dawson's running history

I was supposed to get up and run at the track, but I stayed up too late last night and I couldn't make myself get out of bed, so I ran at the gym while my wife did her training session.  I felt really good by the end.  I got up to 7.2 MPH and then took it up to 9MPH for the last tenth of a mile.

Did a run with a few people that I have met through Steve at the running store.  We did a loop that started off with a good mile or so uphill, and then we wound our way back down for a while.  The funny part is that my house sits somewhere in the middle of this loop, but I had never seen about 1/4-1/3 of it before!  It was a good run and it felt nice to go with others so that I would push myself a little harder.  Finishing time was 59:48.

So riding my bike to work and back for the past three days has really made me sore and tired.  My time today was a good 90 seconds slower than I ever do.  Also when I am running, I just don't have the ability to pick up the pace when I need to.  I am sure that in time I will feel better for my runs even while biking.

I usually get up early to do my long runs on Mondays, but I had something come up.  Although I did get up early, I went fishing for the first time in more than 10 years!  My friend and I each only caught one fish, but it was still fun.  By the time we got home it was noon and I knew there would be no running in the 100+ degree heat.  I also knew that the farthest I have ever been able to go on the treadmill was ablout 6.5 miles (because they reset after 60 minutes).  I decided I was going to do it anyway.  I pushed hard and would push it up to 8 or 8.5 MPH for about a minute and then come back down slowly and do it again.  To make a long story short, by using my cooldown time to inish, I was able to hit 7 miles in about 64:10!  I was pretty excited.

So, today I started back up with a personal trainer at the gym.  I decided it was time to stop being lazy about working out and I knew it would be the best way to work on some of my frustrations with my training.  My trainer put me on a three day a week lifting schedule, which is good for me, but the thing is that means that I have more exercises per time and I have to do 4 sets per exercise!  I decided that since I only had to do three miles, I might as well get my leg day out of the way.  Boy am I paying for that silly mistake.  After only 2 miles, I had been going for almost 25 milutes, and I felt like the tin man.  I decided that I would make up the extra mile on another day.  I think I will be sore for a few days!!!

Well I am still pretty sore from the workout yesterday, but I decided that I would try to do the Wed morning run with Terry and Tim from the Albertson's.  Since it was only the three of us that showed up and they saw how sore I was, we decided to do the 4 mile loop instead of the 6 (Thank you).  I thought I had to do 6 for my training schedule, but when I looked at it, I was still on a 5 mile week.  I knew that if I jogged from my house to where the runners meet and back, it would put me over my 5 miles with the loop.  When I got to the store, my garmil said exactly 1 mile.  I did the loop with Terry and Tim.  I'm sure I slowed the two of them up a little bit, but there wasn't a whole lot I could do to make my legs go any harder.  When we got back to the parking lot I decided that I would TRY to jog back home to get the extra mile in that I skipped out on yesterday.  Although it was the slowest mile of the six, I was able to finish the whole thing in 1:03:?, which is much better than the embarassing paced I was doing yesterday on the treadmill!

I did this at the gym along with a weights workout.  I cannot remember my time, but I am sure it is still slow as I am still feeling sore from my leg workout back on Tuesday!

I honestly think that this run qualifies for one of my top five most frustrating runs so far!  Besides still not being back to 100% from my leg workout (every time I do another run it seems to tighten up the muscles again), it has also been stormy the past few days down here in St George.  I guess it would be ok if the rain acctually brought the temp down and kept it down.  Humidity like we have been having with 100+ degree heat is not fun!  I made sure to leave before the sun had even officially come up.  In fact, I did not even see it until I got around the bottom side of the black hill.  That didnt keep me from sweating like a crazy man the whole time though!  It was so bad that when I had to stop on my way back at one of the parks to use the restroom (maybe 9-9.5 miles in) I noticed that my shorts were acctually soaking wet.  Because of the hydration pack I was wearing, all my sweat was running and collecting where the pack was hitting on my lower back.  The sweat wes acctually dripping off my shorts and hitting my calves as I was going along (ok that even grosses me out a bit so I will stop explaining it!). So, between those two factors, I finished SLOWER than I have my last two half marathons!  I was super frustrated, but at the same time I was glad to have made it through.

I acctually made myself get out of bed to go to the track today, which is more than I can say for the past two weeks.  It felt good to get out there and see some of the same people I always do there.  There are lots of people that I watch there that make me want to keep improving.  There is one old guy there who is ALWAYS there on Tuesdays.  He cruises around the track.  He is usually already there when I show up, and still there when I leave.  If I had to guess, I would say that he is in his 60's, but then I have never been too good at guessing anybody's age.  Anyway, he is awsome and it makes me hope that I can still be doing stuff like him when I reach his age. 

So, I am still doing 400's at the track.  I wish I could move up to 800's but I feel like I would be so slow on the second laps every time.  I did 5 400's.  All of them were in 2:01 or less.  I also warmed up for a mile, and then cooled down until I hit my fourth mile on the Garmin.