Elite Jogging For Dummies

Easy tour of Memory Grove/Downtown.

Zoo/Golf Course loop.  On the return, at the intersection of Sunnyside and Guardsman, I saw a  fox milling around on the grass. I decided to approach and get a closer look.  He got a wild look in his eye (obviously frightened of the alabaster white presence approaching him) and actually charged me for a few seconds! Then he ran across the street to the Rowland Hall grounds.  I escaped without any fox bites.  Unrelatedly, the inside of my right thigh is very sore and tight today.  I'm sure it has something to do with the little tweaks in my form that have caused me to overcompensate with different muscle groups.  

Black Sheep workout at Sugarhouse Park/Highland track. I was extremely concerned about running the workout because of the new pain in my right interior quad. The warmup around the park went fine though so I thought I would test it out on the track a bit. We ran 4 x 100m strides and then an 800m of speed changes. The meat was 5 x 1000m w/ 200m recoveries which has a certain elegant simplicity and is not too harmful the week of a race. I started these cautiously, still convinced I wasn't going to finish the workout, but I kept going and only having 5 to do was comforting. Times were 3:30/3:29/3:28/3:26/3:20. Since the pace was modest, each interval felt better than the one before it. The quad held up fine--not great, but fine. Then we did another 800m of speed changes, followed by an easy cool down around the park.

University of Utah/Avenues route. The Uvenues run, if you will.  I had a massage last night that really helped open up my right hip and helped with my right quad.  Virtually no complaints about the quad today which is quite an improvement from Monday.  These were easy miles, but I felt a little sluggish.  I'm sure I could benefit from more sleep. 

Tour de Holladay with the Radda crew. Kept the whole run at mild pace, just adding a little spiciness toward the end to hold Casey's interest and assure Aimee Larkin that she still has some fast twitch muscles. Jan was with us, which was good to see as he recovers from shin splint problems.

Six easy loops in the Morris Meadow.   This is also the starting place for the Bonneville Shoreline Trail Marathon, which is tomorrow.  Sam is running that race and the trail looks like it will be in decent shape if the weather holds.  There will be some mud, for sure, but hopefully not too much. 

Good luck to all the runners in the Salt Lake Marathon events!

Salt Lake City Half Marathon. I know that I can only race to the limits of my training and my training has been much spottier than I wanted it to be, so I had very mixed expectations for the race.  My strategy was to try and feel good throughout the race, and finish having run 5:45 pace.  I didn't know whether the injuries I've been battling would re-emerge in force because of the intensity of a long race. I'm pleased to say I had nothing to report from the race on that front. I felt very good. In fact, I felt outstanding for much of the race.  At the finish, I was not doubled over in pain, but was conversing calmly with my wife (who ran the 5k).  So I left a lot out on the course.  I know now that I could have pushed harder, but I don't think I knew it during the race.  This race was significant in one key respect; I learned I can trust my fitness. Next time, I will actually try to use it. 

The pre-race did not go well. As I was packing up my drop bag to throw in the truck, I realized that I didn't have my timing chip on my shoe! Nice. Fortunately, the race folks were able to take down my bib number and name and log my finish time manually, but it created some unwanted drama.  The pace at the outset was way too fast for me; I think the leaders ran 5:02 or something. I settled into my own pace, knowing I would have to run my race.  I'll add splits later, but I hovered around 5:40 in the early miles, dropping a few slower miles later in the race. 

The downhill on 21st South was no problem on the SI.  Fortunately, there were aid stations more frequently this year than last year.  Unfortunately, they were passing out whole bottles of water with the caps on them that required more thought than I care to put into that kind of thing.  A dixie cup with tap water is fine and much easier to handle.  At one aid station, I thought this little girl was offering me a cup of water, but it was actually a thing of peanut mix.  Boy, I couldn't get my mind around how that might taste good.  Maybe in an ultra.  Oh, and no mile markers.  But everyone has a Garmin these days, right, so who needs them?  There were clocks on the course, though it wasn't clear what mile markers they were attached to.  At the finish, they had 7-11 passing out pizza slices and buffalo chicken wings for recovery food. It was 8:25 a.m.  I left before picking up my drop bag because waiting seemed hopeless.  I love the course, however, just not the organization of it.

I didn't pass Albert Wint at the end, something that seemed to bother Sasha when I spoke to him briefly after the race.  It's fine, I felt good about this race for reasons that transcended the race itself.