In search of old age PRs

Another run on the track.  It is very dark in the morning and I need to find some other well lit areas.

One more early morning run on the track in Bryson City, North Carolina.  

Warm up and cool down with 5 x 200. Uneventful, except for the poor lady I scared to death when I walked out on to the track at 5:30 AM.  She was walking and singing a the top of her lungs.  I thought it was cool, but she was embarrassed and left after my first mile..stinks, would have been nice to have some music to run my 200's to!

This run was supposed to be on Sunday, but a flight delay in Chicago got me home super late.

Early morning run up Emigration.  Not many runners, but tons of cyclists.  Most have courtesy, but some do not (they actually believe the shoulder/bike lane is there lane entirely...idiots)!

I ran up somewhat easy, then ran marathon pace on the 11 mile return (6:20-6:40)Run was easy until the last two mile.  I can only hope TOU is easy until the last two miles!

Sore miles to Sugar House park.  I hope I can run some intervals tomorrow morning.

Morning interval work-out at Highland HS.  I ran to the track from my house and was still feeling Monday's long run in my legs; however, since I was awake I thought I should go ahead and try the intervals.

Warm up and cool down with 8 x 800 with a 400 meter recovery jog between each 800.  I wanted to hit 2:55 or lower, but averaged a surprising 2:47.  This is a good sign for a 2:50 to 3:00 marathon at TOU next Saturday.

A little windy this morning.  I had to wear gloves.  It is about to my favorite season!

Sluggish run this morning up through the Avenues.  Due to fatigue, I'll probably just do a short run around Liberty park Friday morning then run the Alta Peruvian Lodge race on Saturday (5 miles) then run the 5 miles back up to the lodge. 

I am running the TOU marathon next Saturday, but I'm thinking about running 5 x 2 mile interval work-out during the week.  I would keep it at marathon pace, but that would be a high mileage workout (15-16 miles).  I'm planning on running St. George on October 1 too.  Any thoughts on doing this?

Evening run after dinner around Liberty Park.  I need to get my butt out of be in the mornings!

Super cool race this afternoon.  This race should be packed with people.  For $30 you get a t-shirt, BBQ, live music and BEER!  In addition, I talked with several Fast Running blog people and met the St. George marathon record holders (Devra out-kicked me the last mile)and John Cahill (MC the event).

My plan was to use this race as speed work before the Top of Utah marathon next week.  At the start, several runners told me it was a bad idea, so I was going to go a little easy; however, you get sucked up into the downhill speed and well....I ended up racing it.

Mile 1: 5:03.  200+ feet of drop.  This is crazy fast...and I'm going to run 4 more of these?

Mile 2: 4:55.  400+ feet of drop.  Even faster, but start to get into a rhythm.  There is no way I could run this time for just 2 miles on a flat track.

Mile 3: 5:04.  300+ feet of drop.  I begin to hear expected foot step behind me.  I just ran a 15:38 5K.  I remember thinking, this is Paul's marathon pace?

Mile 4: 5:04  400+ feet of drop.  Rob and Devra are right behind me ready to pass.

Mile 5: 4:53 450+ feet of drop.  I tried to keep contact with Rob and Devra.  They pulled me in to the finish.

Crazy PRs all around.  I had a quick water/recovery and decided to run back up the canyon.  This was a bad idea.  After 1 mile up, I was done.  Luckily, Stephanie Talley's husband picked me up.  My legs didn't feel too bad, so I should be able to run fine on Monday (I hope so).

Shake out run to Sugar House park this morning.  My body is sore from the flu shot on Sunday and the Alta 5 mile race on Saturday.  I felt good at the end of the run, so hopefully I'm on the road to a quick recovery before the TOU marathon on Saturday. 

I  have to work in St George this week so I plan to run some of the marathon route in prep for the race in a few weeks.  The times I have run the race, I never can seem to remember the last few miles, so this week should be informative. 

One more weird thing, I really only talk to Sasha at races, but I had a dream last night that he came over to my house with his family...maybe this is a good omen? :)

Working in St. George, so did a 2.5 mile run out from the finish line of the St. George Marathon and up Diagonal Street then turned around and ran back to the marathon finish line.  I did this run to verify that St. George is indeed all downhill to the finish, because it has never felt that way during a race.  It does in fact drop over 100 feet these last miles.

My legs still feel slightly sore from the race on Saturday, but I hope to be 100% tomorrow.

Also, I found out that the hotel I am staying at this week, Hilton Garden Inn, still has vacancies for marathon weekend!  I was planning on sleeping in my van (yes-down by the river), but opted for the hotel.

Drove back from St. George to Salt Lake.  Did a short night run around liberty.  Legs feel almost 100%.

A fun race in wet conditions today.  I started off wanting to race it, but after the heavy rain early in the race and a few porta potty stops it became a seriously hard training run.

The highlight of the race was running with Joe Wilson the first few miles.  It was also cool running with the top three woman finishers.  I would catch a different one after each porta-potty!  

I still managed 4th in my age division.  The results say 5th, but there is an obvious error that the race officials should correct.  There is a guy that ran a 1:48 half then a 1:10 2nd half...really?  I think this guy made the beeline for the finish and skipped the turns.

It was great talking with all the bloggers and I'm looking forward to St. George in 2 weeks!

One more thing...I suck on the tangents for this course...my race mileage was 26.5.  Anyone else?

Lactic acid shake out run from TOU marathon on Saturday.  Felt pretty good running around Liberty Park.  I hope I didn't push it to hard at TOU and ruin my chances at St. George!

Upped the mileage this morning!  It felt like I ran 20 miles.  It is going to take a few days to recover from the TOU marathon.  

Early morning run around Sugar House park.  I had to wear the gloves this morning!

Morning run, with the gloves (again), up to the Avenues then back home.  I now try to avoid the sprinklers due to the colder temps!

Faster paced run today around Sugar House park then back to the house.  I started the run with a refreshing shower within the first 1/4 mile!  It was dark and I was messing with my MP3 player then--splosh.  It took 3 miles to warm up a little.

After the run my achilles tendon was inflamed.  I'll take tomorrow off before attempting a short run on Saturday.

Nice group run this morning from the Capital to Emigration canyon above the zoo.  The distance was a bit far and the pace too, but felt good during the run.  Taper week!

Easy morning run around Liberty Park.  I hope its not a hot day at St. George this year!

Short speed work session at East High this morning.  5 x 200 with warm up and cool down.  Still feel a little muscle fatigue from the last long run, but it should be gone by Saturday morning.