Sock tans

AM:

Met at sugarhouse, did the cemetery loop. I kept up with the group all the way until we started the fartlek stuff. I fell off and was alone that first lap. Then Dakota came into the cemetery right as I was starting my 2nd lap. I only did 2 laps because that's what I heard we were doing. I knew when to go on and off only because of the faint AAAAWWs Bill would yell, really on/off but they both sound the exact same from far away. So I could only guess when it was on or off. I did a pretty good job of it though. I gotta work on that mental part.

I stopped at 8, but saw Bill and Natalie keep going, (they had just passed me, obviously they had done 3 laps instead of 2) but I had assumed they were just finishing off the mile they were on. I should've kept going. I'll go on a run later today. 

PM:

I met Patrick and ran with him again. We went along 19th and then up sunnyside then followed foothill to guardsman then to sunnyside park and then back on 19th and home. 6 miles 

AM: 

We met at Liberty and did 2 laps warmup. Then we ran over to the hill and we did hill strides race things. Then we ran back to the bench and we made our bingo cards by choosing out pieces of paper 1 at a time and gluing them to your bingo grid in the order you drew them. They were the most random things! For example: "person on laptop" "woman with dreads" "person texting" "veggie garden" "guy on rollerblades" and so on. We were put in groups of four. My group was Natalie, Sam and Kiley. We had to take a "camera phone" and take pictures of the items on the paper. You had to get a bingo 2 ways. We stayed in the park for a bit and got a few boxes, I think they were "person with earbuds" "baby in stroller" "guy on rollerblades" and "person drinking coffee." Then we went to the seven eleven to get the "person with name-tag" and on the way got a "traffic flag." The lady there told us there was a woman with dreads at smiths at the pharmacy I think it was so we headed there. It was pretty great!  On the way we got a "kid on swing" and "person reading" We felt like such stalkers!!! It was a fun run! Turns out that lady wasn't there so we wandered around smiths for a bit then set off for a few more. Then we were going pretty fast coming back!!! Then I did a lap on the wood chips cool down to get to 8.

PM:

I ran to sugarhouse and did a grass lap then a lap on the road, and then it was getting dark and sketchy so I ran home. I went pretty fast actually. Or at least it was fast to me. I was expecting 7:40s, but I was actually going around 6:15-6:20 pace at some of it. On some of the steep hills I got up to 8:20ish, but then would drop to 7:20s or lower on the flat that followed. 6 miles, I thought it was a good run.

AM:

So today we met at the Cottonwood Complex. We did our normal warmup (around the baseball field, then up the hill where you enter, then to the hospital, down to the next road, follow to next road, and basically go around the block) and then we went over kinda by where the start to the regions course was, and we did some strides. Then we got water and then went to the start line of the regions course, and then we did a tempo run of the entire regions course, the long one so that it would be exactly 3. I was supposed to hit 22. I hit 22:10. I PR'd in a workout!!!!

So I was thinking "7:20, hit 7:20" that whole first mile. I was feeling good. at the half mile mark, I realized how fast I was going. I was up with Bill and Ryan and Ethan I think it was, who were hitting a time faster than me. Bill said "you've committed to this pace now. No crashing" or something like that. So I tried to keep up, and I think I was thinking too much about it. I was thinking "No crashing no crashing no crashing" I tried to think positively and it worked!!! But then literally as soon as I thought one bad thought I crashed. It was "not Bessie, I don't want to run up it right now." I fell off of them right then, and then about halfway across the flat part of roller-coaster I thought "I worked this hard already only to crash? No!" So then I tried to pick it up again, but there was that other hill, and I got the negative thoughts again, and I was so close to walking. But I remembered arms, so I focused on them and got past that part. Then when I recovered, Susannah passed me, making me think even more negatively. Then at the top of Miranda I decided I wasn't gonna let myself completely die. I picked it up, trying my best to think positively. I counted down how far I had to go. Just around the triple trunk tree, along the fence, up Bessie, then back down and I'm done! I kept that in mind the rest of the run. So close to being done!! Then came Bessie... my new enemy. I was struggling to keep it positive, but then I heard Bill yelling something like "finish strong!" and I got motivated again and DID finish strong! Thanks Bill!

Then we went for our cool down. I had a choice between doing 3.5 to get to 10 or 5.5 to get to 12. I chose to do the 12, because I need the mileage, though I really wanted to do the 3.5 miles. We went over to that gravel area again and to the frisbee area. I started to fall off around the frisbee area. On the way back I tried to catch them, but I never did. I got to 12 farther away from the cars than I liked. But oh well!

I think I've finally started to realize what has been making me crash, even though Bill has been telling me all along. I guess I never really got it in my head that being positive is the key factor of running. I never truly registered it, it was just some sort of idea that would most likely help me. Now I know how to get myself to stay positive! Now I'm excited for this season!!! :)

PM:

I went 3 miles around my neighborhood. It was HOT!! 

AM: 

Bike and Run!!! It was way fun! I started on the bike. My partner was Tomy. The seat was so high up! We had to lower it for me :0. Even as low as it could go I had trouble starting on it. I started out pretty badly. It took me a while to get on the bike and going good. But then once I got the hang of it I started catching up to everyone! It was weird transitioning from biking to running. Biking made my quads hurt, but I wasn't gonna let that stop me! Let's see my splits:

Mile #

1) 4' 22"07 bike

2) 6' 15"00 run

3) 4' 08"00 bike

4) 6' 47"00 run

5) 6' 20"00 bike

6) 7' 22"00 run

7) 7' 28"00 bike

8) 7' 36"00 run

9) 6' 19"00 bike

10) 6' 45"67 run

So as you can see there was a part of it where I slowed down. It got so hilly!! On a bike it's so hard to go uphill! These times are a little bit slow because I kept my watch going when I was trying to get on and off of the bike. I felt kinda bad because I would make Tomy wait for the bike... I tried not to let my thoughts turn negative though. It was a fun run! It was awesome to have Olivia there on the bike the entire way too because she's just having a grand time on that thing and is so happy, and it rubs off you know? Thanks Liv!

Anyway, a little ways into it, the only person ahead of me was Chris, and I didn't care about that because he's just so freaking fast! So I had great  thoughts! It's such a great feeling to be in the front! I'm so used to being towards the back of the pack! Eventually some other guy from brighton came up on me as we were running and I tried to go with him. But Tomy was in front and THE ONLY bike that was there was the one I used! So he was forced to wait for his partner to get his bike to him, and that was the first/last of any of the brighton people to come up on me :)

Really the only competition I had was Natalie and Chris. At the beginning I was ahead of Natalie, and it was great being the first girl!! I felt fast! Eventually Natalie had caught up to about where I was, and she would get the bike to Chris just as I would pick up the bike from the side of the road. And usually Tomy would be waiting for me to give him the bike. Sorry about that!

The last 2 miles seemed to be the hardest for me because it struck me that I was racing Natalie and Chris, and I felt like I needed to at least feel like I did good. On the bike the last time there was absolutely no downhill, just flat and uphill so there was no going super fast. :( But running that last mile was fun because I had known where the half mile mark was so I knew when I was getting close. Also, that last mile it was so scary because there was this huge group of cows and they were all staring at me, 2 of them were in the road, and I had to run so close to them!!!

When I finished I went out 1.5 and back to get 3. Bill said we could count 2 of the biking miles as running. So I got to 10. 

PM:

I went on a run with Natalie and Abigail!!! It was fun! 4 miles 

AM:

So we met at Liberty today, and we started by doing a lap on the wood chips. Then we went to the Granite track and did a mile of speed changes and came back. It took me a while to warmup, but then I did and I didn't have too much of a problem with staying with the group. But soon I started to fall off. When we got to the track, everyone had waited, and we started speed changes. They started a few seconds before me, and then I gave up and didn't wanna try to catch them. I wish I did. But after the mile, they waited again, and we also waited for the group farther back who were now not too far away. Then we started going again, this time headed back to Liberty, and Bill said to keep with the group, and that this was the part that makes you stronger, so keeping that in mind I tried to keep up with them. I was super sore from yesterday! I started to fall back but Bill was there to push me. Thanks for that! :) Then it hit me that the only girls in front of me were:

1) Olivia on a bike

2) in or entering college

That took my mind off of things for a while, thinking of how weird it's going to be when they all leave for college and when Olivia starts running again. 

When we got to Liberty, Bill had suggested we go to the tennis court drinking fountain so it wouldn't be uphill and a shorter distance. My mouth was so dry, I was all for it! Then we finished the outer loop back to the drinking fountain. I wanted to stop at 10.5, but Bill was like "Come on, it's only 10 minutes!" So he made me do another 1.5 miles to get to 12. We just did the wood chip lap again. Chris came with us too. We went pretty slow, so it wasn't too bad. I had just wanted to stop because I was tired, sore, and running another mile and a half just didn't seem that great. But Bill made me. And I'm glad he did! Thanks Bill!! 

PM:

We went to the Bonneville golf course I think it was. We did different "holes" for each one. We did 2 miles warmup, then we rolled the dice to see where we would start. We went over to the first one, set up the cone, then ran to the starts, and we would race! It was way fun!!! We did that for every singe one. I think we did 5. They were long too! Overall I was 7th! It doesn't really tell you much though because you start in different places. I ran back to the cars and a little bit more to get to 6.

I went for my own run today. I went 20 minutes, then I decided to keep going because I only had to go about 2.5 more miles. I had a side ache, but I tried my best to run through it. I really didn't start to warmup until about mile 3 or 4. But it would've bothered me if I had stopped at 77.5 for the week. So I kept going :)

This is the highest I have ever gone mileage wise, and, oddly, I feel great!!!