--------running---------

Tonight I hit the treadmill. I wanted to get some weights lifted as well as get some miles in so the gym seemed like the easiest place to accomplish that. The weather outside looked simply ideal while I was driving to the gym. 

 The treadmill felt pretty good though it helped me set a pretty quick pace which is nice for me. When I try to pace myself outside I usually run to fast and burnout. It helps me to feel what my limits are when I do it on the treadmill. Hopefully I can start to translate those speeds to the out of doors before too long.

 The weight lifting was really good, I am focusing on higher reps and lowering the weight to about 80% of my 1 rep max. I usually lift pretty heavy but and trying to drop some weight, hence the higher reps and limited rest between sets.

I did a short run tonight, my right knee was a little tight all day. I don't know if I tweeked it a little or if I have been running too much. I will take tomorrow off from running just in case it is that I have been running more than I am ready for.

 Tonights run though short was really good, I did a little trail running this evening again just to give my knee a break from the concrete. I am really looking forward to some drier months so that I can get  out and run some trails. Hills hurt me bad but if they don't kill me they shall make me stronger.

Today I did my longest run to date. Around mile 5 I was suffering and had to walk a little while. I took it easy for the next mile hoping that I wouldn't burn out. I made it and was beat as I was finishing but now only 20 minutes later feel good. My legs feel like they have been working but no worse than after I do my usual 3-4 miles runs. 

 A few more weeks of doing 6+ mile runs and i will probably start working on getting my speed up. My speed currently is pretty laughable, even for the 3-4 miles. One nice thing is that my speed for todays run was right on par with what I usually do for my shorter runs.

If anyone has some advice as to how I can start picking up the pace please let me know.

Thanks in advance,

Today I took a new route, it was nice and not too bad at all. There is one point where the shoulder of the road is parked on and the sidewalk does not exist so that was a little scary with me having my dog along, he is so easily distracted by a distant bark. HA HA

The course tool tells me that my run was about 3.3 miles and it took significantly longer than I thought it should. I guess I just was going slow or the dog breaks took longer than I thought. Overall it was a good easy run.

The dog slowed me down a lot today. This is probably the warmest run of the year so far that he has been on with me, I could tell that he was suffering and needed to slow down. As we came along a major road there were a couple of puddles in the shoulder. He thought it would be a good idea to lay down in the water to cool off. Silly puppy. When we got home I hosed him off. I couldn't tell if he liked it or not. He did keep coming back for more. 

 I think tomorrow I will leave the dog home and go out for a little longer run again. :)

I took jun's advice and went running up in the dimple dell park "gully". It was really awesome down there, the trail has its ups and downs but feels pretty flat. It was funny to me though that the parts of the trail that were the hardest to run on were the sections that the horses had mad super soft. I can't imagine ever complaining about running on a surface that is too soft. HA HA

Today was a really good run for me. I am only guessing about how far I went, it took about an hour and I felt like I had a pretty slow pace going so 4.3 miles sounded like a fun number. It was likely more than that.

Next time I will have to take my handheld gps unit in there and mark some distances. Maybe I will take my dog in there and while he is laying in the mud and water or eating the snow I can get some gps cordinates and make a better guess as to how far I actually went.

Today I just went to the gym and got in a good solid workout. I did the 4 + a little mile run and then lifted. It felt good. When I started running I felt like my right knee was doing something funky, like it was flicking a rubber band every time I bent it. I just took it easy in my warm up and it went away, no idea what that was all about.

If the weather stays decent I think I will make another run outside, I will take my dog up into the gully I ran in on tuesday. I figure there was hardly anyone in there last time so I can let him off of his leash and he won't slow me down. I may find him laying in some snow somewhere but that is better than me trying to drag him out of some nasty roadside puddle. 

I got out with the dog today and did some trail running. It was a perfect day for a run. I felt really good until my dog saw some other dogs and decided to pull me at just the wrong time. HA HA I think I twisted my ankle a little. No big deal though it will be good by tomorrow.

I think I am going to try to log about six miles tomorrow. Jun is trying to talk me into running the 5k in the morning but it is just so dang early. HA HA If I do get up to run that I will proabably go out for another run later in the day so I can get a total of 6ish miles.

Today was a rough day of running, I did something to myself over the Easter weekend and have had a dry and scratchy throat ever since. I took the weekend off and just tried to eat good food and let my body deal with  whatever this is. I feel much better today but when I went running it wasn't so nice. Today was beautiful so I had to get outside. I decided that I would take it easy and map some different distance courses near my house with my hand held GPS. Well I got about 1.4 miles away and hit the wall. Breathing became very labored so I thought I would just take it easy but by the time I got to 1.55 miles my lungs were not please. I decided to turn around there. I now have a really cool 5k run near my house all through trails and trees. The trails that is goes on are even fairly cool during the summer months. I think this will become one of my quick nice runs because it is so good. I am sure you could easly do a 10k out and back in this ravine. I will try to map a course that distance after I am back into the groove.

Today definitaly was good, I wish my run would have been better but I got outside with the dog put some miles on my legs and got some exercise on a beautiful day. I will take that anyday!

Today was my first day back to running after being down with the sickness. I was on a business trip last week to San Fransisco and was not really able to enjoy the weather because I was coughing up my lungs and congested like crazy. I probably could have gotten out for a run over the weekend but decided that I would rather get a good week of running in as opposed to making my lungs unhappy by getting back to it too soon.

Today I did some light off road on a trail near my house. The course was pretty mello, no hills to speak of and I took my dog with me to keep me at a reasonable pace so that I didn't push it too fast. It was a warm day which was beautiful for running. I felt really good and strong for the whole run. I am going to start extending the distance of my daily runs. I am going to shoot for 5 miles on my next couple of runs. I am pretty excited since the furthest I have ever gone is a little over six miles.

Wow, it was a warm day out there for a run. I did not do as well as I wanted and ended up walking way too much. It was a beautiful day and I really wanted to test how much faster I was getting but I think I started out with too much because by about mile 2 I was hurting. My split time to mile 2 felt really fast but I don't know what is was because I didn't use a watch. The last mile or so was brutal. I struggled and did not enjoy it.

It is such a nice day though I must get out and do some other outdoor activities. 

Today I did my run in two parts. I warmed up with the dog and our pace was somewhat laughable. I had orginally planned to do 5+ miles today with the dog but the temperature was just too high for him I suppose. We started out from my house and he didn't sprint away like he usually does so I knew it was hot. We did the first mile or so and I could take the slowness anymore so I ran/walked him back home. I took a short break got some water and was back out there. It made what I did with the dog feel like a warm up. I took off intending to do a little over three miles but after I started going I felt so good I didn't turn where the three mile loop was I ended up going around and doing the 5 mile loop. I felt really good until about mile 4 it just so happens that is where a gradual uphile section starts. I walked for a little while and got my legs to stop shaking and then I was back off to the run. 

This is more than a mile more than the furthest I have ever run in a single day. Sadly my feet paid for it a little. I think it was the heat but when I got home I took off my shoes and peeled off my socks to find dime sized blisters on the bottoms of both of me feet right where the ball meets the arch. Needless to say I am a little disappointed but my legs and lungs feel really good. I could definately do runs of this length on a regular basis. I would really like to get out tomorrow, does anyone have ideas on the best way to run with blisters? I have heard putting a peice of duct tape over the blister can help with the rubbing and at least make it so the blister doesn't grow. Any other ideas?

I totally wussed out today, I had originally intended to do 5 miles today but with my blisters and stuff I thought I would play it safer and hit the treadmill. The first 2 miles felt really good but then I started just feeling gross. I felt like I needed to throw up, and go to the men's room all at once. I decided to walk for a little while and I felt better so I turned back up the speed and now I just started to feel those blisters rubbing and growing. That was when I decided it was time to get off the treadmill and stretch so I could go home.

Today was a really hard running day, it may have to do with just coming off my longest run ever. I will try to get out and run tomorrow. Maybe just 2 miles or so just to stretch my legs and keep me in run mode.

Today was a beautiful day for a run. The sun was out and there was a nice breeze to keep you cool. I set out to do 5 miles today and did just a bit more. I ran the whole time minus two short breaks waiting for lights to change. I felt really strong, and my lungs felt really good. I wish I had an idea of how my time was today because I felt like it was the fastest I have ever run for the whole run. By most if not all of your standards it wouldn't be fast at all but for me it would be somewhat of a breakthrough. I have been working on increasing my distance and worried less and less about speed. Running is starting to feel more natural and less forced which I think is a good thing. When I tell most of my coworkers what I am going to do tonight is go home and run 5 miles most of them can't even fathom such a thing, asking, "why would anyone do that?" I must admit I was one of them not too long ago. 

I am still getting blisters on the bottoms of my feet. I don't know if it is because I am not allowing the old ones to heal completly before I head out or if it is my shoes. Maybe I just have week feet. The blisters never hurt, I just always find new ones when I take off my shoes. I am sure eventually my feet will just calous up and stop getting blisters. I cannot wait for that day to come!!!

Tonight was the first of the weekly Tuesday mountain bike night. We did a ride in corner canyon of draper utah. It was a beautiful night for a ride. the clouds looked a little daunting but the downpour never did happen. Someone has done done some amazing maintenance on the trail system up in corner canyon. I have no idea what the millage was of the ride but the downhill is what I am all about anyway. I think running has definitely helped my biking. I was able to recover from the grinding climbs within a 100 ft or so. It certainly uses different muscles though. My quads were on fire. It was a really nice feeling to get back on the bike.

Sadly after biking there was no light to get out for a run so I let the run go by the wayside. I will pick it back up tonight.

Last night, Opera, my super hot girlfriend wanted to feel a little outdoorsy so we went and did a hike of Bell Canyon. It was beautiful and perfect weather for the hike. I had intended to get out and before but when I looked at my front lawn on arrival at home it needed some TLC. I mowed the lawn and gave it some fertilizer. It was a productive evening that I followed up with the best chicken strips in the salt lake valley. Goodwood's BBQ really does make the best ones I have had in this state! It really was kind of nice because my legs were really sore from the first mountain bike ride of the year. More than I thought they would be anyway.

I am heading out tomorrow (today since I am reporting on yesterday) with Jun for a little dirt run. it should be good. I will be the slow one. HA HA

Running uphills is hard!!!! Down is better. :) Tonight I joined a little group for a run, we did a section of the Bonneville Shoreline Trail. It was awesome. I have run some trails but by comparison they were flat! I had a bear of a time climbing the hills. For a while I was trying to "run" them but then I took a step back and decided I would actually be able to walk them faster and wouldn't get to the top being totally out of breath and end up walking the flat sections or even worse the down hill on the other side.

By the way the 12 dollar socks are totally worth it. I will be going back to the SL Running Company and getting a few more pairs. If my feet are happy then running is an enjoyable experience. It was wild I could tell a difference after about the first mile. 

The play by play of the run is: we started out maybe 6:30ish, I could keep pace(a very mello pace) with the group for maybe about the first .75 miles. I was asked how I was doing and I believe my response was, "I have never gone up this steep of hill running before!" I started walking shortly after that when I saw the group stopped up a little ways further. I caught up to them and was told that we had done 1.3 miles so far. I told them that I wanted to do something like 5 and we took off again. This time either I was slower or they picked up the pace but I was left in the dust. I only caught glimpses of them until near the end. I came up a hill and saw them probably only 100 yards away. Of course the path to them was much longer than that but they just stood there so I figured it was probably about the 2.5 mile distance I wanted to go. Upon arrival I was informed it was infact 3 miles and that I was going to end up doing 6. Suprisingly, I felt really good. Of course I was winded and my legs burned from all the climbing that had been done but nothing unbearable. I said that I was going to turn around and hoped they enjoyed the rest of the run. Turns out that was as far as they were going to go. We turned around and headed back down. I took my rightful place at the back and we were off. I went down the same way we came up and suddenly I saw two of the people from the group. My first question was, "did I cheat?" Turns out they went a way that was slightly longer but much more flat. I was able to stick with them for the last mile or so and arrived at the parking area with them.