Per Aspera Ad Astra

To and from the expo.  6:49, 6:20, then easy jog on the way back (7:30s or so).

Phoenix Marathon in chip time of 2:50:00.1 (and a watch time of 2:49:59.x).  How annoying is that?  Haha.  Can't complain about a PR, but man that .1 hurts. :)

Pre-race thoughts: Uneventful.  Ate 1000 calories worth of powerade, nature valley bars, and bananas between 4:30 and 5:30 for the 6:30 start (I think this was a great decision, as my energy was spot-on the whole race), but feeling pretty darn sick still.  My throat was super jacked up and I had a hard time talking, but I was OK energy-wise.

Splits and thoughts (all Garmin splits, race splits were a little longer, total of 26.36 instead of 26.21, running all the tangents pretty much perfectly):

1 - 6:19, downhill,

2 - 6:18, downhill.

3 - 6:24 mostly downhill, with a little uphill.

4 - 6:18, downhill. 

5 -  6:32, all uphill, should've run more like 6:40 to save energy, felt a little forced.  Accel gel right before 5 mile mark so I could suck down water afterwards, a bit of a mistake, as it has almost no sodium.

6 - 6:40, all uphill, slightly steeper.

7 - 6:16, part of the best 2 miles of downhill of the race.

8 - 6:16, same.

9 - 6:27 No major climbs or drops from here that seemed to play a huge part. 

10 - 6:22

11 - 6:25.  Mentally noted on this mile that I wasn't sure how things would pan out.  I felt reasonably relaxed, but wasn't confident that I wouldn't blow up, especially with those 6:16s in there. Powerbar gel with lots of sodium.  Legs were slightly feeling it already, so this was good.

12 - 6:30.  Decided this would be a good pace to settle at.  I realized that I was about .07 miles ahead of the markers, split-wise, at this point, but just running 6:30s in to the end would get me a sub-2:50.

13 - 6:31, hit halfway in 1:24:0x on my watch, 1:24:30 officially.  

14 - 6:30.

15 - 6:31.  A little after 15 miles, I realized that I could hang on and not blow up.  Another powerbar gel with lots of sodium.  Keeping the legs in the same place they had been since 11.  Starting to feel a little bit hot (training in sub-30 degrees is probably not ideal for a race that got into the 60s).

16 -  6:24.  Little injection of pace.  Caught back up to a guy who had recently passed me and he hung on my shoulder from here until 23.  I thought it was mentally helpful to have someone right there for so long.

17 -  6:24.  Another pretty decent one.

18 -  6:25.  Same.

19 - 6:29, as 6:24-6:25 was getting hard.  Another powerbar gel, calves and quads both starting to feel it a bit.

20 - 6:32.  Took a little while for the gel to hit, wasn't so pleasant.  Getting pretty darn hot.

21 - 6:24. Realizing that I was now .12 miles ahead of the flags, I had to push to hit a sub-2:50, even though my watch splits were perfectly fine.  Frustrating.

22 - 6:26.  Still pushing, perhaps should've hung onto 6:30s slightly longer, hurting.

23 - 6:31.  One more powerbar gel, things were starting to hurt a lot.  Dude on my shoulder dropped off.

24 - 6:42.  Wasn't sure what happened, but I think it may have had to do with my fellow competitor dropping off here.  I didn't sense that I had slowed down and thought my garmin was just a little off at the start of the mile (sometimes it yo-yos on current split pace for 30 seconds or so before it settles, once starting a new mile), but I was just hurting a lot.  Starting to cramp, was frustrated that I hadn't taken a powerbar gel instead of an accel gel at mile 5, because just a little extra sodium would've helped.  I was sweating profusely and very salty.

25 - 6:42.  Just hanging on, cramping...

26 - 6:31.  Realizing I had to push really hard to hit a sub-2:50, now that I was a frustrating .15 miles ahead of the flags, split-wise.  Cramping, but not caring.

26.21 - 1:21 (6:28 pace).  26.21 garmin split of 2:49:10.

26.36 - :49 (5:26 pace), legs were annihilated, but I realized I had to sprint all out to get under 2:50.  Final of 2:49:59:xx on watch, 2:50:00.1 on chip.  UGH!!!

Legs were pretty toasted at the finish, so after waiting for Bill and Spencer to finish, I drank a couple chocolate milks and hopped in an ice bath for 10 minutes.  It hurt like mad for the first minute everything went numb, but it was so worth it when everything got feeling back (much less pain from then until now, 5-6 hours later).  Interestingly, my voice was completely destroyed and when talking to anyone, I'd have to repeat myself a few times for them to understand what I was saying.  On top of that, my sinuses are trashed and I think I'm getting an ear infection, but it was worth it.  It's hard to say, but I honestly don't think being sick slowed me down much.  Maybe everything would've felt a little easier without being sick, but I really don't think it affected my time more than 2-3 minutes at the absolute max, based on how I felt on a number of runs in my last few weeks of training.  My 2:53:07 TM marathon would've predicted a 2:49 low here and this felt harder, but my pace was perfectly controlled there and the weather was hotter here after mile 15 or so, so it's not a perfect comparison.

Overall, I ran pretty smart and within myself.  One more shot of salt probably would've taken care of the cramping, which cost me some time from 23 to the finish, so in the future, I'll spend the $1.19 for another gel rather than using some freebie I have sitting around the kitchen.  I think this is probably the most perfectly executed marathon+ distance run I have ever run given my ability on that particular day (off the top of my head, this was my 15th marathon finish and 35th finish of a race of marathon or longer, as I used to race way way way too much).  I think a little more salt would've given me a finish time between 40 and 60 seconds faster, but we're talking hitting 99.5% of race-day potential, so that seems really good to me.  I only think that one of my mile splits was too fast (5 on the steep uphill), but that probably didn't make much of a difference.  The first half was easier, so a 60 second positive split seems like an even effort to me.  This was honestly a pretty uneventful race for me, which is always a good thing in a marathon.  I would argue that my 2:52:55 back in MN in 2009 is probably marginally stronger, given that this course was really easy and that one was really hard, but a PR is a PR no matter how you slice it.

Everyone I knew from Utah, and otherwise, rocked it.  I loved that Jake won and the 2nd place finisher wore a singlet that said "Team Jake".  Almost seems pre-destined as to how 1 and 2 played out. :)  Riley took 3rd, Utah Valley guys did great, and it was nice to see Spencer hit a 3:05 debut off of injury-marred training.  Bill, my old high school MN XC teammate who I've been staying with down here, barely trained for this, his marathon debut, (3 long runs of 16, 17, and a moronic 22 at 6:30, his ultimate best case MP goal pace 9 days before the race).  In addition, he was the last starter, as he apparently slashed the living daylights out of his legs on barbed wire off the side of the course while trying to go to the bathroom in the dark right before the start, and it took 10 minutes for his calves to stop bleeding.  He took it out as I expected (sub-6 for the first 4 miles, despite having an absolute best case goal of 2:50) and had to fight massive blowups the entire time, but came in at 2:55 (gun time of 3:05... haha...), having to pass almost the entire field of runners to get up to 20th place based on chip.  If he learns how to train and race, he'll be really really quick.

1 mile jogging to my car after work (had a horrible parking spot)

Same as Tuesday, got stuck in a terrible lot a mile from my building, jogged to my car after work.

First real run since Phoenix Marathon 8 days ago.  Running sick did a number on my body and seems to have set me up for a long recovery process.  Legs still felt hammered from about 2 miles in today.  Did a group run with Jake, Fritz, Nate, and Rossy south from Highland High.  They wanted 10, I wanted a little less.  After 4 miles or so, they did a 1 mile-ish loop around some park, so I skipped this mile in favor of stretching out my legs.  We had averaged low 7 up to this point, but picked it up afterwards with a 6:5x and then a 6:44, at which point, my legs had had enough.  That one mile in 6:44 (17 seconds/mile slower than what I averaged in the marathon 8 days ago) felt like 5k/10k effort after 6 miles of running, which was a little scary.  Hah.  The group seemed to want to keep running sub-7s, which I had no interest in whatsoever, so I let them take off and dropped my pace to 7:45 for the last 2.5 miles.  There are days to push and days to just listen to your body, and today was definitely the latter.  I hit 8.5 miles in 62 flat and had to sit down for a few minutes to rest my trashed quads and calves.  I didn't expect to feel great today, but I was a little surprised at just how bad I felt.  I guess I've never simply taken 8 days off after a marathon before, so I think having had an active recovery would've been helpful.  That said, the major factor here was probably just being sick.  I was still feeling it in my sinuses yesterday, 7 days after the marathon and 10 days after first getting sick, but I think running today finally cleared everything out for the most part.  At the very least, it can only get better from here. :)

3 miles really easy as part of a date, red butte area trails.  Legs felt great compared to yesterday except that I slipped in mud and bashed my knee on a rock, which was actually quite painful.

 Super easy, with the pooch.  73  degrees, she didn't really want to run.

Workout with Bill Mennel, who is in town at his parents' condo up at Solitude.  2 mile jog up city creek, 2 miles down hard in 10:02 (5:02, 5:00).  2 mile jog up, 2 mile down hard in 10:06 (5:02, 5:04).  Felt good, but getting sore in the last hard mile.  1 mile cooldown.   Made this specific for Running of the Leopards next week, but it was about 1% steeper downhill, so a little faster.

Easy run with Holly, just recovering from the previous day's workout.  Keeping mileage light until after the 5k next weekend.

1 mile up city creek jog, 1 mile down (average 3.5% decline) in 4:49, 1 mile jog back up, 1 mile down in 4:50, 1 mile jog back up, 1 mile down in 4:50, 2 mile cooldown.  Have been keeping mileage super low to be fresh for Saturday's Running of the Leopards, but got in another specific workout for it (albeit on a 3.5% decline rather than the 2% of the race).  The rest was pretty long, so I'm not sure how good of a predictor this would be for the 5k, but these are really fast times for me regardless, so I think I should be ready for a pretty solid performance.

Warmup with some strides, Running of the Leopards in 16:44, 3 mile cooldown.

Race felt pretty meh to be honest.  Those mile repeats were still in my calves and I just "didn't have it".  In any case, this is only 10 seconds off my PR in slick conditions (probably not much of a factor) on a course that, despite what people will say, is only 12 seconds faster than a flat sea level track according to the Jack Daniels calculator.

Splits:

1 - 5:24 (took it out in about 5:15 pace, settled into that effort, looking to split 5:15 at the mile, only to realize that it flattened out and then went slightly up at the end of the first mile).

2 - 5:35 (got really lazy at the start of this mile, saw I averaged 5:55 pace for the first minute of it and then had to pick back up).  This is the mile that killed what could've been a PR

3 - 5:12 (too little too late)

.11 - :33 (realized I wouldn't hit a PR, bummed)

Effort wise, it never really felt that hard.  I wanted to push it harder, but after a mile or so, my calves just weren't super happy.  In any case, this is the fastest time I've run in just about 4 years, so I guess that's good.  Even adjusted 12 seconds back, this would've been a 16:56, which would've still been my fastest since 2009, so I'll take it for now.

Today's run was 9.3 miles in 65:xx, half with Fritz, Kevin, and some Westminster guy named Oliver.   They all wanted to do 18, but as a loop, so I just went out with them to Cottonwood area and then turned around.  Pace was pretty consistent after a high-7 first mile (right under 7 most of the way).  Legs still feel a little heavy, but I think it's mostly a byproduct of having had no good quality purely aerobic based runs in 3 weeks.

I've had 3 extremely easy weeks, so it's time to start training for real again. This week will have to bridge me back into the mileage (not to mention that work is going to be pretty darn busy this week), but I need to hit at least 40-45 or so, more if it feels right.  I'll definitely have to get in something around 15-18 this upcoming weekend (but by myself so I can run it slowly and not get dragged along at MP).

Ran up the hill to the lab for work from my new place in 16:30-ish, ran back home later right on 6:00 pace.  Probably not quite tempo effort, but close enough.

With Holly.  3 miles hard, on trail (first trail run of any value since quite awhile back), from the City Creek canyon road up to 5-way in 26:54.  I don't know that I've ever run this under 32 before (granted, haven't done it in awhile or ever with reasonable fitness).  I followed the same path that Steeplechase does (ie, none of the shortcuts).  Came back down but in the meadow I took a game trail down on the Northeast side and followed up the canyon for a little while before crossing the creek and coming back down the road.  The uphill was run hard enough that I actually broke Holly on an uphill for probably the first time ever.  She was off leash and it took her ~20 seconds longer than me to get to the highest point.  On the way down, she was only willing to go a very easy pace, so I guess I tired her out pretty well. :)

Easy, city creek trails with Katy and the pooch Holly.

Off!

5 miles with Holly, mixed in 2 hard miles of climbing, which she didn't really like.  Over the last mile, she kept stopping behind me.  Poor pooch needs a haircut so she can deal with the increasing temperatures!

My apartment at 4th and D to B, up to 11th, down the city creek road, onto the BOSHO trail, up to the 5-way (long route, no shortcuts), to the Jewish Community Center, all at about marathon effort in 60:xx (~8 miles, but with lots and lots of climb, hitting the downhill miles at just over 6:00).  Daniels tables calculate this as an equivalent pace of 6:30 if the course were flat, but that's not even factoring in all of the sharp hairpin turns, the rocks all over the trail, or the altitude, so it was a high quality effort.  Hit the bottom and was nervous about my ability to hold the same effort on the way back in my first long run in a month, but fortunately I ran into Mark Lehmkuhle, who was going really easy, so I jogged slowly with him back to the 5-way (3.5-ish miles) before he turned around.  I kept it easy from the 5-way down to the road (mostly around 7:00 pace on what was mostly just a series of pretty steep downhills).  From here, I ran down into Memory Grove and ran it in marathon effort from here (6:15s down the paved path towards the capitol).  I could tell that this was my first long run in a month - after 100 minutes or so, I just felt a little off energetically (despite eating 400 calories worth of cookies while running) and like I was close to getting a headache for the last few miles, but I was encouraged by my ability to still hold MP when I wasn't feeling great at the end.  And, it was only 16 miles, but with a ton of vertical mixed in (nearly 3000' by the end of the run), so it was definitely a "better" long run than just going out for a 16 mile slog with almost 10 at MP.

I'm thinking about meeting up with some folks for another similar length trail run tomorrow, but it will be really slow.  Nothing wrong with that. 

Very easy casual run with Joe Dean.  My apt to memory grove to city creek to the very top of the road (last quarter mile sucked with a lot of snow) and back.  Easy pace, nice to just put another relatively long run in the legs.

1.5 miles up city creek: 

 5.6 miles up city creek:

Afterwards, took Holly to Memory Grove/City Creek for 2 hours of swimming / playing. 

Oh, and I signed up for Utah Valley Marathon today, so that's officially on the schedule in a little over 2 months.