"It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves"

Haven't posted in quite some time...My running hasn't been going so great, but I have been getting in 4 days a week. Even if it is only 3 miles a day. I need something to train for, something to motivate me.

I went six today, which is the longest I've ran since November when I had to take some time off for injury.

Slept too much on Sunday and stayed up late so I was essentially unconscious when I turned off my alarm. I'm extremely lucky someone texted my roommate or I wouldn't have made it to class. Day was chock full of stuff to do, and I couldn't go running at night.

Bleh. Running is not too great anymore. I need to continue pushing through while I slowly build my endurance back up. Average pace 8:30-ish.

A bit better today than yesterday. I went to bed at a good time, but still had trouble waking up. I was reading Advanced Marathoning yesterday, and realized that my form isn't as good as it should be. I worked on decreasing my vertical motion and keeping my shoulders and arms loose and moving in the forward direction. Prior to today, I've been moving them, but my elbows have been tense and keeping my arms up close to my body. The new way felt like it took some more energy, but it did make me run faster easier. Average pace: 8:00 min/mile.

Ran on the treadmill while I was back at home for the weekend. Not terribly entertaining, but I forgot to bring cold weather clothes back with me.

Mile warm-up followed by 4x400s with a 400 break. First one at 12 mph, the rest at 11 first 200 then 11.5 with the last 100 at 12.  I know that I need to have a higher frequency when I do 400s, but having not done any speed work for a while, it was needed.

Not a very good run today. My body just couldn't go, and my average pace ended up being 8:42. It was a recovery day from doing a couple of sprints yesterday, but I was hoping for a bit faster pace.

I ran into two problems prior to today's run: it snowed last night and my legs were still recovering from 400s on Monday. That's how long it's been since I've done speedwork. So, I decided that a nice jog around campus would be nice, and somewhat safer because the grounds crew are out in the morning salting the snow.  I came very close to slipping once, but felt slippery ice beneath me many times. After the first mile, I started to feel better and decided to still take it easy, but throw a little speedwork in. I did 10 steps normal followed by 10 steps faster, increasing in increments of 10 up to 50 and then worked my way back down. I wanted to do more, but the snow/ice discouraged me, and kept my speed down for some of the faster portions.

I've been reading that the best runners run on their toes and I decided that I need to start working on that today. It was amazing how much faster I could go (more than 1:00 per mile) by landing on my toes, but it felt so awkward. I will continue to work on it, but it could be a while before I'm economical at it.

Any suggestions on running on toes would be very welcome. Especially for running downhill.

This was the best run I've had in some time. I felt a little sluggish when I started but was still able to run strong. I feel good about where my running is headed, and I'm finally getting my strength back. Seven miles at an average of 7:43

Splits

1- 7:11

2- 7:54

3- 7:47

4- 7:55

5- 7:55

6- 7:55

7- 7:24

3x5 minute temp sessions at sub-6:45. It felt great to be running faster again. The third one was toughest, and I sent some time running a little too slow, but sped up as much as I could. I had a 3 minute break after the first and a 2 minute break after the second.

Played Ultimate Frisbee for Family Home Evening. We had 3 groups come together and had a bunch of people. Lots of sprints and things. I'm going to regret this tomorrow.

Just a nice, easy run this morning. I woke up and didn't want to run, so I went inbetween classes in the glorious Provo weather. My body felt tired and beat up from Ultimate Frisbee and tempoing yesterday, and I figured I would average around 8:30. My legs just went though, and I averaged 7:34 min/mile around campus.

I wanted to do more this morning, but my body refused. I'm still sore from running on Monday. I just need to focus and make myself run daily. If I do so, these hard workouts will get better and better and I will become a better runner. Watch was funky this morning telling me I was going 6:45 up part of Temple Hill when I knew it couldn't be more than 8:00. Elevation was weird too, but it says I averaged probably around 8:00 min/mile.

I had a neurobiology quiz this morning, and kept on imagining how amazing it is our body can correlate the running motion. I wanted to hook myself up to an MRI and see how the primary motor cortex is working relative to not running.  If I don't go to med school, or don't want to build a sub-light space engine, I think I will study running on the brain.

Short run up to Rock Canyon Park. I went with a girl in my ward, so my average pace was 8:56. I woke up feeling great with 8.5 hours of sleep. Much more than I usually get.  I know I'm capable of longer runs, but I need to challenge myself with longer distances.  It's my goal for next week.

Roughly 4 miles in 40 minutes. I went running with one of my friends, Avery, and kept the pace to about 10 min/mile. I accidentally stopped my watch when I thought I was starting it, so I don't know for sure. Just up and back on Canyon road.

Looks like it's going to be 6 days of running this week woot woot. 

Great run this morning. I stayed up until about one last night. My best friend came down to visit from Draper, and he took us over to the mall. Walked around and stopped in at Gamestop for the fun of it. I found a copy of Grand Theft Auto Vice City for 7 bucks and thought it was a great deal, and my roommate and I needed some new fun game to play. Of course, once we got back to the dorm, the game crashes every five minutes. I guess it's for the same reason Taken is always sold out when I go to see it. It's a sign.

 Back to the run this morning. Slept from 1 am until 10 am. I woke up earlier at 7:30 and 8, but I wasn't in any hurry to get out the door. Plus, I wanted to wait for the Sun to warm up the air. Finally went running just after 11. I went up University to 9th East and then over to Timp View Dr. Ran the whole length of that street, turned around and then continued down 9th East until the end of campus and back. Total length was just over 8 miles, and the time was 1:02:29 which averages out to 7:35 min/mile. Great, great pace for that distance. As bad as taking all of those weeks off in December and as slow as I've been getting back to running, my body needed that rest. I've improved my pace and form quite a bit. Soon I will be back into some good speedwork, and then my body will improve much more.

Great run today. 6.65 miles in 50 minutes which averages out to 7:31 min/mile. I headed out planning on pulling off a 25 minute steady state run. Twelve and a half minutes out, 25 minutes maintaining my pace between 7:00-7:30 and then a 12:30 cool down. I tried talking myself into cutting back once I started as I had some aches and pains still, but I fought through it and maintained in the 7:10-7:15 area for much of the run. Very, very good for where I'm at right now.

I'll be back to where I want to be in just a few more weeks. I'm shooting for 35-40 miles this week and today got me off to a nice start.

Good run today. It was an easy run around BYU campus, but I averaged 7:39 pace. It felt pretty easy.

Crummy run today. My monday workout finally caught up to me, and slowed me down quite a bit. Average pace was close to 9:00 min/mile, yuck. Just wandered around in the suburbs to the east of byu

I was going to take the day off, but I decided to go running with one of my friends at night. Problem is, I didn't wait long enough after eating. I felt like (and wanted to) vomit throughout most of the run. I ended up getting extremely loopy too. My roommate said i was acting like his friends did when they got high on weed...weird. 

I need to run today, but I woke up this morning, looked outside, and just did not want to. It's much colder this morning, and the thought of having to put all those clothes on and trudge up university parkway did not seem appetizing. Tomorrow will hopefully be better, and I want to run 10 miles.

I woke up this morning and had no desire to go running. Perhaps I need this long weekend off... I know that I should go out for a run, but at least now I will give my body some extra time to recover. I've been getting a bit of shin splints and my right foot hurt badly last night. A little extra recovery should help me out for next week.

Oh boy, my garmin wouldn't turn on for about 10 minutes just barely, and I was worried about it. But I looked through the manual and found that you can push lap/reset and mode and it will reset the watch.  By the way, it found the satellite signal very quickly this morning. Does anyone know how to make it do that all the time?

Nice run out to Timp View High. My body felt crummy, and I turned around a little bit earlier than I was planning. It worked out well however, because I got back just on time so I could get ready for class (which I ended up not going to...) 8:04 min/mile average pace. My knees hurt, along with my shins. I hate pains and injuries associated with running.

It snowed last night so I went to the indoor track to just be warm and away from ice. 20 laps in 30 minutes, so roughly four miles. Pretty good. My friend Avery was there with another girl on her floor, and I had some fun passing them every couple of laps. They kept on talking about tripping me up, but I evaded their mischievous attempts.

Nice 6.5 miles in the afternoon. It was warm to put on the short shorts and run up University and down Timp View Drive. A girl crossed the street 100-150 yards in front of me, and she looked like she was going pretty fast. I decided to catch up and see how fast she was going, but then I had to stay in front of her even though she was booking it at almost 7:00 min/mile. I decided that she must have been on the track or XC team here at BYU.  That pushed me out to 3.25 miles at the 23 minute mark, and I wanted to give myself some extra time to get back now that she wasn't following me. My average pace going out was 7:15. Coming back was 7:46. So 7:30-ish average.

I went running with my friend Avery this morning. Nice easy run around campus, but I'm afraid I won't be able to run with her much more. We didn't have much to talk about, and I felt like I was dragging her behind me on a rope. I wanted to just go, but was tethered back with her. Average pace of 8:42.

I went out with my friend Olivia. She hasn't ran for quite some time, so she had some trouble after the first mile. At 15 minutes, she said she would just run back and I could keep on going. Ended up hitting about a 7:28 min/mile pace for the next 3 miles. Pretty good, but my shins are really acting up. I'm ready to go for 10 tomorrow, but worried about if my body can handle it.

Felt like crap today. I slept in until 11 because my roommate woke me up in the middle of the night. I wanted to do 10, but I struggled to even pull off this.

First run after a great weekend. My best friend from high school had his mission farewell (but he isn't leaving until April 1) and I spent some time with all my friends away from BYU. Met a very cute girl and want to take her out later in the week. But, with all the fun, I got crap sleep again, and could not fall asleep until one last night. Woke up, did not want to run, and slept for another hour.

I finally went running after most of my classes at 2 and it is hot outside. My body is not used to 60 degree weather at all, and I had sweat pouring everywhere. I ran in the suburbs east of campus and ended up running up a bunch of hills. It was tough, but I had a wonderful view of the mountains and Utah Lake when I got to my halfway point.

Good, but tough run today. Ran around campus and then up on my usual path down Timp View Drive. Averaged 7:40 min/mile but it was tough to keep on going at some points. 

Roughly five miles this morning. My watch only got 4.67, but I couldn't wait for my watch to get the signal for the first 0.3 or so miles Average pace of 8:04 min/mile. My legs were definitely fatigued today, but it was a good decision to change my longer runs from Monday-Wednesday, to Tuesday-Thursday. 

Good, good run today. Full hour of running with only a short break less than a minute at the halfway mark.  7.8 mph.

Went with my friend Avery this morning.  She mentioned that she had heard about there being trails up above the Provo Temple, and being the sadistic person I am, said let's go. I've been up there multiple times, and everytime I've taken a girl up there, she dies. (I'm not knocking on girls at all, just the typical person who runs to just be fit.)  

So we went.  I was able to coach her up past Temple Hill without stopping, and then went up for an additional 2 minutes while she took a break.  She was ready when I got back and we just jogged back down.  Average pace ended up being 8:57.

Took my shirt off too. That was fun, seeing how many dirty looks I could get from people simply because I have a white chest. I joked to Avery that since my body is a Temple, it should be white because of its glorious perfection. Maybe if I would go to the weight room that would be true.

Yuck. My Saturday runs of late have been absolutely horrible. I just get out there and can't go at all. Well, for the most part. I was waiting at a very long stoplight and some kids on the BYU track team came up behind me. I knew they would be fast and let them go once the light changed, but stayed 10 feet behind them for a mile before they turned onto a different street. It wasn't very tough, and I knew I could have stayed for longer, especially if my body wasn't fatigued. It was a good marker for me to see how much I have improved. Average pace ended up being about 8 min/mile.

But, I am now establishing rules for my Friday activities. 

1) In bed by 11.

2) Friday run needs to be in the morning to allow for 24 hour rest period

3) Don't go to parks in Provo in the middle of the night. Especially when there was an armed robbery a quarter mile away and the police are out looking with shotguns and rifles.

Took the day off today. I wanted to let my shins have an extra day of rest and cut my mileage for the week back to 30.  I hate getting back into running condition because it involves so many injuries everytime.  

My roommate is very sick today, and has only gotten out of bed to throw up and go to the bathroom.  I'm praying that I don't come down with it. That would be the worst thing that could happen right as I feel like I am about to break through and get some better mileage and running in.

Thought about doing a longer run today, but figured that if I kept it easy then my legs would have an extra day to heal. I kept the mileage/time low, but went a little too fast. I average 7:29 min/mile but had erratic mile paces of 7:00, 8:11, 8:15, 7:02, 6:55 and 7:35 (for the last half mile). Add in that I ran and down Temple Hill and that was a little too much stress for my already injured shins. Hopefully I can still have a good week and slow down the pace while running for the same time periods and let my shins have a break.

Not feeling too great today. Slow pace and ending up taking a shorter route back to my dorm.It was fine outside until I went out there, then it started snowing and kept on coming down the whole time I was running, but luckily I dressed for cold weather.

Only 5.59 miles today, compared with yesterday's 5.5. I took 5 more minutes to run only a tenth of a mile more. That is a good enough explanation of how much slower my pace was today. I was comparing my current shoes to my retired ones, and I think I need some new shoes. Maybe that will reduce the stress on my shins enough that they can heal.

My friend from SUU is coming up tonight to go to a Silverstein concert with me at Murray Theater. It's going to be amazing, but I might end up taking tomorrow off to let my body rest. If you want to listen to Silverstein check them out here:

www.purevolume.com/silverstein

I'm taking the day off. It's snowing outside, and my body needs to rest. I am so sick of being injured.

Bought new running shoes yesterday, the DS Trainer 14s. Hopefully that can solve my problems.

I also went to a concert for one of my favorite bands, Silverstein.  It was really good, but standing around for a couple hours sure didn't help my shins feel any better.

I wasn't going to run, but I had a burning desire to do so. I ended up pushing it quite a bit and averaged 7:11 with my fastest mile 6:32. When I was running downhill, I flew. The power in my legs felt so wonderful, but I'm going to regret going so fast tomorrow.

I need some help figuring out what my problem is however. It's now been 6 months post-marathon and my body is nowhere even close to where it was then. I can barely sustain a six mile run, compared to going for 10 easy before. I took some time off in December and had crappy mileage in November, but there is something wrong. My body is not coping with the stress of running, and I'm afraid that I'll end up taking time off again to let it heal. Anyone have any ideas why my body isn't recooperating?

I ran roughly 40 minutes around the indoor track today. My new shoes, DS Trainer 14s, came today and I wanted to try them out while keeping it easy on my shins. Felt very good until I switched halfway through to my old shoes and my shins started hurting after about five minutes. I'm not sure if it was my shoes or just that point in my run. Felt very good compared to last week and I'm happy for that.

Yes. I ran only two miles today. Very bad. I wanted to stay on the indoor track so I went to lift weights for about 45 minutes until the track opened up. I started out with fatigued arms and my stomach started to act up at about 1.5 miles. I finished the second mile and hoped that being outside would help me feel better, but nope. I went back in and didn't want to run. Hah.

At least I ran and lifted...

6 miles in 45 minutes. That's a very good 7:31 minutes/mile pace.

4 easy miles with my friend Avery. Nice recovery pace of 8:46.

This cold weather is depressing me. I know that I need to run and I keep telling myself that I will, but it's going to wait until this afternoon when it's as warm as it will get. What happened to the nice warm weather we had the other week?

 Edit: Wow, I have such awesome friends acquaintances. One of my friend's moms got conference tickets for her to take her friends to conference with, she invited me a week or two ago, and now I am sitting in my room while my roommate and a bunch of other people are going to conference. woot I am so loved. Oh, and to add to that, they are staying at my friend Avery's house tonight. I run with her every thursday, and thought we were friends, but I vividly remember being invited to come up some weekend to her house too. I am ready to leave BYU and go home. I cannot wait to leave these people.

To celebrate, I punished my body through a 6.69 mile run averaging 7:40. I was exhausted after simply 50 minutes of running and my knees hurt pretty bad. This is just not working.

Rest day.

 Hoping for some better weather this week and some great running.

I ran East of BYU campus this afternoon. I just wandered around for a bit. I found a nice hill that I've ran up before, and told myself I wasn't going to do it, and then proceeded to do it anyway. Nice eh? That took me over to the Temple, and I ran up to Rock Canyon, which is another brutal hill. Then just back down to my dorm. I was in no hurry, and kept my pace one that felt easy. Going up the hilly parts, my average pace was like 8:40, but for the rest of the run, it was 7:30.

Roughly 7 miles. My GPS says only 6.7, but I went out 3.6 and then turned around. I did go a different way back, but it should have been the same distance.  Ah well.  The 6.7 miles on my watch, I averaged 7:40 min/mile. It was hot, and very tough to keep on going and I ended up stopping 4-5 times on the way back.

Although I say/think this everyday, I need to up the mileage and start doing some speedwork. Hopefully, that will start once I get home from school.

I don't know what's up, but I had the hardest time with my run this morning. Roughly 4.5 miles in about 33-34 minutes. Not as good as I wanted it to be, but at least I pushed through it.

Took it easy and ran with my friend, Avery. Slow and easy along the Provo River Trail.

Took it very easy today with barely any mileage at all. I was tired and wanted to just get in something of a run today. I went to the Provo River Trail again, I thought it went farther North, but ended up running in the same place as yesterday. Average pace was about 7:35

My shins are feeling much better, and I slept forever last night. I was up trying to study until 11, but couldn't focus and went to bed. I woke up at 8:30 with a bloody nose, but went back to sleep until 11. The extra rest was much-needed, and I'm feeling ready for a hard day of studying and writing to finish up my classes.

5.5 along the Provo River Trail. I hit an amazing speed of 7:17 min/mile, which I think is most likely a record easy run pace for me. As I mentioned before, my shins are doing much better today than they have been, and now I know how to remedy shin splints without stopping training. Just take it easy, hold off on the miles, and gradually increase the stress as they heal. 

Oh, funny story. I went to the shipping place in the bookstore yesterday, and I had my shins wrapped up. Some guy there starts talking to me about shin splints and then asked me what I ran for the track team. I said "what track team?" and he had assumed I was on the track team as my legs were wrapped. Weird.

Yay finals week. Woke up at 5:45 to go running with my friend, who was a no-show, and then studied for an hour before my final test of the semester.

  Average pace was 7:31.

Wow that was tough. It was absolutely beautiful outside today, perfect temperature, and there was just a light drizzle of rain. I decided to just go out and run a nice and easy 7 miles or so, but once I about 10 minutes into the run, I felt like going fast. A little voice in my head said "Let's do a tempo run!" and so that's what I did. 20 minutes out, 18 minutes tempo, and 24 minutes back in. It felt wonderful, and I averaged 7:13 min/mile. That's 8.3 mph! Fastest I've ran for an hour since the Marathon! 

woot.

Provo's weather is terrible today. It should be a nice spring morning, maybe some showers, but it is SNOWING. I left my dorm expecting a nice run in a light rainshower, and within 5 minutes it started snowing. I was originally going to go 5 miles or so, but I had to turn back early for the safety of my future children. I didn't wear proper clothing for a snowstorm.

Just a short run again today. It was warmer, but my body felt pretty horrible. Now, in addition to my shin pains, my calf feels like I pulled it.  It hurts on the back of my ankle during plantar flexion.  Not fun. Still hit 7:47 average pace.

5 nice and easy with Avery. Average 8:49 min/mile for her.

Did not feel good today. My shins are hurting very bad. It's becoming a trend in my running to have one good run a week and the rest are so-so to bad. Ah well, at least I hit 30 for the week. 

I just lump everything into easy miles unless it is threshold now. Soon I will start figuring out how fast the other paces are and do actual workouts instead of just running distance.

Great run today. Averaged 7:21 min/mile for an HOUR! So good. Ended up being 8.16 miles. Slowest mile was 7:43 and fastest was 6:59. I got to mile 6, and knew I had 2 left to go with only 15:30 to do it in to maintain the 8 mph pace. I sped up and held a good 7:10 pace for the last two miles, and am very pleased with how I responded.

Felt good for the first couple miles, and then just ran out of gas and couldn't keep on going. Cut the run a mile short.

I felt really bad again today. I'm not feeling sick or anything, but I had a hard time getting out of bed. I left to run and after about 20 minutes I started to struggle to keep on going. I stopped a bunch of the way back home too. I don't know what the problem is. I thought I was finally on track and would be able to start running more than 30 miles a week. However, I don't know how I'm going to even hit 30 good miles this week.

 I really need to find a job too. So if you live in Saint George and are looking for a very good, dedicated, hard working employee, talk to me. I have experience using a cash register, cleaning, selling to customers, food preparation, and customer satisfaction. Plus I type about 90-100 words per minute.

Taking the day off in hopes that I will be able to run better the rest of the week.

Felt a bit better today. I still had some diaphragm problems around the 4.5 mile mark. I stopped 3 times and took some big, deep breaths, and also tried breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth. It worked somewhat.

Average pace of 7:42 over 7 miles is pretty good too. Tomorrow I plan on running indoors on my treadmill so I can better control the pace and see how my breathing goes and other pains. By the way, can you run barefoot on a treadmill? I see no reason why I can't, but just checking.

I lifted for 45 minutes and then ran for 10 minutes barefoot on the treadmill. It felt very good until I realized I had a couple of blisters forming. woot. I then ran another couple of minutes with shoes on, but my blisters hurt. I'm going to pop them and hope for the best.

7:57 average pace.

Attempted a tempo run, but I lost it 15 minutes into the tempo part. Horrible time trying to run so far this week. Average ended up being 7:44

7:49 average.

7:40 average

Nice, easy, fast run to recover. Didn't take my Garmin.

7:31 average. Pushed it a bit.

A bit tired. Averaged 7:36 min/mile.

7:49 average pace. I was doing very good, maintaining roughly an 8 mph pace for the first 5 miles, and ended up taking the last two much slower.