Running Blog

Today all the 800 girls had 35 minutes easy so we were all going to go together but Sydney had to leave early so Heather went with her and Megan and I went together. We had a full set of drills before. Then we just ran down 8th. It was very quiet because Megan and I are kinda the same type of person (we'll talk to you if you talk to us first). It felt way good though and I got into that zone where I was so wrapped up in my thoughts (does it surprise anyone that they were about uses of grammar in different circumstances?) that I forgot I was even running. It felt way good. Then strides were good except the grass was freezing cold. Core was just 7/8 with push ups and dips as supplementals. I think we were supposed to do med. ball too but we didn't. 

20 minute warm up then hills with Megan and Sydney. Coach came and watched us this time. We did 4x35m warm-up hills, 4x70m progression hills, and 4x60m acceleration hills. They felt good- much better than last week. The one thing I really need to work on is my arms. I've never paid attention to my arms before, but Coach says I really need to focus on driving them from hip to chin. He also said my turnover is sorta slow, so I'll be working on that too. It's good to get feedback on form, because I've never had any real instruction on form before- I was always getting yelled at for my breathing (okay, not really yelled at, but still). So now I'm super conscious about my breathing (especially around this team because they've never heard how out-of-whack it can get), but I hardly ever think about my form. So I thought it was a pretty productive practice; even though it wasn't particularly hard, it was really technical and I got a lot out of it. We cooled down 12 minutes back to the track and then did legs. I did a 15 minute ice bath in the training room with Janz after.

35 minutes easy on my own, since Coach and the girls on the conference roster left today. I have no idea if the 800 girls met today or not.. I just decided to head out down 8th by myself. Then a set of 7 min core. Probably should have done an 8 minute set too but I didn't. Felt good today.

Did not feel well at all today- I got a sore throat at some point during the night and then started feeling nauseous and sorta dizzy partway through the day. Also I fell off my bed (approximately 5 feet off the ground) while trying to close the window last night and smashed into my desk- pencils went flying. So to say I felt a bit off today is an understatement. I considered skipping the run and taking a fabulously long nap in hopes of feeling better, but decided against it.

I decided to meet at the track at a little bit after regular practice time in case the 800 girls decided to meet up today (they're always late). However, because of my irritating inability to be late for anything (although, I admit, it's not nearly as irritating as my mother's incredible ability to be late to EVERYTHING), I showed up at 3:03 (practice is at 3:10). After about four minutes, I got sick of waiting, so I left before finding out if anyone was meeting up.

I went down to the Island Trail and was having a grand old run until I hit a slight snag: I passed a nice old man standing on one of the bridges over the canal. He said "hi" and I said "hi" and then he said "have a nice run" and I said "thanks" and I kept running. But then I looked at my watch and realized I was 3 minutes away from the turnaround point, meaning I'd probably have to pass him again on the way back. And then my social anxiety started to set in. I hate passing someone twice on a run- mostly when I'm by myself. Not for any sensible reason, it just makes me feel super awkward and anxious. Generally I'd just turn down another road on the way back and avoid the situation altogether. But I was on the Island Trail, meaning I was stuck between a canal and a cliff with a friendly old man standing between me and the only way out. So the only feasible solution was to take extra long before turning around. So I ran an extra 2.5 minutes to make it an even 20, then stopped and stretched for a ridiculously long time. Then I got up and started running back- slowly. Then I hit my second snag: I passed two of the USU guys running the opposite direction. This didn't seem like a problem at first (except for the fact that they said "well, look who it is," thus implying that they know me, and I didn't recognize them at all) until I realized that at some point they would be turning around as well and with me going as slow as I was, they'd probably pass me again. This caused me even more anxiety than the old man, so I picked up the pace and tried to get off of that stupid trail as quickly as possible (good news: the old man had left and the guys never passed me again). I had a pretty good pace going the entire way back, so the run ended up being like 37ish minutes (my watch didn't restart after a stoplight at 34 minutes, so that's an estimate). Then I had 8xstrides on the practice field and a full set of legs. I didn't actually remember all the leg exercises though, so I just kinda did what I knew, plus some that I probably made up in my mind. I felt not so sick afterward though, so that's way good.

And that's the personal account of my 40 minute run by myself. My ability to turn a relatively uneventful run into a story as long as the run itself astounds me. It's a fairly useless skill, but hey. I'll take what I can get.

Didn't run yesterday- I'm still feeling like crap. Haven't gotten much sleep the past few nights because I can't breathe when I lie down. But I couldn't skip two in a row, especially the long run, so 50 minutes today. We were supposed to run on a trail but I only know two trails and neither sounded fun for a long run so I ran out to Green Canyon Trail and back, which ended up being exactly 50 minutes. I did have to run up a forever long hill to get there though and my calves and arches definitely felt it. Sort of did legs after but I'm just not feeling it this week.  After work today I will be nonstop resting til Monday.