Fuel It Right

60 min run in the hood.

60 min easy spin on the trainer while watching Dr Phil talk about his new 20/20 Diet book. I am really curious what Dr Phil has to say about diet.

Morning spin class. 50 min. Tried to do heart rate but it wasn't picking up so I just tried to get my heart rate up with intervals.

easy peasy 

slow but good miles.

3 hr spin class. felt good, things went well.

1 hour 45 minutes of amazingly relaxing yoga.

First treadmill run in ages. Longest run ever.

easy spin

1 mile warm up on the treadmill, 20 min tempo on the bike, 35 min total. Cut the workout short to go snowboarding.

easy run.

Feeling tired so I cut out the bike and did strength and a swim.

Through in some hills. Another slow but good run.

easy miles from home.

morning spin class. 

1 mile on the tm, 2x1 mile on 800 off & 3x 800 on 400 off, followed by gradual climb, 50 min total, ended with another mile on the tm.

easy pace, didn't feel ankles at all :)

1;57;20/9:47 ap, 145bmp

Long run moved to friday. ankles feel pretty good. Out and back with the first half uphill. threw in 15 miutes at 155 bpm, tried to keep hr low besides that.

Out and back to The Great Salt Lake. First time in 32 years. The way out sucked, lots of wind. The way back was great. My legs are spent though. 

Don't know how I got a week off, but week 18-24 should be down here.

Easy miles, hiit

1.5 mile wu, 8x200 w/ 200 recovery, 46-48 seconds each 1.5 mile cd. Strength focus arms. 

AM- 80 min, 4x 4 min flat big gear, 4 min standing climb, 4 min seated climb, 4 min recover.

Good stuff

2 mile wu, slc running 5k course. I was signed up for the race but decided to go to St George for some cycling fun. Still wanted to run the course and see where I was at. 24:43/7:58. Splits 7:45, 8:00, 8:14, :44. 3 mile cd

Afternoon ride in St George. 35 miles of bliss

St George/Veyo loop. weather was perfect. took the first hill too hard and died but pie at Veyo made it all better.

Yoga followed by a very chill ride through Snow Canyon. Another great day in St Geezy.

Evening easy run. Legs feel good, ankles feel good, life feels good.

hiit

50 min spin class, strength.

2 mile warm up, 3x1 mile slight down hill repeats w/ .5 mile recovery. I was going to be happy with an 8:10 avg for the 3x1. Ended up w/ 7:42, 7:51, 7:49. It felt pretty good and I'll take it.

Evening swim sesh. I love the pool.

Morining spin class. 55 min w/ 40 min of easy climbing.

out and back from home. up & down 9:36 avg

yoga

ez

ez ride + run + hiit

1:11:47/8:58

wu, 6x800. Very sloppy sesh. I need to do 800's on the track instead of Liberty. It plays with my head. Just wasn't feeling it. 3:32, 3:42, 3:39, 3:54, 3:47, 3:53. I tried :)

ez ride + run. hiit/strength.

ez swim. lots x 100

2:09:13/9:14

Kept it easy, last 3 miles was a tempo, 8:30, 8:24, 8:14, maybe a progressive.

yoga

ez run, hiit.

all ez

1:10:25/8:43

2 mile wu, 5 mile tempo 8:29, 8:22, 8:15, 8:15, 8:20, 2 mile cd. Felt pretty decent.

gym workout. needed to break up the boredom so 2.5 mile run, ride, 1.5 mile run.

Down Provo Canyon starting from South Fork. All down hill is quite nice. I'm not used to it though so I was feeling really sloppy. Pretty tired but got it done.

hiit.

This whole Friday long run is pretty enjoyable on Saturday.

1:02:24/8:54 ez run

ez ride, hiit, ez run.

2 mile wu, (3) 3x400 @ 6:48 pace on treadmill, cd. sufficiently worked. snowboarding at Snow Bird. Cut it short cuz my shins were hurting.

Easy ride up emigration in the afternoon + easy run in the evening. Legs feeling good.

easy strength session + esay swim.

I wanted to do well but I also wanted to be realistic. Given my injury and my slow come back to running, my goal going into the race was 50 minutes or less. The course is flat as a pancake so I knew an 8 minute pace would be challenging yet attainable. That's exactly what it was. 10k is a tricky distance. I had to be really careful not to go out too fast and blow up in the second half. I almost prefer 5k's. They are more painful but the are only 3 miles. I kept my head space pretty good the entire time, trying to stay relaxed and focus on the right now instead of how much more I had. A couple other strategies I used were slight surges every once in a while, nothing huge just a nudge, and smiling. Smiling really does make you run faster!!

I did a 2 mile warm up at a really easy pace. My legs felt really good so I got a boost of confidence there.

I took a caffeine gel and started the race with a burst of adrenaline that was very noticeable. I slowed it down a bit and focused on staying in control and keeping good form. Good form while trying to run faster than I'm used to is proving to be a bit challenging. I feel sloppy but it's improving. 

Splits:

1- 7:44 Super relaxed but scared I was going too fast.

2- 7:52 Controlled but feeling it.

3- 7:55 Ah, Liberty Park, my happy place. I know this park all too well; feels good to be in a familiar place.

4- 8:05 I let the bad thoughts of "only half way there" creep in but tried to focus.

5- 8:02 Legs feeling it, but I still felt good and in control.

6- 8:00 Sloppy legs, a little jello-like but reminded myself that there was a mile to go and I wasn't done yet. Plus, if the cute lady in front of me could do it so could I. I was also wondering why I wanted to run a completely flat half marathon again. Completely crazy!

.2- 1:30(7:37 pace) Felt good about the effort. I pushed and stayed in control.

Finish 49:09/7:55 pace

cool down to finish.

This race went surprisingly well for me. I didn't have high expectations going into it. I wasn't even really considering this to be a race I would "race". I've been pretty tired from my training lately and I did hill repeats on my bike on Thursday that left my legs feeling dead so I wasn't expecting my legs to feel fresh and strong. I was happily surprised that they felt pretty dang good and what started out with what I intended to be a training run turned out to be more of a race pace effort than I thought it would be.
The race is the exact same as the first half of the Ogden Marathon. It starts with about 4 miles of downhill, flattens out for several miles and ends with several miles of rollers. I wore a watch but rarely looked at it and mostly ran by effort. I checked my heart rate randomly and glanced a few times when it beeped my mile splits. When I saw that my legs were feeling good I made sure I was pushing at an effort that was difficult but sustainable. I really worked on staying mentally focused and relaxed. The last 5k I tried to really turn on the mental side of racing and worked through the fatigue I was starting to feel. I worked hard for those last three miles and I am really proud of my effort. It's hard to race when you're not feeling "it" and I'm glad I could switch gears and prove to myself that I can push.

Splits: 7:45, 7:56, 7:38, 7:38, 7:39, 7:42, 7:49, 7:51, 7:55, 7:47, 8:03, 7:52, 7:51, 1:11(7:26)

Finished with a 7 mile cool down w/ Josse.  Good day :)