX 11 system that I use for work.

I ran two separate runs today and had to cut my run short in the morning, because I had an early meeting with Sun Microsystems at work.

I ran 6.3 miles at a 6:53 pace, and in the afternoon I ran 5.2 miles in a 6:22 pace.  I like running doubles but usually with higher miles.

Today I ran in 3 inches of new snowfall on a very hilly course. Most of the run was on roads that were still covered. I ran 10.1 miles at a 7:07 pace. It was 19 degrees when I started running and when I finished it was 14 degrees, yes it got colder.

In our newspaper this morning were expecting record cold temperatures: quoted "Accuweather.com said the next month could be one of the coldest 30 day stretches in the United States in the last half century. He said the unfolding weather pattern could likely mimic those of 1957-1958,1965-1966 and 1977-1978".

Tomorrow it's suppose to be 4 degrees when I start running. Oh well you run because you know you have to run.

This morning I ran 2.1 miles at -4 degrees at a 6:47 pace. I could only run 2 miles, because I got a call from work about a system problem and had to make my run real short.

This is the coldest dat I've ever ran in, and my hands wouldn't have been able to run any longer than the 2 miles I did. They were completely frozen even with my cold gear Under Armour gloves on. But the wind chill was also -14 degrees and it was blowing at 10mph.

Right now the temperature is -1. I plan to run on my lunch hour will see how that goes.

On my lunch hour today I ran 9.1 miles at a 6:34 pace in 59.34 minutes. The temperature warmed up to 6 degrees so I was excited about that, but there was still a wind chill factor. I had two pairs of gloves on, my underamour cold gear pants and shirt, plus a racing jacket, and my ski mask. I don't think I'm going to be able to run tomorrow morning for my long run outside. I'll have to go to the gym and be put through torture with a boring treadmill. At 7am tomorrow the temperature is suppose to be -6 degrees.

Run 16.3 miles today at a 6:48 pace. I had to do this on a treadmill because the

temperature outside was -6 degrees and it wasn't going to get any warmer through out the day.

I hate running on treadmills, but I'm stuck doing it for the next week. Our weather is even suppose to get colder. I would have ran outside if it was at least -2 degrees.

Sick today with the stomach flu.  Hopefully, I will be able to run tomorrow.   I went to work and have been dealing with writing code all day with Perl with Mysql using the DBI module.  Were writing a new account creation system, and Mysql will be used to store a lot of the students information.  Error checking in Perl and Mysql is not fun, I've been trying to find a good error checking module already out there.  

 Really fun stuff to look at when your not feeling your best.
 

Still trying to get over this nasty stomach flu.  

This morning I ran at -4 degrees so I dressed in two layers. I ran 8.2 miles at a 6:47 pace. I wore three pairs of gloves. My hands are really the only thing that gets cold.  There's still quite a bit of snow on the ground so your always having to watch out for ice.

This afternoon I did some speed on the treadmill.

Mile 1: 6:40

 Mile 2: 5:56

Mile 3; 5.20 .6: 5:10

Total 3.6 miles.

Then I did some weight lifting afterwards that was fun.

Being tired today I ran 9.3 miles at a 6:53 pace in 1:04 in 6 degree weather. I was grateful it was above zero today. Very hilly course again 2 miles of the course were totally uphill probably peaking at 300 to 400 feet from the starting point of the 2 miles.

I not sure what I'm running tomorrow morning anywhere from 8-10 miles and maybe some in the afternoon. The sick days I had this week through my schedule off a bit.

I still need to find a hotel in Boston. I went to www.marathontours.com and all the hotels they suggested are booked. I wanted to be close to everything since I've never even been close to the city of Boston before. I would say I'm in a bit of a punch right now. Not sure what I'm going to do, but lacking of planning put me in this situation.

Colossians 3:23  (NLT)  Work hard and cheerfully at whatever you do, as though you were working for the Lord rather than for people.

I want to dedicate this bible verse to my running that I do it for the Lord only.  I want to run as though I enjoy seeking the Lord.

The temperature this morning was suppose to be wermer than Wednesday, but it wasn't. It was 1 degrees, but with no wind so that made it nice. I ran 8.2 miles at a 6:36 pace in 54:18. I looked like frosty the snowman when I was done. My eyebrows had ice all over them. I had to keep cleaning them off during the run, because when I would blink the ice would almost keep my eye shut. I can't wait till the temperatures get warmer it makes it so much easy to prepare in the mornings to run. I'm getting tired of looking like the midnight robber covered from head to toe with clothing.

Today I ran 20.3 miles in a 7:08 pace in 2:24:50. I really took it slow in about the first 14 miles than I picked the pace up a bit. Very comfortable run for me. This course was very hilly and I'm sure harder than the Boston Marathon course. Here is a image of the elevation below, I wanted this to be a hard run to evaluate where I'm phyiscally running a up and down course. I feel awesome after the run no soreness. My wife came and met me on the 16 mile teasing me by hanging a vault zero out the window of the car. That's what I like to drink after running. I know it's a pop and not the best thing, but I'm not perfect.

My wife was concerned because I left when it was 9 degrees outside, and blowing. My hands got really cool after the 10 mile, but they were fine by the time I got home. I need to go buy some gore-tex gloves, because I don't see our weather getting warmer. This training is difficult in the cold weather like this, because I can't do speed work with a breathable mask on so I pick days when I can do it. Okay I'll quit whining and quit making excuses. I'll is well though.

Elevation Chart for todays run

Today I ran 11.4 miles in 6:53 in 1:18, a lot of this run was the same course I ran on Saturday. I started out really slow and then started picking the pace up to get good negative splits. Today's starting temperature was 3 degrees.

The Tempo run today went well I ran 9 miles at a 6:14 pace with only a .2 cool down. This was mostly a flat course with some uphill and downhill. The temperature this morning was 10 degrees.

Then on my lunch hour I ran 2.3 miles on the treadmill at a 6:53 to 6:58 pace just as a warm-up to do some strength training.

Today I ran 9.3 at a 6:45 pace, sort of just floated along today.  I haven't slept the last two nights, because I keep dreaming about  codig my Perl/Mysql project at work.  I came to work today and my UPS battery unit caught on fire so we used the Fire Extinguisher.  There was so much smoke that I could work for two hours.   Luckly it happened in the morning and not in the middle of the night, or who knows it could have destroyed the whole building.  It started on fire when I first got in my office door.  I thinking it was God, he takes care of our needs.

Today I ran on my lunch hour 9.3 miles in 1 hour at a 6:28 pace. I didn't run this morning because my Garmin wasn't charged it's that bad. Three of the miles I did were one mile hill repeats. I'm really trying to build my quads for Boston and I hope all the hill work I'm doing will accomplish that.
The temperature on my lunch hour was 27 degrees.

I exactly slept all night last night, and didn't dream about programming code, because I've made huge accomplishments on that yesterday and today.

Well tonight I did my long run starting from work. I went in an hour early so I could start my run at 4pm, because I knew it would cool off fast. I had to switch my run from Saturday to, tonight because of other things going only(I still will run on Saturday though to try out my new shoes). My hands were froze by the end of the run, because of the elevation I probably traveled.

I ran 17.5 miles at a 6:53 pace in 2:01, a bit faster than I wanted to go, but I felt fine. I was very cold and wasn't dressed for this run, because it started out very nice at 4pm. The last 6 miles I picked the pace up a bit. I was only going to run 16, but I did a loop back to my office and it was longer than I thought. During this run believe it or not I did 4 hill repeats, not something you usually do in a long run, but I want to get my quads built good for Boston. I really following my own training program.

Monday: Pace run
Tuesday: Hill repeats alternate Speed work
Wednesday: Tempo Run
Thursday: Pace run
Friday: Whatever I feel like
Saturday: Long Run

Today was suppose to be a recovery run, but trying out my new shoes sure didn't seem to make it that way. Even though I thought I was trying to go slower, it wasn't as slow as I wanted to go. The recover run I thought was much faster than I thought I was running. Tomorrow is a rest day so I won't overwork my body.

Anyway I ran 8.1 miles at a 6:49 pace in 55 minutes, the run seemed so easy.
It must be the new Asics DS Trainer 12 shoes. I do like the lighter feeling on my feet. Will see how well they work on a longer run.

Today I ran 10 miles in 6:37 at 3 degrees, but it really did feel to bad when your in 3 layers and once you hit the first mile your warm enough. I really wanted to go with just a soft floating run today, but for the first 5 miles I had two dogs chasing me a black lab and a German shepherd. I couldn't believe it "5 miles!". One got behind me in the second mile and tripped my leg and I almost did a face plant in the pavement. I don't know how I caught myself, but I did, and I was mad after that.

I found myself running faster and really messing up what I wanted to accomplish on this run. I weaved in and out of roads to try to lose these dogs but they were relentless. Finally, I thought okay dogs lets see how you like hill work. I climbed a few hills but they were both there with me. When I reach the top of the last hill (these weren't big big hills) I turned around right at the dogs and that seemed to confuse them because they kept going straight right by our interstate into a field, and never bothered me after that. I then went back down the hill way off from the course I wanted to run. But I did run another 5 miles back to my house.

I love dogs, but today they were just a distraction especially when your worried about being tripped. It was a good run and I broke in my new Asics Gel DS trainers.

Today I picked a fine day to do 5 Yasso 800's, because the track that's just pretty much a walk from my house still had snow and ice on it in just one corner section. But I managed to do okay other than I would lose my traction and bounce when I hit that corner section. I also didn't get much sleep last night, because our 2 year old son kept us up, plus I stayed up late to do homework in my online College class so I didn't want to get out of bed, and run any sort of speed work. But I used my will power and kept thinking "Boston", and was out the door by 6:30am.



If you want to average the 5 mile run the average pace would be 6:07 (no stopping).
Mile 1
Interval 2:49
Rest: 3:19

Mile 2
Interval 2:50
Rest: 3:18

Mile 3
Interval 2:51
Rest: 3:14

Mile 4
Interval 2:46
Rest: 3:13

Mile 5
Interval 2:40
Rest: 3:26

Without taking a break (other than resetting my Garmin for this next bit of running) I kept running and ran another 5 miles at a 6:37 pace in 30:30 minutes it felt real easy. The temperature today was 14 degrees I was excited about that. I'm very tire at work, because of the lack of sleep. What was I thinking taking an online College course.

Today I decided to do a different type of training to see if I could really hammer my legs and test my fitness level. I first started off climbing the hill that you've see in my past elevation charts. The first few mile pace times were 7:02, 7:01, 7:31, (very steep section, I struggled on this section I felt), then 6:56. Now the next couple of miles are downhill and I wanted to push not real hard, but hard enough that I felt I was getting a work out. These sections I know I could probably run in the high 4 minute miles but I wanted to stay in the low 6 minute pace per mile. My splits were 6:24 6:05, 6:01. Now the experiment I wanted to try to get out of this training run is to see how my legs would handle the next three miles on the flat course to finish off the run. I wanted to test how well my legs would transition to the flat part by pushing with tempo speeds to the end. My splits for the next three miles were 5:53, 6:02, and finishing at 6:11 and I felt pretty good and not really that fatigue after the run so that was exciting. Total pace average per mile was 6:30 in 1:06 for 10.2 miles.

I also ran on the treadmill on my lunch hour for 2.5 miles at a 7 minute mile pace. I was mainly at the healthly club to do a full body workout and not really run that much

Ran 9 miles this morning at a 6:54 pace. I just wanted an easy run, because I've had to rearrange my long run schedule of 20 miles for tomorrow which I usually do on Saturday's. I'm either going to run my long run tomorrow morning then go to work, or do it on my lunch hour. I have to work late tomorrow night to put on some system patches so it does matter if I'm a couple hours late from my lunch hour

But I'm not sure when I should run, morning or at 12pm?

Well today on my lunch hour I ran 21.1 miles at a 6:58 pace in 2:27. Yes 21!. I ran on a hilly course sort of the first 10 had some small hills but I made up for it in the last half. I will post my elevation chart when I have my Garmin with me.

The bad thing about this run is the wind was blowing at 18 mph, and I had a stomach ache from mile 9 on, because I ate too much for lunch and I did let it digest long enough. But overall everything went well, other than I really wanted to run at a slower pace to get more time in this run to buiild the endurance level.

Tomorrow a recovery run.

Today I got up at 8:30 after being at work till 3am to do a recovery run. I really wasn't too sore from
the 21 miler on Friday.

I ran 6.5 miles at a 7:26 pace felt good and easy. The wind was blowing strong but the temperature was around 20 degrees. We are suppose to be warming up here soon.

 Today I ran 9.1 miles at a 6:40 pace in 1:00, and on my lunch hour I ran 2.1 miles at a 6:53 pace on the treadmill.

The weather was around 30 degrees so that was nice.

Today I did hill repeats. First I had to run 3 and a half miles to get to the hill I wanted to run the repeats on. I didn't won't to drive because I wanted to warm up first. I did 5 repeats at 400m I wanted to do more but I started getting a stomach ache on the second repeat. I ate refried beans the night before need I say more. But I did run a total of 11 miles at a 6:55 pace. It took me 3 and a half miles to get back home with a stomach ache that wasn't very enjoyable.

I felt it was a good work out with the hill repeats that I did do.

Tomorrow tempo run.

I didn't get much sleep last night because our son was up and down all night. When the alarm went off to run at 6am I didn't want to even get out of the covers at all, but I did 20 minutes later. I was scheduled for a tempo run after running hill repeats yesterday. I felt sluggish the first 800m of the run like I wasn't even ready to move. I did the first warm-up mile at 7:09 then the tempo miles

6:22
6:21
6:19
6:00
6:10
6:05
6:06
6;07
6:02

If you count the average with the warm-up mile I did 10.5 miles at a 6:18 pace in 1:06. I didn't want to dip into the 5 minute mile range, because I wanted to be consistent in the low 6 minute miles.


I still haven't made reservations for a hotel, and a plane ticket to Boston. I'm getting frustrated, because I don't know anything about the Boston area. Like once I get off the plane from Boston I need to get a cab to the hotel. The one I was looking at staying was Constitution Inn http://www.constitutioninn.org/, but they don't have a shuttle to that hotel, so I don't know if I have to pre-arrange a cab ahead of time or what. Some of the hotels I've called are not a lot of help. The Salt Lake Marathon that weekend is sounding more and more enjoyable to run and a lot closer, only 150 miles away.

Today I ran 7.2 miles at a 7:04 pace in 50:59 minutes, in a rainy muddy mess. I wanted to really cut my pace back because of the back to back speed days, and tomorrow morning I'm going to run 16 miles for my long run on Friday again. I have to take time off from work, because I'm at the max for my vacation hours so I chose to take a few hours off in the morning. That's horrible I'm forced to take vacation. I don't want to take any vacation right now because I have too much to do.

Friday morning I decided to do my long run, because I was off from work the first half of the morning. I was scheduled to run 16 miles but when I got half way into the run I decided to run 18 miles instead. I run a very up and down hill course probably like nothing I've done before, and I came away feeling really good after the run.

I want up and down 500 feet three different times in this run to get ready for Boston

I ran 18.2 miles at a 7:02 pace in 2:08.

Today I did a recovery run of 10.1 at a 7:15 pace in 1:02, it felt really good. I was a little sore from yesterday's long run, but felt really good after the first mile. I know my pace should be slower but I felt that I really back off and was running slower. But I do know the first 5 miles I run a pace of 7:30 per mile. The run was really easy. It's amazing how you can run so far on a recovery run, and if like you didn't run at all.

I won't run tomorrow so my weekly total is below (I could run just to get over 70, but who cares it's not that important).

Total miles for the week: 68.2 miles.

I need to caught up here. I've been so busy with work and running.  I'm still only taking one day off per week running.

Monday February 12th

I ran 11.3 miles at a 6:50 pace on a very hilly course. It was a good run to start the morning off with. Not really too cold. We are starting to get warmer. I believe we won’t experience anymore single digit weather.

Tuesday February 13th

Today was track speed work day. The temperature was 28 degrees which wasn't too bad, but the track was all frosted over. It looked like an ice skating ring, but it wasn't icy at all.

I did 6 X 800's

Mile 1
Repeat: 2:48 Rest 3:19

Mile 2
Repeat: 2:42 Rest 3:24

Mile 3
Repeat: 2:41 Rest 3:23

Mile 4
Repeat: 2:41 Rest 3:18

Mile 5
Repeat: 2:43 Rest 3:24

Mile 6
Repeat: 2:48 Rest (did get this one)

These were okay, but I was hoping a little faster.
Afterwards I just kept running for 5 .5 more miles at a 6:38 pace. Total miles 11.5.
I was frozen by the time I got home, because I didn't wear the proper clothing for this training session

Wednesday February 14th

Today was tempo run day. I did my normal 9 mile tempo run with a one mile warm-up.

1. 7:08 (warm-up)
2. 6:19
3. 6:17
4. 6:12
5: 6:10
6. 6:16
7. 6:16
8. 6:12
9. 6:11
10. 5.57

My left calf has felt really tight after this run and still does a little bit. I think I pushed too hard on that last mile. Maybe two straight fast runs in a row is not a good idea.

February 15th

I made this run into a recovery run since I haven't been doing very many which is foolish. I ran 7.7 miles at a 7:20 pace. My left calf was still tight after this run, but nothing that's really affecting my running, but I want to make sure I don't ignore it. I ran in my new Avia Lites shoes that came yesterday. I’ve been running in the Asics DS Trainers, and I think because there a little lighter that I’m going to make them my marathon shoe

February 16th

I did my long run again on a Friday, because it fits my schedule better. I did the craziest elevation I think I've ever done. I went up and down so much that it was like being on a rollercoaster. I ran 21 miles at a 7:03 pace in 2:28. I took an ice bath after this run, because I haven’t done one for a while. My left calf isn’t as sore as it was on Wednesday. Tomorrow will be a recovery run of some mileage I don’t know yet. Whatever I feel like doing.

Today was a recovery run, and the weather was very nice. It was 34 degrees no wind, and the sun was out so I ran 8.5 miles at a 7:20 pace. Not really much to report other than I ran a flat course some up and down but not a very far distance.

Now I really have a tough decision to make. I've wore my Avia Lites in my last 5 marathons and they have done me good, but the new Asics DS Trainers 12's I've ran my last two 20 milers in, and I seemed to perform very well, and their even lighter than the Avia Lites so I need to decide which shoe to go with. What I might do is run my next 20 miler in my Avia Lites to see what I feel is the best.

Today's run I felt like I was shoot out of a cannon I run the first 4 miles at a 6:30 to 6:35 pace. I thought someone needs to close-line me to slow down even though it was comfortable, but I did slow myself down. I was hungry when I woke up, but I didn't want to eat anything before the run. I slept till 9am this morning, because of the holiday I didn't have to work. I really woke up hungry, then I realized the last time I ate was Sunday around 2pm. That was probably why I was running at a faster pace to get back at the breakfast table. This run was suppose to be easy miles, but like I said I did focus and slow down.

I ran 9.1 miles at a 6:48 pace in 19 degree weather. Then once I got home my daughter wanted to run a mile around the block, so I compromised with my stomach, "you can wait another mile before inhaling food". We ran 1.3 miles in a 9:30 pace (she's 10 years old). Then the breakfast delight began.

Total miles 10.4

Hill speed work tomorrow.

Today I did hill repeats and I really wasn't motivated to do anything, because one of our systems was having issues, and I was up till 12:30 am last night. But I got up and did 7 miles at 6:41 for the hill repeats. I did 6 X 400's and 1 X 800, in 20 mph of wind going up. This was very tough, by the time I was at the top I was winded except on the last 800 that felt good (strange with that being longer).

I also did 2 miles at the gym at a 7:20 pace, and did strength training on my quads and hamstrings to
prepare them for Boston.

My job has been making training tough with being up so much lately in the midnight hours. It seems like I'm always training with tire eyes, but just the thought of Boston will not stop my motivation, and the help of God behind all my training.

Later tonight I took my two year old son to his Mommy/Daddy and me tumbling class, where the parents get to do everything too. I always take him so that I can have time alone with him, because my wife is always with him all day. I really enjoy it, just him and me.

Second speed day in a row today well actually a tempo run. Although, it took a fork lift to get me out of bed this morning, because I didn't sleep all night, because of 30 pages from this one system that had the Network Time protocol all out of sync. I was mad, I'm not getting any sleep and today I had to wake up and do a 9 mile tempo run. Well enough of my complaining I'll get back to today.

I first did a warm-up mile of 7:15 then the following;
6:23 (just easing into it, my legs felt tired)
6:14 (better but still felt tire)
6:17 (slower but I felt a little stronger)
6:01
6:06
6:08
6:02
6:08
6:07

Cool down mile of 7:10.

The tempo miles where an average of 6:09 per mile not bad, but I could have pushed harder, but I was tire and I didn't want my form to suffer and risk injury. Face it I was just being lazy.


My wife ask me why I pick to run 9 tempo miles, I told her it just sounded like a good number, and running that many can only make me stronger.

How many tempo miles to other runners run?

Total of 11.1 miles

Well today my main focus was to run slow, and break-in my new Mizuno Wave Rider 9 shoes, so I ran 9.1 miles in 7:13/7:14 (don't have my Garmin with me so I don't know which pace average it was). I felt like I was running in place. I actually wanted to average 7:30, because today's run was just to log some slow miles and get ready for tomorrow mornings Long Run of 16-18 with probably 12 miles being at marathon pace. But I'm getting better at getting the slower recovery runs in at a slower pace, because it's all about spending more time out there on your feet than on how many miles you run on these recovery runs. I want to have a good endurance factor to my advantage.

The run was pretty boring the temperature was 46 degrees and the weather said that there were 20 mph winds, not when I was running that was incorrect. Well I guess the last three miles there were some considerable times the wind would pick-up. The shoes seemed to be fine. I definitely felt that they were heavier than my other two brands of shoes.

Sorry for the delayed report, but I’ve been busy along with other things. It’s been an emotional two days.

February 23
Well today's run really had me wondering if I was going to be able to accomplish what I wanted, a good marathon pace run. First off I started to develop a cold yesterday afternoon and by night I had a headache. Later on that evening my stomach started hurting, and by that statement I'm sure you know what's going to proceed next. I wasn't able to sleep, and at 1:30am my stomach hurt so bad that I jumped out of bed ran to the toilet and vomited everything I ate that night. That woke my wife up and she said, "your not going to run tomorrow morning", and I thought that was probably the case.
Well, I woke up at 6am and had a stuffy/runny nose and a little bit of a headache, but my stomach was fine. I decided to run, because I couldn't run my long run on Saturday or Sunday I would only have enough time for a recovery run on those days. I thought to myself Boston is important, and If I can run a marathon sick I can surely do this long run.

Now it even gets better, we got dumped on last night almost all the roads were covered in snow and it also rained a little last night so to top things off there was ice underneath the snow (it’s still snowing hard right now). My goal was to run 12 miles at marathon pace in an 18 mile long run.
Anyway, the wind was blowing about 15 to 20 mph, so I started out at 7am at 23 degrees with a warm-up pace.

Mile 1 7:26,
Mile 2 6:59 (still warming up and the wind made it difficult to keep a consistent pace.)
Mile 3 6:56
Mile 4 6:54
Mile 5 6:38 (Marathon pace miles start)
Mile 6 6:40
Mile 7 6:42
Mile 8 6:36
Mile 9 6:36

The next two miles I decided to change my strategy a bit by climbing some major hills about 300ft. I wanted to see after these hills if I could maintain my marathon pace. This would be a good test on the quads and hamstrings. Well this was a stupidity strategy, because those roads were icy and snow-covered and made my pace suffer and made me work extra harder for miles 10 and 11. But that’s okay, because I was able to maintain my marathon pace afterwards fine and the run seemed very comfortable, other than my stuffy, runny nose.

Mile 10 7:02
Mile 11 7:10
Mile 12 6:22
Mile 13 6:22
Mile 14 6:30
Mile 15 6:29
Mile 16 6:39
Mile 17 6:25
Mile 18 6:59
Mile 19 7:30

My total average pace for the 19 miles was 6:47, and marathon pace 6:43, which I really could have easily ran at a faster pace. If I wouldn’t have made a course change on icy/snowy hill roads (I don’t know what I was thinking) it would have been better. At least I know this pace I accomplished well. I really feel confident that I can get well below the sub three goal. But one step at a time there’s a lot of training left. I really felt good that I did as well as I did for not feeling the best, and only having a bagel with honey to fuel my body.

February 24,

This morning I woke up not feeling good. With a full blown cold: runny, and stuffy nose with a headache, and feeling weak, but I didn’t want to miss my training so I run anyways. I ran 8.2 miles at a 7:28 pace. This was a good recovery run, and a good way to end the week. I was going to run seven days this week, but I better be smart and rest and get better.

Today I ran 11.1 miles at a 7:00 pace in 1:18. The course I chose today was a very hilly course for the first 8 miles. The last 3 miles were flat, and the last mile of the course I ran into some trouble. Since we've had snowfall the last 3 days some of the roads are icy or covered in snow. When I was about to reach the last mile of the course it has a turn on a back road leading a mile away to my house. When I turned the corner I stepped on some snow covered iced and wiped out. I cut a hole in my Underarmour tights in the knee and was bleeding pretty good, but I got right back up and finished the mile running at a 6:40 pace just to get home faster. I did cut my knee up pretty good, but not enough to go to the hospital. But it actually does hurt and I ran another 4.5 miles on the treadmill in the evening at the health club.

I'm more mad about ripping my Underarmour tights than my knee, because of the expense in purchasing them.

Total mils 15.6.

Today I did hill repeats around one of our University campus hills. The hill is called red hill and its exactly a mile loop around, 800m uphill and 800 downhill, but there's a road in the middle that will allow you to do 450m's up and down. I did 6 x 450m's with a horrible wind at 20 degrees, and I must admit I didn't want to do it. I had to run on my lunch hour, because I had to be at work at 6am.
I really hate running on my lunch hour, because it takes me longer to get prepared, other than when I go to the Health Club to run. I almost went to the Health Club, but I couldn't see myself running hill repeats on the treadmill, because you can't do a downhill. I ran the uphill around a 6:30 total for the repeats. I also did warm-up and cold-down miles. The total was 11 miles at a 6:54 pace. After the hill repeats I ran around the full hill and its simple to do after slowing down from a hill repeat pace. Then I ran back to work which is two and a half miles away.

With this being such a hard run I don't know if I'll do a tempo run tomorrow or wait till Thursday, and just do recovery miles tomorrow. I'm not sore just tire from getting up so early to go to work, and working almost 12 hours.

Today, I just took it easy to setup for a tempo run tomorrow so I ran 10.1 miles at a 7:07 pace.  This week will be my high miles week leading into Boston.   The course I chose today was hilly.   I want my quads and hamstring to maintain a certain fitness leading in to Boston and running hills and hill repeats and lifting is a good start.

Today I did a tempo run and it definitely will be memorable. First off the temperature was 19 degrees, "no problem" but with a 25-35 mph wind which made the temperature 8 degrees according to the weather. I almost went to the health club treadmill, by what I report below I wish I would have.

The wind was blowing Southeast I knew the direction I would run in would head right into it. I did a two mile warm-up and then started the tempo miles the first 3 the wind was probably blowing 10 mph into me (more so on the side not head on), but it didn't seem hard because I'm used to that speed of wind. Pocatello always has a consistent wind blowing. Then mile 6 I headed into the part where I knew the wind would be the strongest. But it wasn't as strong on mile 6 so I should have ran that mile better, I don't know what happened. It was blowing 25 to 35 mph on miles 7 & 8, and it just zapped the strength right out of me, because I was giving it everything I had to try to keep my current pace, and the wind would literally almost
knock me back. Towards the end of mile 7 I was so tired I slowed down to try to gain some energy for the next two miles. Mile 8 was better but the wind really hit me hard still. This road is about a 2.5 miles stretch before you turn. Mile 9 I turned and the wind was only blowing about 10 mph into my face so I finished pretty strong. But it definitely was a struggled tempo run.
I thought before I left the house I could change my route and run with the wind, but I wouldn't have counted the pace as fair and I wanted it to be hard. This was too hard though. My hands were numb by the time I got home and I had to rub them it get the feeling back. I was almost in tears because the pain hurt so bad. Next time if it's this windy and cold I'll go to the health club treadmill. The training runs this week by far have had some weird things happen, and the weather seemed to cause them all.

mile 1 7:33
mile 2 6:47
mile 3 5:59
mile 4 6:01
mile 5 6:01
mile 6 6:12
mile 7 6:27
mile 8 6:18
mile 9 6:02
mile 10 6:35
mile 11 7:14

My day wasn't done yet I decided to go to the Health Club after work, and I ran 2.3 miles at a 7:28 pace just a warm-up to see how my legs felt after the tempo run. They were fine and it felt good. I lift weights on my quads, hamstrings, and calf's to get a strength training work-out. Tomorrow I haven't decided what I'll run but it will be between 14 to 20 miles and maybe 8 at marathon pace.

Total miles today 13.3.

Today I ran 20.3 miles at a 7:10 pace on the same course as last week, but I extended it to get the 20 miles. I was mainly focusing on a slow pace it was a very easy run. I did mix in a few marathon pace miles but only two, because I did a tempo run yesterday, and didn't want to over do it. The weather was 17 degrees with no wind, but for some reason my hands were colder than they have ever been (maybe still poor circulation from yesterday). I was very scared after the run, because my thumb felt like a solid piece of ice. I might have to go in and get it checked, because the tip is still tingling after a few hours being at home. I read if this is the case that you should go see your doctor.

What a week for me... to summarize: Monday I fell on the ice. Tuesday I did the worst hill repeats in the worst wind possible. Wednesday that was good day "cool". Thursday I did a tempo run in the worst wind again, and I froze my hands off for the first time this week. Then I did it again today. Right now I'm at 70 miles for the week in 5 days of running. I have either 1 or 2 running days left this week. Should I dare run. I will tell you this whole training for Boston I've had some weird running experiences that I never have had before.

I have the day off, except I have to go in tonight and put patches on one of our computer systems but that won't take long.

Recovery run to end the week at 80 miles.  I just took it nice and easy at a 7:29 pace in 1:12.  Sometimes just taking it slow makes you appreciate the outdoors.

The past couple of days I've been so tired. More tired than I've ever been in my life. The reason is the late nights, Friday night I stayed up till 3:30am fixing a problem at work with our Calendar Server which is a most that its up and running. Then I got up the next morning at 9am and ran 9.7 easy miles. Saturday night I stayed up till 2:30am, because of my online web homework that was due the next day. Yes, homework due on a Sunday. You don't go to class so due dates are a lot different than going to class to turn in work.

Sunday was my scheduled day off from running, and I was busy at home and didn't get a chance to rest. By 9pm that night I was completely drained and wiped out.

Monday: I woke up so tired that I don't know how I ran the first couple of miles. My eyes were tired they didn't want to stay open. The first three miles I averaged a 7:40 pace. I think the music is the only thing that kept me awake But I ran 10.5 miles in a 7:04 pace in 1:14. I didn't really do any marathon pace miles last week so I convinced myself to do four in this run at a 6:40 pace.

Still tired! This afternoon I went to the health club and ran 2.3 miles at a 7:30 pace just to get warmed up to do some strength training. Total mileage 12.8 miles. Days like these make me wonder if I have it in me to run a marathon under 3 hours.

I hope I'll be able to sleep tonight, my work hours is really starting to affect my sleep. Not good for the training.

Speed work today

My times were awful that I shouldn't even be posting them, but I'll do so anyway (need to post the bad days too).

Interval 1: 2:49
rest: 3:27

Interval 2: 2:50
rest: 3:18

Interval 3: 2:55
rest: 3:22

Interval 4: 3:05 (I was running like a water buffalo here)
rest: 3:20 (my rest was almost better than my sprint, how sad is that)

Interval 5: 2:52 (I guess not too bad, for today anyway)
rest: 3:23

Interval 6: 2:47 (I did better on this one that I decided to do another one)
rest: 3:34

Interval 7: 2:52
rest: n/a

Then I ran two cool-down miles at 6:56, and I know I should have went slower on these.

I totaled over 9 miles today, and decided to take a break in the afternoon and not do anything. I do kind of feel sluggish/weak like it's tough to get up and have energy. I think maybe I did too much on Monday with little sleep over the weekend. Where I ran a total of 13 miles and also went to the gym, and did sit-ups and push-ups before bed.

Tonight I never got off till 6pm and had to take my son to daddy and me tumbling class (which I would do even if I was dead tired because I love it), tonight homework. Not much rest for me tonight.

Well today I had a scheduled 7 mile tempo run, but I thought I would take it easy, because of the way I've been feeling the last couple of days. I thought I would run an even pace of 6:30 for 7 miles which is way above my tempo speeds. I was up till 11:30pm last night doing homework and I thought this sounded like a good plan. The weather was wonderful 33 degrees no wind sunny and it was warm.

Approaching the end of the first mile I thought "NO Way!" I'm not going to take the easy route the whole point of this training is to get the best ability out of my body leading to the taper, so I thought I would ease into the Tempo Run. The warm-up mile I did was 7:21 and then I started the tempo portion.

6:12
6:18 (I was messing with my ipod on this mile and it caused me to slow down a bit, I should have just left it alone. But it still shouldn't have stopped me from running this mile better.).
6:08
6:03
5:59
6:06
6:04
6:32 (cool down mile but my mind was wandering thinking of the flying pizza boxes that Scott was having to dodge in Philly. I was also thinking about how his hill repeats went in frigid weather).
6:48 ( better cool down mile but still had a lot on my mind and not paying attention to my pace.. SLOW DOWN.)

I really felt good on this run today and not sluggish, except I could have done a better job on mile 2 of the tempo portion. Now I've done back to back speed days this week which last week I did them between a recovery run. It seems I perform better with back to back speed days. I know that's not the recommended way to do it and its hard on your body. I'm not sure why it works better for me. I don't consider it the right way to train, but I guess if it works keep doing it.

Tomorrow will be an easy recovery run.

Ran 2.3 miles at the Health Club this afternoon at a recovery pace of 7:40. I really like running in the afternoons after a hard morning run, because it feels good to do an easy unfocused run. I lifted just on my upper body today, nothing on the legs. I already torn enough muscle fibers on my tempo run. Makes no sense to strain them more.

12.6 miles

Today I was schedule for a recovery run after two speed days in a row (Yasso 800's and 7 mile tempo run) well I changed that. If there's one part of my training that I'm concerned with it's the marathon pace. I only decided a few weeks ago what pace I wanted to run the Boston marathon in, and I haven't done very many training runs at this pace. I did do a 12 marathon run a couple weeks ago, and a 2-3 mile pace run on Monday (that was a mixed up 10 mile run). The runs went well at the 6:40 pace but still I need more runs at this pace.

So today I ran 8.1 miles at a 6:50 pace in 55:24. Five of the miles I did at marathon pace: 6:43, 6:32, 6:33, 6:35, and 6:39, and it felt easy. That really made me feel better and comfortable where I'm at in the training.

Must of the training programs I see have at least one marathon pace run per week.

Long run went well. I ran 23.6 at a 7:16 pace in 2:51. I was more worried about how cold it was vs. how the downhills were. I almost quit because of the cold, but I figured the miles will drop in elevation fast. Like I said I've ran this course in the past and the downhill don't seem to bother me. The run went very well. I'll post more later.

Here's the course I ran... good one to be ready for Boston

http://www.pocatellomarathon.com/maps.htm

Today I did an easy recovery run 8.4 miles at a 7:29 pace in 1:03 minutes.  Since I did 23 miles yesterday it felt good just to get out there and run just run and not focus.  Next  week on my long run I plan to do 18 miles and 12 of those miles will be at marathon pace to see where I'm at (6:40 pace).  Boston is coming up soon. My goal of being under 3 I believe is in reach..

I can't decide if I want to do one more 20 miler before Boston, I've done 5 so far for the training.  Whatever I decided I feel like I've trained hard and I hope I see result.  We need to think postive and have confidence right?

You know when you have a day-off from running you expect to be motivated to start back up. It seems like the last three Monday's I've had to drag myself out the door to run when I take Sunday's off. I should run on Sunday too, because usually I have the carving to do so. If I would have during this training cycle all my mileage week totals would have been in the high 70's and low 80's. Oh well the mileage totals for me are not that important what I get per year.

Today was hill repeats, and I got out the door so late that I didn't go to my usual spot. I decided to run a hill on our overpass its only 150m's, but I figured that's better than nothing. I ran two miles to this overpass for a good warm-up which felt good after the day off. I did 9 X 150ms and ran two of the downhill’s fast. I felt pretty good I pushed at a real hard pace in the low 6 minute pace (I didn't record the intervals, because I forgot to set my Garmin for that type of training workout. I just have overall pace for the whole run.) One observation of this workout is the uphill comes up so fast, because of the small distance between intervals. Maybe it’s me, but this short distance Hill Repeats are just as tough as 400s.

After I got done doing the intervals I decided to run the next 5 miles at marathon pace (I’ll have to display those later). I nailed the 5 miles, averaging around a 6:35 pace. I felt like I could have dropped the pace lower but I didn’t want to over do it. That's a pretty good work-out doing a marathon pace right after hill repeats with no break.

Totals 10.2 miles at a 6:35 pace in 1:07
This afternoon at the health club I did something different, rather than run two miles as a warm-up I ran 2.5 miles at marathon pace and the last .5 at 3% grade and the first 2 miles at 1 to 1.5% grade. I really wanted to get more miles in at the (6:40) pace. I really think I should drop my marathon pace to a 6:30, because I know I could run at this pace for the marathon because of my tempo times. I’m going to play around with this Friday when I do 12 miles in my 18 mile long run.

Total for the day: 12.7 miles.

Today was a simple easy run. Other than the first 2 miles are going at a very slow grade uphill and mile 3 you  climb 500+  feet.  I like doing this course once a week because of  the hilly portion and then the downhill.  It's a great run to prepare for Boston, other than I wish I could run the downhill first then the uphill, but where I start from my house it's impossible.  I've often thought about driving to the top then starting the decline and then I would be able to run the hill on the last portion.  Good course if you did two loops on your long run then you could hit that 500+ feet hill twice.  The hill lasts over a mile.  I did one 20 miler on this course where I looped it twice.
I believe I showed a "gif" image of the elevation from this course in one of my blog entries.  My Garmin 205 does a great job at showing the elevation, especially when you can download your runs to motionbased.com.

During the training period for Boston I've really ran a lot of uphiill and downhill courses as much as I can.  I believe this has really helped my endurance level.  I can only hope, and give God the blessing for helping me.

Today I did a seven mile tempo run.  I felt really good and probably the fastest tempo run for the start of this year.  I wanted to see how my body would handle a marathon pace mile after the tempo run instead of dropping down to a cool-down mile.   I felt fine and could have continued with the marathon pace miles.  Good training day leading towards Boston.  Overall totals  10.4 miles  at a 6:20 pace in 1:06.

The course is the same course I've done all my tempo runs, mostly flat with one small uphill and downhill.  There was a strong head wind at mile 7 that I really and to push through at 25 mph.
 

Mile 1: 7:24 (warm-up)
Mile 2: 5:59 (start tempo)
Mile 3: 5:53
Mile 4  5:52
Mile 5  6:00
Mile 6  6:03
Mile 7  6:07
Mile 8  6:05
Mile 9  6:32 (marathon pace mile)
Mile 10 6:50 (should have cool-down slower than this, but wasn't focusing on the cool-down I guess)

Today I ran 9.2 miles at a 7:14 pace faster than I wanted to, but they felt easy.  Today is just setting up for tomorrows 18 miler where 12 miles will be at marathon pace.  I was tired this morning I had to be at work by 6:50, because Idaho Power was shutting down power at our University, and I had to make sure that our systems would be okay on the backup APS power units, or else we would starting shutting them down if Idaho Power took too long.   Our battery backups will hold the power for 25 minutes.   Idaho Power only had the power off for 9 minutes.

Rather than go back to my office... I did my run at 8:30am.  I feel really tired today I need to get to bed early for the run tomorrow.
 

Friday

Well today was a real test where I'm at with my training: success or bust. I scheduled a 12 mile marathon pace run within the 18 miler. I mentioned earlier that I needed to decide on a marathon pace either 6:30 or 6:40 or somewhere in between. I need to have that confidence to know where I stand, because I've been concerned about being wishy washy with my marathon pace.

It was about 8:30 in the morning when I headed out, and the temperature was 32 degrees not short weather yet, but it did warm up
to 70 degrees for the day. I proceeded on a course that was up and down in elevation to make things interesting.  To make a long story short I nailed it, and I felt like I could have dropped my marathon pace to a 6:20 or 6:25. Truly I thank God, because he's the one that's put me where I'm at, and helped me with this run today. I was praising him at mile 12, because I knew I nailed the pace miles, and I really thanked God for the help. I felt so good that I did 16 marathon pace miles. I'm really shocked and surprised because the first 12 miles I was fighting against a 10 mph wind. But it just felt so easy the whole run. For the 16 miles I averaged a 6:30 pace, so maybe there's my answer. I was shocked and surprised, but I really have never tested what I can really do.

I don't know what I will try in Boston, do I even try to drop the pace lower? Do I just try to stay between 6:30 and 6:40? Who knows the answer. Maybe I'll decide when I just start running the race. But I feel real good about my chances being under 3 hours. I just hope the weather is cool.

I think next week I'm going to try to find a gradual long downhill (at least 8 miles) that has a little up hill then another gradual downhill to really be close to the Boston course (probably an 18 to 20 miler).

The rest of the day I took my 2 year old son out for pizza and I ate a foot long meatball sandwich at Fazoli's. Then we went to the park for 2 hours and climbed rocks to the top of the park. It's a pretty steep climb. Then we played on the park toys till 5pm. Wonderful day, my wife wondered when we were coming home. I didn't even sit down and rest the whole day.

(Sasha I love the html editor)

Total 20.2 miles at a 6:38 pace in 2:14.

mile 1 7:04

mile 2 6:32
mile 3 6:36
mile 4 6:33
mile 5 6:33
mile 6 6:31
mile 7 6:40
mile 8 6:28
mile 9 6:29
mile 10 6:35
mile 11 6:38
mile 12 6:30
mile 13 6:20
mile 14 6:44 (went up a major hill didn't try to keep same pace. I went up easy. )
mile 15 6:18
mile 16 6:16
mile 17 6:27

mile 18 7:01 ( Start cool-down miles)
mile 19 7:07
mile 20 7:10

Saturday:

Was a recovery run which I had to wait till the evening to run, which would be the first time in the training where I've ran in the evening.  My family and I had to travel to Twin Falls, Idaho (110 miles away) to my daughters soccer games.  They won one and lost one, and believe it or not I got a sunburn because it was over 70 degrees.

I ran 8.7  miles at a 7:27 pace in 1:04.  I really wasn't sore from Saturday's run, but I was tire into the first mile, because of all the driving, but I quickly restored my energy in the run. 

My wife also ran a mile and my kids too, because we went to the track for the run, and we all went to subway and pigged out afterwards.

This sounds like a broken record, " I didn't get much sleep last night", but this was because my son wanting to play at 3am, and getting up to go to the bathroom several times. But I went to bed early and didn't feel real tired. With our busy weekend my son's sleep times were altered, so I think that was the problem.

Today I did 6 X 800's, with one warm-up mile, and 4 miles after the 800's mixing in 10 x 100 accelerations.

800's (The 800's were far better than two weeks ago when I was in left field or something)

Total 6 miles at a 6:07 pace (overall)
split: 2:38 rest: 3:23

split: 2:40 rest: 3:18

split: 2:43 rest: 3:18

split: 2:46 rest: 3:29

split: 2:47 rest: 3:16

split: 2:45 rest: 3:22

Then did the 4.1 miles at a 6:40 pace.

Did 2.6 miles at the health club at a 6:53 pace. My goal was to keep the run semi-fast since today was a speed training day. I did most of it at a 2% grade with probably half a mile at 3% grade. Then I did some strength training on my hamstrings, quads, and calves. This was a full day of training, hopefully I won't pay for it tomorrow on my easy 10 mile run. I really want this week to be a hard training week since Boston is close and the taper is near.

Total miles for the day 12.7 miles

I ran 12.08 miles at an easy 7:01 pace in 1:24. The temperature was 41 degrees so things are warming up. This was my easy run day, but I chose a hilly course, so some parts were not effortless when running. This is the same course I run once a week, but when you reach the top of the hill (about 500ft up) there's several turn off roads that go uphill from the main road (Satterfield St.), and I would run up each street and run back down to the main road and continue until I reached the next street that went uphill. I continued this pattern until I reached the end of Satterfield St., and then you turn and run completely downhill for 3 miles, then the course ends with 2 flat miles. I wanted to get more of the uphill and downhill work so I chose a longer course today. I was actually kind of tired after this run, hopefully it doesn't affect my tempo run tomorrow. It might be because I always do this run in my heaviest running shoe which are a little bit big on my feet, because when I bought them all they had was a full-size bigger and I always go up half-size. But I got a great discount, and I couldn't pass them up. But they do bloody my toe every time I wear them, because of the movement in the toe box.

I not sure what my plans are this coming Friday's long run, because the last three weeks I've ran 20, 23, and another 20. I think I have done over six 20 milers for the training. Maybe one more couldn't hurt at a slow easy pace or should I mix in some marathon pace miles?

Today was my tempo run day, and second speed work-out for the week.  I wasn't able to sleep last night until 3am, because our son kept getting up.  This is a new thing he's trying.  My wife and I read that two year olds will go through this stage.  With not getting much sleep I decided to change the run to a 4 mile tempo instead of a 7 mile tempo, because I was flat out tired when I woke up at 6am to run, and it gave me an excuse to be lazy.  But, for some reason I found the energy at mile 4 in the tempo run to decide to do the original 7 mile tempo (thank you Lord).  The wind wasn't a problem this morinng, and that was nice to have it not blasting in my face.

Total Miles 11.4  at a 6:19 pace in 1:12.

Mile 1   7:16  (warm-up)

Mile 2   5:58  (Start Tempo)

Mile 3   6:01

Mile 4  5:53

Mile 5  5:52

Mile 6  6:06  (got lazy)

Mile 7  5:57

Mile 8: 6:00 (end tempo)

Mile 9 6:24

Mile 10 6:35

Mile 11 6:48

Today was an easy run, but I did mix in some marathon pace miles (well sort of). I decided I would do some marathon pace miles while I was running (nothing like changing the training strategy), because I'm going to run just a slow endurance 20 miler tomorrow. Although my times were a little higher than what I think my marathon pace will be in Boston, but I wasn't trying really trying hard to hit the pace: 6:44,6:36, 6:37, 6:34, 6:41. They were so easy that I thought I had to be running 7 minute miles, they were done with little effort. I didn't want to go hard today, because of the tempo run yesterday. The tempo runs have really helped me increase my marathon pace since I started implementing them in my training. Sasha gave me some really good tips and advice that has really helped my performance.

Today was cold compared to previous days. The temperature was 19 degrees when I started running at 6:40am. I wear my UnderArmour cold gear tights and shirt and two pairs of gloves. I did the route I run my tempo runs, but to make it different I ran it the reverse way.

Totals miles 10.65 at a 6:47 pace in 1:12

 This afternoon at the Health Club I ran 2.5 eventful miles on the treadmill at an easy  7:30 pace.  I mainly went there to do strength training on my upper body.

Today was a real messed up day. I took vacation till 11am so that I could do my long run today, like I've mentioned in the beginning Saturday's and Sunday's long run days don't work for my families schedule right now. I've got too much stuff going (soccer) .

When I woke up this morning at 7am I had the worst headache and stomach ache. I actually woke up soaked in sweat on my head and body. My wife had something similar yesterday like this. I couldn't even start running until 9:40am, and I still had a nasty headache, but my stomach ache wasn't as bad as when I woke up. I was planning on making this more of an endurance run but it really didn't turn out that way, because I needed to be at work, and didn't want to make up too much time being there late. I decided I can do this so I sucked it up motivated myself and told my wife not to worry. My fuel belt holes money so I took 50 cents with me in case I needed to call my wife if I started crawling on the road, or bonking.

The first few miles were very tough with the headache, but I did get in some sort of consistency, but it wasn't my best 20 miler. I didn't feel totally fresh through the whole run. I chose a incredibility difficult course. I don't know why I like to put my body in a torture chamber especially when not feeling well. This course was very hilly, and challenging. I mixed in 5 marathon pace miles in this run, just to feel some speed and get done sooner( in a row 6:19, 6:27, 6:31, 6:29, 6:33, 6:43) . I got too hot in this run because the weather warmed up fast and I was in two layers. I'm sure I shredded a lot of pounds in this run. The course had a lot of rolling hills and what was frustrating is the last 9 miles of the course I had a horrible wind in my face. The amount of clothes I had on fatigued me a bit, but I wasn't trying to go all out either, or I would have overheated. I ran 20.46 miles at a 6:51 pace in 2:20. I feel really good about this because I wasn't in the best condition to do this run with a headache and stomach pains. I did have a lot left at the end, but I was a little sore after the run. I don't feel to bad now. I will definitely take an ice bath after my recovery run tomorrow. Well no more 20 milers until Boston, next week probably 16 miles.

Chart elevation

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/chart/get.do?xy.width=1000&xy.height=400&svgFormat=false&episodePk.pkValue=2303229&xy.domain=totalDistance&xy.ranges=elevation&xy.ranges=speed&xy.autoFit=true&xy.legendVisible=false

Easy recovery run 10.22 miles at  easy 7:34 pace. The day got hot pretty fast after starting the run. I had to shred my gloves.  Also ran with the wife and  kids at night.   My  10 year old has been running since she was  seven and  has run several 5k races, including last your in Ogden.  She has also ran a 4 mile race too.  I'm really proud of her and I keep telling her you can be good if you keep it up, because you started early.  I don't want to push her though and have her hate it, sometimes I feel like I do.

Sunday: I decided to take off and not PR my mileage for the week for a couple of reasons. 1. I did have time in the morning, because my preparation for church is more important. 2. We ate at Golden Corral after church, and I was so stuffed I couldn't move. 3. I had homework, actually I'm working ahead, because the week of Boston I have an Exam and to get ahead would benefit me.
4. I really did want to overtrain, I've ran 7 days twice during the training cycle and was fine, but really I was so stuffed after lunch I couldn't have ran anyway. Finished week at 82 miles.


Monday:
After my buffet addiction yesterday I ran hill repeats today. Below is the elevation chart. 8 x 300, and I sprinted down on the third and sixth hill repeat. I averaged between a 6:30 and 6:40 pace going up. After that I ran up a hill for a mile it was only 200ft and than downhill the rest of the run. I took it easy on this part of the run.. I'm really getting some good quality hill training these last few weeks and it makes me feel ready for Boston.
Total Miles 11.20 6:59 pace in 1:18

This begins the taper week, and I plan on running 60 miles, but not cut the intensity.

Schedule

Tuesday: Easy Run

Wednesday: 7 mile tempo run

Thursday: Easy Run

Friday:  16 miler (8 marathon pace miles)

Saturday: Easy Run

Tuesday:
Well today was suppose to be an easy run day, but it turned out that I go home sooner on my 10 mile run than I planned. After the 1st mile the weather changed into an ugly thunderstorm and just poured so I decide to pick up the pace and run about 6 marathon pace miles. Now it even gets more interesting at mile 8 heavy snow started coming down. I looked like a lost wet puppy when I got home. I'm surprised my wife recognized me.

Totals 10.4 miles 6:46 pace.

ohn : Thanks I know how important the rest will be for the freshness of my legs for those hills so I need to cut the mileage down.

Matt W: I really hope all the hills I've ran have built up my quads. I guess will see.

Wednesday
Well this will probably be my last tempo run for this training and wow the wind was bad and that's all I can say. It was a extremely tough run in the wind. Actually, it was a horrible run in the wind, my pace was all over the place. It never let up the whole run. Ee have a wind advisory alert along with snow for the whole day today according to the weather channel. The wind right now is blowing 35mph that's what it felt like this morning, but I don't think it was that strong. Anyway, it's done and I'm glad, because it was down right cold with that wind. I'm around 31 miles so far this week in three days so I've cut my running back a bit.

Miles
7:22
6:06 (Begin Tempo)
6:15
6:03
6:10
6:07
5:54 (only reason I got this time was because of a little bit of downhill)
6:03 (End of tempo)
6:43
6:51

Today was an easy pace run consisting of 10.1 miles at a 7:16 pace in 1:13. The wind was blowing at 16-20 mph for 8 of the miles than the last 2 miles the wind was pushing me. Very cold today I believe the temperature said it was 24 degrees. My hamstring was a little tight yesterday after my tempo run and is a little tight today, but I don't think its anything to worry about. I did do some hamstring stretches last night and this morning. It's do this once before after I've pushed a hard tempo run, but it went away.

Well I did my last really long run to prepare for Boston today. I'm definitely going to be easy on my body for Boston so I can be fresh in 17 days.

I decided to run 10 marathon pace miles in my 17 mile run today, and it went well. Even though I was tired, because I went t to bed late last night and didn't sleep very well. I almost decided to do the long run tomorrow, because it was out right cold (22 degrees), and it was suppose to be a lot warmer tomorrow. But I figured I would be okay. I woke up and ate half of a granola bar, and headed out the door. I usually eat more, but I had to be back at 9:15, because we were having family pictures done and it was 7am when I left. The family pictures where going to be done at our house so if I was a few minutes late it wouldn't be a problem.

I ran 4 warm-up miles and then went into the pace miles.

6:30, 6:23:, 6:30, 6:27, 6:30, 6:26, 6:28 6:33, 6:25, 6:22 and then 3 cool-down miles (6:49, 7:00, 7:11)

Totals 17 miles at a 6:43 pace in 1:54

It felt good. Two things though that went wrong: 1. I should have ate more before I left. 2. I took three Cliff bloks with me, but I dropped two and only had one for the run. I felt really tired after the run, and that was my fault for not getting the proper nutrition before and during the run, and also the night before.

I'll take an ice bath sometime today or tomorrow, and then sit in our hot tub.

Has far as training next week (still have a recovery run tomorrow) I will probably will do all easy runs, maybe mix in a 4 mile tempo run. Right now I'm sitting at 58 miles for the week, and I wanted to taper at 60 miles so I'll be a little over with tomorrows run. Maybe at 65 miles.  Do I do any short hard runs next week, because my assumption is bascially the trainings over and anything I do now will not benefit me on race day.

Next weeks miles I figured I would drop to 40 miles.  I really want to nail this race I hope I've done what I can.  I really have trained hard, and thank the Lord for allowing me to be dedicated.

Ran an easy run today after a marathon pace run yesterday.  I ran 7.7  at a 7:30 pace.  I'm not sure what I will do this week to beginning the two week taper for Boston. I know I want to cut the mileage to around 40 miles.  I think on Monday I will got to the track and do 6 x 800's, and from there I think I will do the following: (any advice would be appreciated).

Monday: 6 X 800's   (total 6 miles adding cool and warm-up miles)

Tuesday: easy run (6 miles)

Wedneday:  4 mile Tempo Run (Total 6 miles one warm-up and one cool-down)

Thursday:  Marathon pace run (6 miles)

Friday :    12 mile easy long run.

Saturday:  easy run ( 6 miles)

Monday:

I did 6 Yasso 800's. I used my Ironman watch to keep track of my splits and I messed up and only got two of the spilt times (I had my garmin on my other wrist so I have the overall mileage). It was raining and windy outside so I almost went to the gym, but I hate treadmills, especially trying to do speed work. The rain was coming down hard that between split 4 and 5 I only took one lap to get ready for the next 800 repeat. I was completely soaked when I was done, and very cold.

Split 1: 2:59 ( I took it easy, because I wanted to see if the wet track was going to cause a problem so I took a sign of caution.

Split 2: 2:34 (I just wanted to get these done because of the rain).

All the rest of the splits were lost.
Totals: 8  miles in 6:34 pace in 52:57

Here's my plans for the rest of the week. If you want to comment feel free. I would be interested on what others are doing.

Tuesday: easy run (6 miles. This will be hard because I'm not used to running less than 10 miles on any run.)

Wedneday: 4 mile Tempo Run (Total 6 miles one warm-up and one cool-down)

Thursday: Marathon pace run (6 miles)

Friday : 12 mile easy long run.

Saturday: easy run ( 6 miles)

Today 7 miles at a 7:29 pace. I took it real easy today. It was very

cold today 19 degrees with the wind blowing... I hate when the

temperature drops below 20 degrees. I basically ran 3.5 miles uphill

then 3.5 miles downhill still trying to match what it will feel like in

Boston. Although these hills are about three times as steep as

Boston's. Tomorrow my last tempo run for the training which will be 4 miles.

Today was a 4 mile Tempo run. I felt so good today... first time I've exactly got 8 hours of sleep in a long time. I ran my first tempo run on a flat course today, except mile 3 of the tempo run had a 6% grade hill for 200m's, and another smaller hill after that. I wanted to run up the hill during the tempo training to see how my legs would respond. I didn't run my normal tempo hilly route because I wanted to shorten the mileage this week, and that course takes me too many miles from my house. I felt really good through the whole run. Tomorrow I will plan on doing a 5 mile marathon pace run.

The temperature climate here is outright crazy, yesterday when I ran it was 19 degrees. Today when I ran at the same time it was
46 degrees. You really can't depend on a good streak of weather yet, except it's suppose to be nice the rest of the week.

Totals 7 miles 6:17 average pace, 4 mile tempo pace 5:48
7:04
5:51(Begin Tempo)
5:42
5:52
5:50(End Tempo)
6:44
6:52

I had a hard day yesterday well last night. I had to put my Dog to sleep at the Animal Clinic. We've had our German Shepherd for 12 years (My wife and I have been married for 13 years), and she was older than the kids. She was a wonderful companion. I stayed with her the whole time when the vet put her to sleep. My wife cried so hard, and I did everything I could to fight back the tears. Our dog kept losing weight, and we took her in three months ago and the vet told us to just feed her more. Well she still kept losing weight and we discovered she had liver disease and her kidney's were failing. The hardest part was telling my 10 and 7 year old girls.

Why I'm I bringing this up, because I really didn't care about my running session today, but I was scheduled to do a 5 mile marathon pace run, and this is a running blog. I ran 6.62 miles at a 6:25 pace in 42.33. Pace miles: 6:14, 6:16, 6:12, 6:14, 6:25. I was disappointed in myself this was suppose to be around 6:30, but it felt so easy, but my mind wasn't focused and I wasn't thinking about the pace. Maybe my pace should be 6:20, because of how easy this was, but I'm not changing it now, because I've already focused on 6:30. Basically you can chalk this run up has a failure, because I wasn't even close to the pace mark. I'm very disappointed in this run, but it felt so easy and I wasn't even pushing I was just at a relaxed pace. But it's a failure, because the purpose was to run at a marathon pace. The last mile I did focus more and I really felt I was going so slow. Anyway tomorrow a slow 12 mile long run.

Today I did 12.8 miles at a 7:11 pace in 1:32. I ran a course that had a lot of uphill and downhill, more so uphill. I dressed way to warm for this run, because the temperature really increased fast during my run. The effort was good, it was nice running back in the double digit miles which I haven't done all week. Tomorrow probably 4 easy miles with strides at the end.

Haven't really planned out next week, but probably will only do about 20 to 25 miles.

Today I did 6.8.miles.  Five easy miles and 1.8 miles in strides.  The last mile I ran 5.58, but it didn't even feel like it.  I ran it with little effort (100m's stride with 200m's jog in between, I thought I was jogging).  I would have done more, but we were at my daughters soccer tournament in Twin Falls Idaho and it was starting as I was doing my workout.  Can't miss the kids soccer game. 

 
We stayed the night in Twin Falls driving up Friday night so that we wouldn't have to leave Pocatello so early in the morning on Saturday to get to her tournament games that started at 9am.

 Not really sure what next weeks training will bring since its the last week till Boston.  I know Wednesday I'll do a pre-race dress run of 8 miles two at marathon pace.
 

 Monday (Today! WEEK AWAY)

I ran 6.2 miles at a 6:59 pace in 43.32. This was just an easy run. It was cold today at 36 degrees and the wind was blowing at 20 mph right at me for the first 4 miles. I didn't put much effort into this run. I was thinking that next Monday I will be doing it for real.

Tomorrow I will do a 2 mile tempo in my 6 mile run. I might has well get a little bit of tempo work in.

I wore my marathon shoes to get more miles on them, I like to at least have over 40 miles on them for the race, because they feel more flexible.

There comes a point, "from what I've heard from others", in your training where you know how you feel. Well today was a turning point in my training that really made me believe it was a success.

First off the weather was awful. We had a wind advisory today on the weather channel and it was true to form. When I started running it was 19 degrees with a 20mph wind gust blowing against me. What! spring where's it at around here. Today I wanted to do a 6 mile run with a mini tempo of two miles. With little effort I ran the two miles in 6:11 and I was being conservative... it was too easy. I feel really good right now and know that was an accomplishment in my training. Okay it was only two miles, and I know that's not much, but before this training a 6:11 pace for 1 mile would have been a big effort. I know I've improved on something for this to happen, and I know that my marathon pace has improved too. But we still have a race and that's where the training needs to show the improvement.

I know that I plan on taking the first few miles slow in Boston giving up sometime. But I know this will help on the hills, I've learned this from my other hilly marathon's and it does work if you can keep yourself from bursting out. I need to find that Boston pace calculator site, because I believe I will follow that.

My overall totals today were 6.3 miles at a 6:42 pace, little faster on the cool down miles but I wasn't real focused after I accomplished the tempo miles.

Ran 7.7 miles, 6:56 pace in 53:27. Three miles at marathon pace 6:28, 6:20,6:26. Very cold morning at 22 degrees. I was frozen when I was done because of the higher elevation that I run today.

The marathon pace miles were done with little effort, but that should be the case because I haven't ran many miles this week because of the tapering.

4.6 miles at a 7:34 (tapering)

2.64 at a 8:30 pace.  (tapering)

I ran the Boston Freedom run 5k.  Didn't bring my garmin it was just for fun and a warm-up for the real thing tomorrow.

Boston Marathon

The race was fun and I enjoyed every minute of the experience.  I felt I could have run a lot faster but I played it conservative, because of what the weather was suppose to be like.  But I really don't contribute the weather to my time it was my own fault.  Mile 9 I had to brown code in the porter potty and that cost me two minutes.  This has never happened and I can only contribute this to the change in the time of eating for a run.  Then I lost a couple minutes in the beginning because of the bunched runners where I couldn't weave in and out of traffic.  I was really conservative before the hills, because I wanted to make sure the wind would not affect my approach up the hills.  But I felt I was too conservative.  The hills were easy... Heartbreak Hill was a piece of cake.   The last five miles of the race were the fastest miles in the race I felt I could have kept going and wasn't sore after the race so that tells me I was lazy and didn't push hard enough.  Even though I did PR I'm disappointed.  Like I said the weather wasn't a factor it was my own fault.  Robert Cherulyot was 7 minutes slower this year than when he won it last year.  This was also the case with the women's winner.  I really didn't think though the weather was a factor other than the heavy wind gusts at times would knock you off your pace (36mph).

One probelm I had is I listened to other runners that have ran Boston before giving me advice that I would never get under 3 hours in this weather and wouldn't PR in these conditions (this was before the race).  Instead I should have trusted my own training and abilities.  But I do know now that whatever one I run next I will PR and not be conservative.  Maybe Ogden or Deseret News marathon next.  I think I'm capable in the future of getting under a 2:50.

I couldn't sleep last night because I was so mad at myself being so conservative in the race.  My strategy ran through my mind over and over again.  Even though my goal was to be under 3  hours I guess why I'm so disappointed is I felt too fresh in the end and should have pushed harder.  But it does make me hungry to run another  marathon soon to see what I can really do and just go for it.

I did a 4.2 mile recovery run at a 8:13 pace from the marathon yesterday.  It felt good really no soreness.  That's the result of being lazy in the marathon and not pushing hard enough. 

 I did accomplish my first goal of being under 3 hours in a marathon.  But it really bothers me that the time could have been much lower without the potty break, slow couple miles, and not being aggressive enough.  I know in the back of my mind that I wasn't aggressive enough because I didn't really know the course so I think that does bring on a semse of being careful.  But if I run it next year I know what I'm capable of.

Now to achieve the next goal to be under 2:50.

No Running.  Enjoying day with the family.

No Running.  I didn't want to start running too soon so that the muscles heal.

I ran 7 miles today at a 7:13 pace.  I'm not sore from the Boston Marathon and feel good so tomorrow I will run 10 miles.  It's time now to focus on the Ogden Marathon and not be conservative, but be aggressive and prove that Boston so have been like this. 

Boston was too easy of a run for me to come away feeling so good.  I wanted to be so sore, because then I know I really worked. 

I ran 12.1 miles today. I was going to only run 8 miles today, but my friend and sister-in-law  where driving up to the Pocatello Marathon course and asked if I wanted to go too, definitely  YES!  The first 16 miles is downhill and that would be excellent training for the Ogden Marathon if I get a chance to go.  My friends are training for the Ogden Half Marathon.  I pushed the pace a bit and ran the 12 miles in a 6:51 pace.   This is faster than I was going to go since I ran the Boston Marathon on Monday, but everything was okay.   I really want to run Ogden I'm so hungry to better my time from Boston that it's killing me inside.

Today I ran 10 easy miles at a 7:05 pace. I ran a course that had a lot of uphill and downhill. Those of you that are from Utah might be familiar with Red Hill around the ISU campus in Pocatello. That was part of the course I ran. This weekend I'm running a 10k race which I haven't done forever it seems. It's sponsored by the ISU Wellness Center, and they don't keep track of your time. I would assume it's not an official marked course. I know that part of the course goes around Red Hill.

I'm feeling good after last Monday's marathon. I do have a little soreness around the hip after Saturday's run, but nothing that's bad. Today I ran in a pouring rain like Boston again.

Today I ran 10.1 miles at a 6:49 pace, the last mile I ran at a 6:14 I wanted to see how I felt running faster after the Boston marathon. Tomorrow I will do a tempo run and really see how I feel.

Today I did 9 x 400 with a 200 jog in-between. I would get six of the splits on my watch

1.19, 1.24, 1.27, 1.26, 1.27,1.26.

Then I did a two mile tempo run 5:50 and 5:53. Then three miles after that 6:19, 6:22, 6:39.

I tried out my new Mizuno Idaten shoes that weight about 7.1oz very light and I felt good in them.

Total miles and average for the whole run according to the Garmin 9.2 miles at a 6:14 pace in 57:33. I felt that I could have kept going at a good pace.

12.2 miles today. I ran the 10k race course that I will run on Saturday as part of the 12 miles. It's a very hilly course, but it will be fun. I ran a few miles somewhat faster miles, mile 4: 6:40, mile 5: 6:19, mile 6: 6:25, mile 8: 6:32, mile 9: 6:00, mile 10: 6:39.

The run felt good, my legs were tired at the end because this was very hilly course, and I've been only getting about 5 hours of sleep the last three nights. I'm trying to finish up my Web Management design for my online college class. Running Boston has put me on a tight schedule where I have to stay up late to complete this project. I'm not sure how I'm going to run the race Saturday. I know I could run it really well if I decide to push it, which might be good to do before the Ogden Marathon.. I'll just have fun, isn't that what running is about.

Today I ran 10.1 miles at a easy slow pace of 7:10. I've ran hard the last couple days somewhat, so I took it easier today. I got about 7 hours of sleep last night, but I was still tired waking up.

Tomorrow 10k race, rush my daughter to her two soccer games 55 miles away (11am and 3pm are her games).  

I haven't signed up for the Ogden marathon yet, because I don't know yet if I have to work that weekend. It's a 50/50 chance ... but I'm pretty sure I will be able to attend.  I hope I'm ready to run a 2:50 I just need to be aggressive.  If I hit the wall been aggressive at least I know I gave it a shot and not wonder.  I know in Boston I could have been under 2:50, because of the way I felt.

Ran this evening 4.6 miles in the high 6 minute mile pace.  (Easy run felt good)

The ISU Wellness Center race which is considered an unofficial 10k race took place today, and it wasn't much of a challenge. The course is marked correctly, but it's unofficial because they don't keep the time you have to yourself. My Garmin was my time clock. I won the race with a time of 36:20. There really was no one to push me so I didn't really push the uphills hard. There was one runner with me till mile two, and I could tell he pushed the first mile to hard. Because I tried talking to him and he was breathing real hard so I knew it was a matter of time I would be way out in front. But I didn't think it would happen in the third mile that I would be way alone. But I did push the downhill in the last mile treating it as a hill repeat. I think I might have been able to shave a minute off this time if I pushed harder, but I'll never know.

Afterwards I ate a powerbar and I was off to Idaho falls to take my daughter to her soccer games (11 years old). She ran the 5k race at 27:10 and finished first in her age. My 7 year old did the 5k walk and did very well. I've also got her running, but I would rather run with her at her age in a race like this. My wife ran the 5k race too with a major headache and not feeling very good so she slowed way down, and she would kill me if I posted her time.

Forgot 2.8 mile run tonight.

No running today.   I feel that 65 miles for last week wasn't enough.  I really felt too fresh and should have done at least 80 miles.

Today I ran 12.2 miles  at a 6:59 pace in the morning, and then 1.4 on the treadmill on my lunch hour.. I was extremely tired because I was woke up at 2am.  Our file system on our Mail Server was locked up, because an error in a snapshot backup which caused our University Mail Server to go down. Fixed the problem and got back to bed by 3am and woke up at 6am to run. 

Have you ever ran and your mind is just tired, but your legs know what to do.  That was my situation this morning.  I really didn't care what pace I ran at I knew I just had to run.  I figured an aerobic run would do good.  I was surprise after two miles my body started to function and get into the run.  The first two miles are uphill in the route I chose this morning, going up Pocatello creek and then turning up Satterfield Drive.  

I got bad news!  I can't run the Ogden Marathon because our system conversion date for May 19th can't be changed.   I'm extremely down, I was excited and ready to be aggressive and push myself.  Also it would have been a good chance to meet some of you who are running it.   I 'm really upset and down.  I guess I will have to wait for the Des. News marathon.  One time a year we have to do a system conversion and it falls on the day that I would want to run a marathon.  I was even thinking of stupid thoughts like I could run the marathon drive back to Pocatello and get there by noon to do the conversion, but it's a team effort and the conversion is scheduled at 9am on Saturday, but that's how bad I wanted to ran and to pace with others (sorry Ted).  It's really a big blow, I ran the Ogden marathon last year and really wanted to improve on my time, because I've doubled my training this year compared to last year.

 Oh well enough feeling sorry for myself, GOD is good all the time.

Today I wasn't real motivated to get out and run for a few reasons.

One: I stayed up after midnight for the third straight night and finish my final web project for my College course (I can got to bed early tonight!!!!!!!).

Two: My mind my body was tired from the late nights and a lot of work put in for this conversion at work.

Three: I can't remember when I've been so depressed that I can't run the Ogden Marathon, it's put me in a sad,"feel sorry for myself" mood. I think this is the biggest reason of all that I was unmotivated.

But I quickly got over my immature attitude and headed out the door. Even though I was tired and lacked energy, I decided to stick to my training and do 6 yasso 800's but instead of jogging 800m's between each one I experimented and only did 400m's between each one. I wanted to see what I could do with a tired body and make it tough, because this what's going to make a difference in a marathon

The splits are not impressive, but I guess not bad for a tired body.

1. 2:54

2. 3:01

3. 2:56

4. 2:58

5. 2:55

6. 2:54

Then I did some running afterwards, and ran a few marathon pace miles. I will have to get my Garmin to get the rest of the statistics for the run. I used my stopwatch for the track splits and my Garmin for the overall run. Total 10.01 miles.

I also ran and walk 2 miles with my wife, dog and the kids.  Just kind of a fun run.

Today was my easy run day after the track work yesterday. I wanted to run a little longer than I usually do so I ran 13.1 miles at a 7:11 pace in 1:34 on mostly a flat course. The winds kicked up to 16mph, but didn't seem to affect me any (not after experiencing 30 mph winds in Boston). I was extremely hot at 50 degrees. I'm going to break out the tank tops now.

I exactly got a full 8 hours of sleep last night and went to bed at 9:50, because I was so tired and weak yesterday. I'm going to do the same thing tonight, because I think my body is starving for rest which I haven't allowed to happen, because of the busy schedule.

My plan for this week is to probably run around 80 miles. But I don't know. There's actually a marathon I can run on June 3rd but it's not a Boston Qualifier this year because they changed  the course somewhat this year. http://www.dammarathon.com/pdf/courseelevationmap.pdf It was a Boston Qualifier last year, but because of the change in the course it takes a year to get re-certified. Or I could run the Des News Marathon on July 24th which is a certified course. It don't really matter if it's certified or not, but if I run a better time than what I did at Boston it would be nice to use that time to register for Boston next year.

I don't know what I'm going to do.

Today I ran twice trying a little experiment with running. I ran two tempo runs in one day.
Not really pushing them as hard as I could because I knew I would run twice.

First run I ran 11.1 miles at a overall pace of 6:25 in 1:11:23. This was the worst weather and hardest stretch I've ever had to run for two miles. The winds were up to 50 mph and it was pouring rain. Good think I had my waterproof North Face jacket on that I bought at the last minute in Boston for that marathon. I felt for two miles that I was jogging rather than running and the wind several times knocked me clear off the road. I've never experienced anything like this before. This is the first time I wanted to quit the run and go home. Where are Dorothy's Wizard of OZ slippers when you need them.


7:06 (warmup mile)
6:36 (warmup mile)

Tempo miles
6:00
6:02
6:04
Okay here is where it starts to get ugly 6:18
6:51
6:23
5:57 (finally was away from the wind)
6:09
7:05 (cool down)

This afternoon I ran 7:40 at a 6:36 pace in 48:34. The wind was still there at noon but not as bad as this morning. I felt pretty fresh in this run considering it was three and a half hours later.
6:54
6:31
6:14
6:14
6:11
6:33
6:53

Totals 18.5 miles

Tomorrow I will do the same thing (maybe depending on the weather) but with easy runs.

Guys I need some advice I'm thinking about running the June 9th Teton Dam Marathon http://www.dammarathon.com/pdf/courseelevationmap.pdf or July 24 Des News. marathon. I feel pretty fit to run on June 9th, but the Des News was a fun one last year too. Or should I just run both?

Two easy/recovery runs today.

 AM:   11.52 miles  done in the city at a 7:39 pace.  Really an uneventful run. I ran up and down blocks near my house.

 Lunch Hour:  done in the city again and around Bartz field.  I did a lot of hills on this run.

10.10 miles  at a 7:32.

 

I got up at 5:30am to run today what was suppose to be a marathon pace run, but I ran faster because we had to be in soccer tournaments in Idaho Falls by 7am.

 6:20, 6:03, 6:05, 6:03,6:04, and 6:15.

Ran with the dog later for three miles  (8:25 pace)

Three mile marathon pace with warm-up  6:28, 6:24, and 6:24.  We had to be at soccer tournaments again in Idaho Falls, and I got up late so I didn't run very long. 

Later went to Church (If I did 9 more miles today I would hit a 100 miles for the week.  My week totals start on a Monday.
 

Monday
Ran two runs today. This morning 11.3 miles at a 7:09 pace in 1:20. This run I did my standard hill course. Although, I ran a lot more rolling hills on this run by changing my route today.

Lunch Hour: I ran for 41 minutes didn't have my garmin, but it was probably 5.5 miles. I ran around our College campus just enjoying the nice weather.


Total for the day 16.8 miles

Today I ran with the dog for one mile to warm-up.  The dog (pure breed Golden Retriever) set a new PR at 7:50 for the mile.  I let him open it up a little.  Before I've always held him back just so he learns control.

 Then I ran to the track and did 11 x 400's with a 200 jog in-between.  My Ironmen watch only holds eight splits so it overwrote the first three.  I also had my Garmin on to keep track of the mileage and overall pace.  I know the first one was  78, then the fourth split on 100,84,88,89,86,86,88,87.  I know these are not that great, and I need to try to push harder. I was very tired still from the weekend and not getting enough sleep again, but that's no excuse. Then I went into a three mile tempo run 6:17 and 6:15.  I did these two miles on the track, and because I hate the track so much I really wasn't focusing on running any harder, so the last mile I went off the track and ran to my house and around the block (I live only one block from the track).  This last tempo mile I did in 6:06. 

 
This type of running session has really helped me I think develop more stamina to get more out of your body and push for that extra speed.  I would have never thought you would ever try a tempo run after speed work.  Ted and Sasha gave me the idea, thanks guys.

I really feel I have a long way to go to get where I want to be.  I really need to start to run some small races (5k, 10k, 20k) unfortunately there's not a lot around Idaho.

 Totals 11.2 miles at a overall 6:38 pace  1.14 time for the total workout.

This morning I  ran 11.01 at a 7:12 pace.  Three miles of it with my dog who set a pr at 7:40 pace, of course I've been holding him back.  I'm sure he could do 4 minute miles if I let him go.  Pretty much this run was around the city, and it took me about 4 miles to really get into this run.  I did a couple fartlek's in the middle of the run just to see if that would keep me interested during this easy run day.

 Lunch Hour:

I ran 4 miles on my lunch hour at marathon pace, exactly a lot slower but will call it near marathon pace (6:37).  Did this around the city and it was extremely hot.  I definitely like the morning runs versus the afternoon heat.  I ran by a lot of construction, we are finally getting a Chili's and Texas Roundhouse restaurant here.  The run was with little effort and I felt really relaxed.
 

Five mile tempo run was on the schedule today.  I ran the first three miles with the dog, which is a loop three times around my block. Then my wife has been coming out and grabbing the leash so I can start on the tempo portion of the run, or whatever run I'm doing that day after my warmup.  When she seen me coming after the third loop she informed my that I got a call from work that our remote access was down (Cisco acs what a headache).  I went in the house and brought that back up in 5 minutes and then started immediately into the tempo portion.  That really wasn't so easy to do after stopping and starting. But my tempo times were for 5 miles  6:07, 5:59, 6:02, 5:47 and 5:53, then I wanted to slow down just a bit and not do a cool down mile yet so I ran a  6:19 the next mile.  Totals 10.3 miles for the day.  I feel I'm getting faster on the tempo runs, but sometimes it feels like an all out effort.  I hope some day that a 5:50 pace feels totally comfortable.

Today I was going to do a 20 miler, but I didn't get much sleep last night. There were three cop cars across the street from are house and from 1am to 4am they were making a lot of noise, shining their huge spotlight, and racing up and down the street. We didn't know what was going on. When I did get back to see I slept in too long to prepare for the 20 miler, and would have been way late for work. I decided to do 11 miles and mix in near marathon pace miles (6:33, 6:35, 6:34, 6:35, 6:38, 6:31) . I did a loop around a portion of the city and the wind was blowing very hard which made the effort harder than I wanted. Especially since I'll run a 20 miler tomorrow.

Totals 11.6 miles at a 6:43 pace in 1:18.
PM 4.5 miles at a 6:51 pace.  I run by the ISU Track where the ISU track was having meets with other colleges such as University of Oregon.  I ran by a few of them as they were warming up around the college.  I wanted to run at a slower pace, but I had to hurry a bit because my daughter had a tournament soccer game, which I'm very proud of her because she scored the winning goal with just minutes left in the game.  I ran right from work, and around the college back to my work.

20 miles this morning on an up and downhill course. The wind was awful at about 20 to 30 mph and made the run tough. I did run some marathon pace miles, and the overall average for the whole run was 6:47 pace. But the wind really had its way with me on this run.

Two hours later I run with the Dog for hree miles. 23 miles for the day.

8pm tonight.

Well this day even gets more interesting I just ran another 1.6 miles with the dog at a 7'43 pace. My cousin bought a Garmin 301and she is in a panic, because she and my other cousin are going to run the Ogden half marathon and she came to my house saying her Garmin skipped from mile 4 to mile 16. The only thing that I noticed different from my wife's and hers was the auto trigger wasn't set. I set that to "on" and went out for a run, but I didn't noticed a problem with it. She said it started acting up at mile 4 and then skipped and displayed "distance" 16 miles. It has the latest software/firmware upgraded on it. Has anyone else experienced this problem? She's not quite experienced enough yet to know what pace she's running at without the device. I've helped her train and she's shooting for a 1:50 time.

 Okay after Iooking at my blog and totaling my miles I was only 2.6 away from hitting 100 miles.  I've never hit a 100 miles and it was one of my future goals to do so in one week (now you know where I'm going with this.  I went back out and later ran 3.5 easy miles to get over the 100 mark for the week.  Now normally I don't care about bolstering my miles, but I was so close why not.

Three easy miles eventful run.

Monday
Today I run 8.3 miles in the morning at a 6:58 pace in 58:15 minutes on my standard Satterfield hilly course. I couldn't run as long, because I had to take my daughter to the dentist. I wanted to end the last four miles on the run at a faster pace and I achieved that (6:31, 6:13, 6:23, 6:40).

Lunch Hour:
Ran 2.3 miles on my lunch hour on the treadmill at the gym. This was just a warm-up so that I could do some strength training. The only excitement was watching ESPN while I was running. Can you guys believe the news about Brett Farve? He does deserve a better receiving group, and getting Moss would have really helped their changes this year. But you shouldn't whine about it and asked to be traded... if that's true.

Total miles today 10.6

Today I decided to do hill repeats since the Teton Dam Marathon has a section that has a gradual uphill for a few miles. I did 9 x 400's and sprinting down the hill every third one. The first few were tough and my legs felt a little tight (time for an ice bath). After that I started running home and half way through the mile I thought I will make this a two mile tempo run

first mile 5:53 (this could have been a 5:30 mile if I didn't decide halfway in the mile to make it a tempo mile. The next mile I had problems I had to stop at traffic for about 40 seconds so I only ran a 6:14, then I almost got it by a car pulling out a side street (great way to end the run). I followed that up with some cool down miles.

Totals 12.02 miles at a average pace 6:47 in 1:21.

Lunch

Today I suppose to mow my grandpa's lawn on my lunch hour so I decided to run there and back from work. One way is only 1.5 miles. I took it easy with splits of 7::14, 6:52, and 6:40.

 Tonight:

My wife wanted to run tonight and I decided to run with her.  We dropped my daughter off at soccer practice and decided to run home which is 2.7 miles.  I ran at her pace which is around 12 minute miles. She ran 3 miles yesterday so it was cool that she did back to back days.  It was kind of nice to run with somebody.  Pretty much every mile I run is by myself so it was nice tonight. 

Easy run day:

11.21 miles at a 7:18 pace in 1:21.  I ran the first 3 miles with our dog, and then handed the leash to my wife and kept going.  Very eventful run.  I didn't get run over or anything like yesterday.  I'll only run once today, because I want to be fresh for the tempo run tomorrow.  My calf's are a little tight so tonight if I get a chance I will foam roll my calf's.

Tempo run today of 6 miles. I did a couple things wrong with attempting this tempo run. 1. I didn't get enough sleep last night. I was up working on programs for our system conversion on Saturday past midnight. 2. I only did one warm-up mile when I was already tired and should of warmed up longer. 3. (I know I said only two but I thought of another one while typing) I did my run on my Asics DS trainers 12 that already have 400 miles on them and I could feel it in my feet today.

Tempo miles

5:59
6:03
6:12 (just felt fatigue and tired... basically being lazy no excuse)
5:47
5:54
6:37 (stopped tempo)
5:49 (decided I would do another tempo mile)

The last mile was the easiest, but most of the run I felt tired. Tomorrow recovery run Saturday 18 miles with some tempo and marathon pace miles mixed in. I might try this run on my Mizuno Idaten shoes that are 7oz, their racing flats.

Simple easy/recovery run of  10.4 miles at a 7:21 pace in 1:16.  This is my 19th day running in a row, but that streak will end this Sunday.  Three of  the miles I ran with the dog at about a 7:48 pace, he's starting to do really good to not jump out in front.  At the end of the run I did 3 x 100 strides.

 Good luck for all of you that are running the Ogden Marathon/Half-Marathon.  I know you all will do well, and I wish I could really be there.
 

Ran 20 miles today, and treated part of it like I was running the Ogden marathon since I couldn't run it today because of work.

Consecutive marathon pace miles were 6:20, 6:23, 6:25, 6:19, 6:17, 6:18, 6:20, 6:16, 6:20, 6:12, 6:04, and 6:14 (avg. 6:17). I also ran a 6:39 for the next mile, but is was suppose to be a cool-down mile but it really isn't because of the pace time. I don't know how to classify it. I should have just ran another MP mile. The threshold mile felt pretty easy and comfortable. The course was flat with rolling hills.

I had a rough morning before the run. I woke up at 1am and vomited my Chinese dinner, but I got up at 5am thinking I can still do this even though I felt weak and tired. I ate a bagel and half a powerbar and headed out the door. I was very optimistic how I would perform, but the run went well.

I felt like I could hold this pace for 26 miles, but training doesn't count you have to do it in a real race situation. I really felt I could have performed well in Ogden if I was there, but I probably wouldn't have been as fresh as I could have been because of the high mileage.

Overall average for the 20 miles was 6:33 in 2:11:40

After working about 26 hours in two days for our system conversion I didn't want to get up this morning.  But my legs felt real fresh, because I took yesterday off.  I decided to mix in some marathon pace mile in my run, or lower than marathon pace miles: 6:13, 6:13, 6:02, 6:12 and 6:22.  I only did 8.6 miles today because I needed to get to work earlier.  I felt really good, no soreness after my 20 miler on Saturday.

Totals: 8.6 miles at a 6:36 pace in 57 minutes.

 I'm shooting for June 9th to run the Teton Marathon, so this week I'll probably hit around 80 miles .

I'll do yasso 800s'm tomorrow and maybe mix a couple tempo miles after afterward.

Wednesday: an easy  run:  I'll probably run a course that has a lot of up and down hills.

Thursday:  Tempo run (not sure yet how many miles)

Friday:  Easy run (at least 10 miles)

Saturday: 18 miles and mix in some marathon pace miles.  I'm hoping to do this run on the Pocatello Marathon course.

Today I did 5 x 800's in a strong wind along with a few temop/mp miles afterwards at the track.

Again my 800's are not very good  2:54, 2:50, 2:54, 248, and I messed up on the last one.

Then I ran another 5:50 6:05 and 6:24 tempo/p miles.  I totaled 11.4 miles at an average pace 6:31 in 1:14.  I didn't run anymore today, because I didn't take a lunch and I didn't get home until late.  I worked over 12 hours today on putting little fires out from our system conversion.  I so looking forward to this 3 day weekend.

Ran an easy run today... 12.1 miles at a 7:07 pace in 1:26. Ran the first 3.5 with the dog at a 7:17 pace. My golden retriever is getting very easy to run with, and he does a good job of not allow anything to interfere with the run. I ran up Satterfield hill which is a 500ft climb and then back down the other side to get practice on the downhill. I did mix in 3 MP miles in this run.

I've started experimenting with my stride. I noticed if I take shorter step per minute my pace is faster because of the rapid return and pushing off more. I also experimented with this yesterday in my speedwork. I don't want to make changes in my stride right now, but has anyone else experimented with this.

I haven't registered for the Teton Dam marathon yet, but I will run a 18 miler this weekend to get that last long run in. I'm not sure how I'm going to approach this training run yet. Last week I did 12 MP on my 20 miler.

Lunch hour  4.1 miles at a 6:50 pace. 

What a rough night last night... my youngest daughter we found out has strip throat, my wife and son were vomiting all night, and to top it off I had the worst headache last night and still had it this morning. I wasn't sick I just think it's all the hours I've been putting in at work and not getting rest.

My oldest daughter was at an end of the year soccer party, and she was fine.

I wanted to run a 5 mile tempo run today and I thought with a headache I would be alright. The first mile wasn't to bad 5:59. The second mile seemed to be a lot more effort 5:50. The third mile I turned into a 25 mph wind and I couldn't hold the pace in the 5's 6:10, previous to this point the wind was pushing from the side, and it kept pushing me off the road. The fourth mile I turned with the wind at my side, but still the effort was hard 5:52. The fifth mile the effort again felt hard and not easy 5:49. Then I did a couple MP miles after that 6:19, 6:13.

I really wish running in the high five minute miles would get easier, but it still seems tough at this point, and I know it takes time and dedicated training. My headache is still there and I want to run a 18 miler Friday rather than Saturday. But maybe after a hard tempo run it might not be a good idea.

Faith is something you can't see but you must believe in and trust that God is with you.  My faith has really been tested this week.  First off on Monday my Grandma was admitted into the hospital, because her right leg/hip has a spur that is being touched by a nerve.  This was caused because her back alignment is out of place.  Also her left leg was fractured about a month ago, and it's healing up good.  But she was in so much pain Monday that I had to help my Grandpa admit her in the Hospital right in the middle of all faculty/staff at work coming online on our new system.  If you can't rely on God in these situations than there is nothing else that matters.

They moved her over to physical therapy yesterday to see if that will help, if not than the alternative is to have surgery to remove the spur.  Which isn't good because she's 85 years old.   Well last night she was trying to get out of bed, and the nurse didn't put the bed rail up so she fell out and completely broke her wrist.  This happened at 1am I went up and stayed till 5am.  They had to reset her wrist and cast her arm so this might delay the physical therapy.  I owe a lot to my Grandma because she paid for my first year of college, when I was trying to save enough money to go.  She didn't want me to wait to long to go because she was afraid I'd change my mind.  She's always been a hard worker and an inspiration to me, and I would do anything for her.

Run 5 miles with the dog at an easy 8 minute mile pace then ran three miles at MP pace. I ran around the city very uneventful run.  I did do 5 x 100 strides at the end of the run.

Usually I don't run on Sunday, but Monday I wanted to take the wife and the kids on our ATV's  so before church I ran 10.28 miles at a 6:44 overall pace.  The first 4 miles I ran with the dog then

I did some tempo miles and marathon pace miles.  I really wasn't trying to go for to much intensity today (6;25, 5:57, 5:59, 6:06, 6:03, and 6:15). Very hot for 8am in the morning.
 

I ran 2 miles with the dog.  Today was my day off.

Today was one of those days where I didn't have a planned idea what I was going to run. I didn't really want to run too slow so I ran 7 MP miles one threshold mile.

Total 9.3 miles at a 6:36 pace overall.

Since this is a taper week I probably will run around 50 miles. Thursday I'm thinking about either doing 4 x 1600 mile repeats or 8 x 400's with a 200 jog. What do you guys think?

My focus has been more on my grandma in the hospital right now than on the running. I've seen her every day, and she's starting her physical therapy treatments today. I really hope with her age she can rebound. But I will stay focused and be okay.

Starting last night I started getting a sore throat by morning it move in the state of a terrible sore throat. I ran 8miles I think at a 7:16 . The first 4 miles I ran with the dog which will always be slower, but this was an easy run for the taper week. I hope my sore throat comes with nothing else.

Update:

I've started to caught some type of bug.  Along with a sore throat I've now developed a stuffy nose.  This is not good 9 days before a marathon.  I haven't registered yet.

Well this morning I woke up with I believe a cold.  I was little warm, had a sore throat, and a nice full stuffy nose. Going to the track was out of the question because my body also felt weak.  What a time to develop a cold almost a week before the marathon.    I did run though and I probably could have gone to the track.  Even though my head felt like it wasn't even in the run but asleep, my body seemed to know what to do.  

I ran the first three warmup miles with the dog  7:31,7:15,:7:07.  Then dropped the dog off back home,and right in the middle of the fourth mile I thought I would do 3 mp miles. First mile (since I started so late in this mile)  was 6:36.  Then I decided to pick it up a bit 6:08.  Well might as well pick it up some more 5:50.  Then in the middle of the last cool-down mile I changed my mind and wanted to finish with a MP mile 6:29.   I did 7 miles overall, and I still feel hot, tired and weak, but I will get some rest tonight and see how I feel tomorrow. 

Last night I had a 101 fever and stuffy nose and cough.  I've been taking everything possible to get better before next week.  I woke up this morning not feeling great, but I went out and ran 5 miles anyway.  I ran sort of a 4 mile ladder run and then a cool-down mile.   (6:36,6:28,6:04, and 6:01).  Hopefully I can get over this sickness.  Tomorrow depending on how I feel I was going to do a 12 mile run  and more of a downhill course.
 

Ran my final long run before next weeks marathon.  13.02 in 6:29 in 1:24.  The first few miles were down  hill, and I ran a little faster than I was planning on, but that's okay, good confidence builder. I ran a 5 mile tempo in the middle of the long run (6:01, 5:58, 6:11, 6:07, and 6:10).  I also did a 500ft hill that was over a 1 mile in this run.. I was trying to get a combination of down  and up hill.  The run felt good with little effort.  Now it's time to reserve a Hotel in Rexburg.

Thanks Ted for your previous comments.  I feel ready. 

Today was my wedding anniversary. I've been married for 13 years. I took my wife to a movie and to Red Lobster and just enjoyed the day with her. I ate like a horse at Red Lobster and probably gained three pounds.

Then my wife and I went for a 2 mile walk alone. It was great.

Today run was just a slow run with a couple of faster miles but right above Marathon pace.  I felt kind of weak and tired today.  Probably because of all the food I ate yesterday at Red Lobster.  I ran the first 3.5 miles with the dog.  He was testing my patience today by trying to chase after birds. 

 Total 6.3 mile at a 7:05 47 minutes.  I did 4 x 100 strides towards the end of the run.  The morning was beautiful and the temperature was great at 48 degrees.  If I wasn't taping I would have ran longer.

 

I ran 7.1 miles today with 3 being MP miles.  I feel a little better today.  My sore throat and fever have finally left.  Now I just need to get rid of this coughing and stuffy nose.  Today I have a doctor's appointment, because I've had this lump on my shoulder blade that as doubled in size the last two weeks. I first thought it was a pimple but I'm not sure, it been hurting when I turn my neck and move my shoulder.  It's also starting to bother me when I run.  I'm hoping it's like an in-grow pimple.  I never mentioned it because I thought it would go away, but now it's spread a little and is hard around the outside.  But I have faith in God and his healing power.

Anyway back to running,  for Teton I'm just shooting for a personal best, the only competition is trying to beat my conservative mind and get  under or  get around 2:5?.
 

My doctor's appointment yesterday to check the lump/bump on my shoulder went well. It's an infection, but he didn't want to cut it open because of the size and swelling so the doctor put me on an antibiotic for 10 days to cut the swelling down. Either this will remove the infection completely, or reduce the infection. Then the doctor can proceed and cut it out and drain the infection and bandage it up. The infection was caused from an in-grow pimple/zit (those wonderful bumps we didn't like as teenagers), and he said it still might grow it's ugly head.

The first thing he told me and he tells all his patients, "to relief their minds", that it's not cancer, nor did I think it was either. I thought it was something simple which it is, but it's sure irritating my neck, shoulder and hurts when I run. It needs to go away quick.

Thank you for your prayers. This site is great for learning about other running experiences and helpful advice, but you can also feel the strong spiritual aspect behind this site.

Okay running today I had to run on the tortured treadmill because we were experiencing thundershowers when I woke up. I mean it was pouring and blowing hard. I really hate treadmill running. I would rather sit through a boring work section meeting all day than run on a treadmill. But I ran 5.3 miles, and a couple of minutes at a 5:30 pace not too much because of the taper.

I need to at least get in 30 miles this week before the marathon. It really bothers me not being able to run as much with a taper, almost depressing.

One benefit about taking these antibiotics is they should help my cold.  Right now my breathing feels like about 65% when I run because of the sinus and stuffy nose.  I want to go in on Saturday at a 100%.

Today I ran 4.2 easy miles in a light rain.  It's rained continuously for the last 30 hours now.  The temperature was 38 degrees when I started running which I loved.  I'm definitely a cool weather runner.  I don't like the heat which I'm sure most of you don't.  Running performances are definitely better in cooler temperatures.

I'm still not over this cold and stuffy nose I think I'm just going to have to live with it and do the best I can for Saturday.  I plan on driving up to Rexburg around noon tomorrow from work.  It's only 70 miles from Pocatello, and I'm staying at Days Inn.  Then I'll find a place for dinner and just relax for the rest of the night.  I'm going alone, because my wife Saturday is working at our church booth at the park for family fun day selling hamburgers and hotdogs etc.  This is a fun raiser to help build our new church.  Then my oldest daughter is running the 5k  Pocatello Heart Beat and Sole city race on Saturday.  My youngest just wants to walk the 5k race with my mom.  I actually won the 10k portion of this race last year, it's a brutal course.  You really have to be prepared for the uphill.  The last two miles of the course is uphill.  But I had an advantage this is one of the routes I like to run all the time, because you have a major down hill in the beginning than a major up than it repeats this pattern for the rest of the course, so it makes a good training course.

3  easy miles today.   I will head to Rexburg around noon today.  Will see how things go on Saturday.

Today I ran the Teton Dam Marathon and it was a race to remember for bad reasons. Going into a race you of course want to feel like your fitness feels good and your health is good. Unfortunately, in this one I couldn't get over my cold and sinus issues. More on that later. I first arrived in Rexburg, and picked up my race pack and toured the city. I've actually never been here before, and the funny thing is I only live 70 miles away. The city is very easy to get around, and I found where I needed to be on Saturday morning. I went to the potato bake dinner the night before on the free marathon meal which I've never eaten a potato before a marathon. I met a lot of nice marathoner's.

Race morning I woke up with a terrible headache, sinus drainage, and coughing, which I thought my antibiotics would take care of, well not a chance. I met Clyde and Jeff at the pick up area, and what great guys they are and incredible runners I hope to be at their running level someday.

As we started the race I really felt like I was in a groove except I had a hard time breathing, because it seemed like I was coughing every minute the whole way. The first half I finished in 1:22 something and I really felt good other than the coughing. But on mile 16 my stomach felt awful really hurting bad, because I needed to go to the bathroom bad. I asked the aid station when was the next porta putty and they said "we don't know, very encouraging (they also didn't hand me water correctly at two aid station in a row, where I didn't drink any water for, 4 miles . Well I started the hills on mile 16 and my stomach felt terrible. Half way in mile 18 I went off course and ran behind this grain facility and had to "Brown Code". I looked at my watch to see how much time I wasted doing this and it ended up being close to 3 minutes ( you can see that below in the pacing chart). The worst part I had to find some grass and you can guess the rest. I felt really great after this except the course elevation chart online is inaccurate and there's more hills than the map details. Clyde mentions this too in his race report. This was disappointing when your try to figure your pacing strategy. I started cruising down mile 20 and turned the corner and there was another hill that I wasn't excepting. It slowed me down and the rolling hills began.

Then after mile 21 I developed a really bad side stitch that didn't go away until the end of the race. Every time I would try to speed up it would just kill and I had to slow down and I had to alter my stride (this has never happened to me before and the only thing I can contribute it to is probably all the coughing I did just jolting my insides so much). The last mile my side hurt so bad I felt like I was crawling, and finally the finish (2:59:32).

I'm really disappointed how the second half went, and I can only contribute it to I wasn't feeling well enough to run this race, and my immune system broke down. After the race I ran to the restroom six times with a stomach ache and did a "code brown" each time. My stomach was killing. Finally about an hour and a half later there was nothing left in my body to go to the bathroom. I drank plenty of water during the race... I just think my immune system broke down. But no excuse I should have toughed it out and tried to run hard in the ending miles.

I talked with both Clyde and Jeff after the race, and stayed to support them getting their medals.

I don't know when I will run yet, but I know going into this marathon I really wasn't that focused on what I wanted to achieve with everything going on in my personal life. But 2:50 would have been nice, but it just wasn't there today.

I think I will do Des New Marathon on July 24. The downhill isn't really hard on my legs, and I ran this one last year and felt good. Then I will run Pocatello and TOU. But I think I'm going to take three days off to make sure I'm over this cough and my immune system is built back up.

The best part of the trip was meeting Jeff and Clyde they are great individuals and runners. Fast Blogs did a good showing today.

One thing I think I will work on in my running is more tempo miles in my long runs. This race has made me even more dedicated and I would seek any advice to become a better runner. I would also be interested in others diets before the marathon or leading up to it.