Same Time, Same Channel

Confession is good for the soul. I was too lazy and/or too intimidated by the cold and the hills to get out and run in the mountains yesterday and today.

In other news, I am back home in Colorado. The weather was tolerable to good for the drive home.

Easy run + 8 x 10 sec. hill sprints + level 3 shred.

5:05 am, 23°F, 68% humidity, wind 5 SSE.

Oh how I hate to get up in the morning. However, I'm glad I live in Colorado instead of Utah (sorry Utahns) since I'm a morning runner, because the sun rises earlier in Colorado than in Utah (also sets earlier, but that's another story). I could see some lighter sky on the eastern horizon by the time I finished my run just past 6:30 this morning, but I know from my experience last week that it is still pitch black in Utah at 6:30 in the morning right now.

I ran the the County Line loop and I started out pretty slowly, but then hurried up, particularly in the 6th and 7th miles because I was anxious to get to the rec center for a pit stop. Then I ran a little slower after that. I've got to reprogram my body to get up and function early in the morning after my 2 weeks of slothfulness.

I consider today the beginning of the new year for myself. I was still on vacation up through yesterday. Now it's back to the grind stone. I've got the kids all off to school, and I've still got to shower and get ready, run a couple of errands and get to work. I'm running a little late this morning because I had to stop after the first circuit in the shred and drive Thing 1 and his string bass to school this morning. I finished the shred when I got back. Maybe life will be easier next year when Thing 1 is gone off to college. Thing 2 doesn't play an instrument.

AP: 9:45. Splits: 10:02, 10:03, 9:56, 9:47, 9:40, 9:12, 8:52, 9:08. Pace on hill sprints: 6:35, 6:59, 7:14, 7:36, 6:49, 6:37, 7:06, 6:54.

Easy run.

5:19 am, 34°F, 47% humidity, wind 9 S.

I got out the door late this morning because I had to iron a shirt for my husband first. He usually does his own ironing, but he needed some help this morning. Then I had to stop midway through my run to give him some encouragement via cell phone. All this, combined with having to wait at some lights, resulting in my getting back later from my run than I would like to. I was afraid this would result in Thing 3 oversleeping because he's not very good about setting his alarm, or hearing it when it does go off, and I often have to wake him up when I get in from my run, so I called Thing 1 when I had about 2 miles to go and asked him to make sure that Thing 3 was up (Thing 2 was already gone to seminary). Now the hot water is all gone from the bathing of Things 1 and 3 and so I'm writing my blog entry and maybe I'll go eat breakfast while I wait for some hot water.

It was no easier to get up today than yesterday, even though I got to bed earlier last night.

AP: 9:46. Splits: 10:29, 10:09, 10:06, 9:51, 9:59, 9:32, 9:22, 9:30, 9:22, 9:25.

Tempo run. 2 miles easy, 4 miles @ 1/2M to 10K pace, 2 miles easy. Level 3 shred.

4:50 am, 36°F, 53% humidity, very slight SE wind at times.

I managed to get out and run before the cold front came in. It looks like the temperature is starting to drop, and we're supposed to be positively frigid tomorrow. I saw several runners out before 6 am this morning and that surprised me. Maybe it's the New Year's Resolution crowd.

I didn't sleep really well last night. I started waking up periodically at about 2:30. I was paranoid because I needed to get out to run early enough to be done in time to drive to seminary, and I haven't driven to seminary or run that early in several weeks.

I kind of a struggled on the first couple of miles of my tempo run and felt like I couldn't get going as fast as I thought I should. I wanted to hit 8:00 pace on those miles, but couldn't. Maybe it was because those miles were net uphill, or maybe I just don't do well with a tempo run the day after a 10 mile run. Maybe I need to switch my schedule around a little. I finally got going on the last tempo mile because I was going downhill by that time.

AP: 8:45. Splits: 9:47, 9:44, 8:12, 8:15, 8:08, 7:44, 8:56, 9:05, 0.29 @ 9:27.

First things first: Happy Birthday to Michelle!

I haven't run yet this morning because a) it's 4 degrees outside, and 2) it's my third son's 13th birthday and I had to prepare a birthday breakfast for him. I'm just going to do some work now in the wee hours of the cold dark morning, and then run later, after the kids have gone to school.

**Addendum**

8:52 am, 7-10°F, 64% humidity, winds calm.

I was going to go to work and run on the treadmill after I got all the kids off to school, but when I took my daughter to the bus stop, I realized that we had blue skies and sunshine. I was in kind of a bad mood and I decided that sunshine and fresh air, even if it was very cold, would do more to improve my mood than fluorescent lights and heated air in the fitness center would. So I covered myself in smartwool and strapped on my yaktrax and headed out the door.

I had 10 miles on my schedule, but I wasn't sure whether I wanted to go more than 6 in this weather. I have a 6-mile route and a 10-mile route that share a little more that the first 3 miles. So I ran those 3+ miles and then got to a corner and had to decide whether to turn and do the 6-mile route or go straight and do the 10-mile route. I was feeling relatively comfortable, so I went straight.

Some of the sidewalks had been plowed with varying levels of success and some hadn't, but the yaktrax were fine in all cases. I did hit one slipper spot where there must have been a sheet of ice under the snow, but had good traction other than that. I surprised myself a little by running slightly faster than I ran this same route on Tuesday (9:35 average pace vs 9:46 average pace).

AP: 9:35. Splits: 9:55, 9:42, 9:41, 9:26, 9:50, 9:37, 9:09, 9:22, 9:34, 9:38.

Easy run + level 3 shred.

9:15 am, 20-26°F, 36% humidity, wind 8 S, sunshine.

I was up late working last night. I was awake off and on between 4:30 and 5:30 this morning while my husband got ready for work, and then I went back to sleep until I had to get up at 6:15 to drive to seminary. After the drive to seminary, I did the shred. I often neglect to do the shred when I alter my routine and don't run first thing, so I made a point of doing it today.

I managed to get some work done while I was getting the kids off to school and then I finally got out for my run after the kids were off to school. I wore the same clothes that I wore yesterday (I washed them after my run yesterday) and I was a little too warm today. The temperature was warmer, but it was windier, so I thought that with the wind chill it would be like yesterday, but it wasn't quite.

I felt really sluggish when I started out, but I was feeling better by the end.

AP: 9:41. Splits: 10:08, 9:49, 9:46, 9:25, 9:34, 9:27, 0.20 @ 9:21.

I'm having trouble with Garmin Training Center this morning. I managed to get todays run uploaded and then it crashed and now I get an error every time I start it. I've tried reinstalling it, and no dice. I've sent the log file of my error to Garmin. I hope they're able to help me.

Long run.

7:28 am, 29-40° (it really warmed up over the course of my run), 30% humidity, wind 4 SSE.

I normally meet up with the Michelles at 7:30 on Saturday mornings, but I wanted to sleep in a bit, and so I pushed it back to 8:00. But I was running to Michelle's house, so I had to leave just before 7:28 (it would have been before 7:00 if I hadn't changed the time). I ran about 3.5 miles to Michelle's house. They were standing in the road waiting for me when I got there, so I just kept running and they joined me when I got to them. We took a hilly route that Michelle had run once before. It went through a couple of neighborhoods that I had not been in before, and I was impressed that she didn't get lost.

We ran 8 miles together and then I took a 2.5 mile route back home. On my way back, I saw Barbie out walking. I've seen her quite a bit recently, but it's usually when I'm driving kids to school in the morning. This is the first time in a while that I've seen her while I've been running.

When I got home I came into my house and changed into my VFFs. I had a nice little 1/2 mile route in my neighborhood and I was just going to do that, but after I did that I was feeling good and decided to do it again. My husband was waiting for me when I got home because I told him it would only be 5 minutes, but it turned out to be 10. I had a quick shower and then we went to IHOP. I like pancakes after a long run sometimes.

I'm hoping that we get no new snow and get some thawing the next week so that we can run on the trail next Saturday. I'm a little tired of pounding the streets all the time.

AP: 9:53. Splits: 9:30, 9:11, 9:07, 9:19, 9;56, 10:09, 10:32, 9:52, 10:29, 10:27, 10:06, 10:23, 9:39, 9:45, 9:55.

Easy run + level 3 shred.

5:16 am, 28°F, 46% humidity, wind 4 SSE, waning crescent moon.

It was chillier than I expected it to be this morning. I was dressed okay, but my face got kind of cold because I didn't wear my face cover. I usually wear that only if it's below 20 degrees.

I normally do hill sprints on Mondays, but I skipped them today because I needed to get home to the bathroom. I thought about going back out to do them, but I ended up having to deal with kids. I got home at 6:40 and I asked my 18-year-old son, who was still in bed, what time he needed to be to school, because he doesn't have a regular school day today. He's got an honor orchestra thing all day. He said that he had to be there at 6:45. It would have been nice if he would have told me that last night. So he hurried and got ready and I drove him and his bass to school. I got him there about 7:05, but the bus that's taking the kids downtown was still there. He says that in the 3 years he's done this honor orchestra, they've never left the school on time. We've got to go downtown tonight for the honor orchestra concert and to bring the boy and his bass home. I dislike driving downtown and would rather take the light rail, but we'll have to drive so that we can bring the bass home.

I ran the County Line Road loop. The hills didn't feel too bad, but I wasn't going terrifically fast either. My fastest mile was the last mile because of my aforementioned need to get home.

AP: 8.11. Splits: 10:07, 9:51, 9:53, 9:44, 9:49, 9:29, 9:40, 9:11.

Medium-length run.

5:03 am, 29-32°F. 33% humidity, wind 10 S, little sliver of a waning crescent moon.

My plan recently has been 10 miles on on Tuesday, 8 miles on Wednesday, and 10 miles on Thursday. I've been struggling to stick 4 tempo miles within that Wednesday run after the 10 miles on Tuesday. So I decided to change things up but I wanted to keep the overall mileage the same, so I shifted two miles from Wednesday to Tuesday so that I have 12 on Tuesday, 6 on Wednesday, and 10 on Thursday, and then I'll put the tempo miles in the Thursday run instead of on Wednesday. That way I can have a nice easy day before the tempo run. And I have the option to make the tempo run longer if I want to.

To follow up on some issues from yesterday, my son agreed to bring the bass home on the train, so that's what we did. But we didn't get home until late (we probably would have been just as late if I had driven) and I had some stuff to do when I got home because I hadn't really been home all day, so it was hard to get up to run this morning after only 5 hours of sleep, but I did it anyway. Speaking of my busy day yesterday, have I told you want a wonderful person Michelle is? She knew I had a busy day, but so did she, and she knew I didn't have much time or a plan to feed my family, and so she made a pan of enchiladas for my family. Isn't she great?!

In other news, my 2nd son chose walking to seminary two days/week over carpooling, so the carpool is officially ended. The carpool was convenient for me, but this arrangement isn't much worse for me, since I'll still drive only 3 days/week (with the carpool, I was driving 2 days/week). So he walked to seminary this morning so that I could do a long run.

I ran two different 6-mile loops this morning, the 2nd one being my standard 6-mile loop, so I've got some slower miles in the middle of the run when I hit the 3-mile uphill portion of the 2nd loop, in addition to the slow uphill 3 miles at the beginning of the first loop. OK. It was all pretty slow. It took me a long time to finish this run.

AP: 9:38. Splits: 9:56, 9:59, 9:57, 9:29, 9:12, 9:23, 9:39, 9;42, 9;45, 9:31, 9:42, 9:22, 0.28 @ 9:31.

Very slow easy run + 10 x 10 sec. hill sprints + level 3 shred.

5:04 am, 39°F, 26% humidity, wind 6 SSE.

I ran really slowly this morning. I didn't realize while I was running that I was going so slowly. Oh well. It was supposed to be an easy day anyway. I did the hill sprints since I skipped them on Monday.

I was up too late again last night. I had a Relief Society thing until about 9:00 and then I stayed up watching The Biggest Loser. I probably should have just gone to bed and saved TBL for tonight, but tonight I have to go to an orchestra festival at the middle school. It seems like I've got something every night this week, I just can't quite remember what's on Thursday.

AP: 10:14. Splits: 10:18, 10:04, 10:06, 9:55, 9:55, 9:54. Pace on hill sprints: 7:11, 6:44, 7:22, 6:56, 7:16, 7:10, 7:34, 6:35, 7:18, 6:58. It's weird how on those hill sprints I alternate between a slightly faster pace and a slightly slower pace. I don't do it intentionally.

I tried to compose haiku in my head while I was running. Maybe that's why I ran so slowly.

Auntie Em writes poems
I want to write one too
How is my first one?

Let me try another.

Up too late last night
Dark to bed and dark to rise
Sleep is short and sweet

OK. That's enough bad haiku for now.

Tempo run. 3 miles warm up, 5 miles @ 1/2M - 10K pace, 2 miles cool down.

5:14 am, 30°F, 53% humidity, winds calm.

I wore double gloves this morning and got too warm a little ways into the tempo portion, so I took one pair of gloves off and put them in my jacket pockets. At one point, one of them fell out. They're not expensive gloves, but still, it's a pain to lose a glove. I may drive around a little later and see if I can find it.

AP: 9:03. Splits: 10:29, 10:30, 10:09, 8:06, 8:29, 8:10, 7:53, 7:57, 9:22, 9:22.

Incidentally, I took a 2-hour nap yesterday afternoon, which I desperately needed, but it made it a little bit hard to fall asleep last night.

Here's today's haiku, which I composed while running this morning:

Increase your cadence
Relax your neck and shoulders
Run you tall puppet

Tired and worn down
My knees a little achy
So no run today

OK, so I lied. Really I just changed my mind.

12:35 pm, 52°F, 28% humidity, wind 6 E, beautiful, glorious sunshine!

I decided to take my pasty white hairy legs out in the sunshine wearing shorts and no socks. I was thinking of doing an easy 4 this afternoon (and I mean easy) and I thought it was a nice day for the VFFs. It was probably a little foolish since I've only run in the VFFs twice before the furthest run was 1 mile, I decided do do the whole 4 miles in the VFFs, thinking they would force me to employ a running form that was easier on my knees. It was harder on my calves, as I expected. The left one is feeling just a little tight. I'm going to go roll it.

I was slow. I guess I didn't speed up my cadence enough to compensate for the drastic reduction in the length of my stride from what I do in shoes.

AP: 10:08. Splits (HR in parentheses): 9:58 (132), 10:09 (142), 10:02 (140), 10:22 (139)

Also, this morning I did P90X yoga with the incomparable Michelle and another friend that we're trying to recruit to our Saturday running group.

Long run.

6:35 am, 36-44°F, 16% humidity, wind 4 SW.

I went up and looked at the trail yesterday and it looked good, so we decided to run on it today. Michelle was planning on 6 miles and I was planning on 16 and it's a little disheartening to still have 10 miles left when the others are finished. I realized that it was about 5 miles from my house to the rec center where we meet to run on the trail, and so I ran there this morning, ran with Michelle and Ali on the trail, and then ran back home.

It turned out that I didn't look at enough of the trail yesterday. It turned out to have a lot more snow and ice on it that I expected. It was slick in spots. Unfortunately, Ali twisted her ankle when we had a little less than a half mile to go, so we walked the rest of the way back. I hope her ankle is okay.

It turned out, as I figured it would, that running to the rec center was easier than running home from the rec center. Running there is gradually downhill all the way and I had the wind behind me. Coming home was gradually uphill and into the wind all the way.

AP: 9:46. Splits: 10:10, 9:46, 9:24, 9:29, 9:25, 9:54, 9:52, 9:58, 10:14, 10:23, 9:49, 9:52, 9:40, 9:23, 9:23, 9:37.

Easy run + 10 x 10 sec. hill sprints + level 3 shred.

7:17 am, 36°F, 52% humidity, wind 6 SSE.

I've got the day off work today, so I got to run with Michelle. She wanted to run 6 miles and I wanted to run 8 or so, so I took the shortest route I could from my house to her house, which is about 1.4 miles. We ran 6 miles together, and then I ran the same route back to my house, stopping when I was almost home to do the hill sprints.

It was fun running and talking with Michelle this morning, as it always is. And she did a great job picking up the pace at the end.

I've got a Garmin 205 and the Michelle's neighbor, the other Michelle, has a Garmin 405. The other Michelle wasn't with us today, but I've noticed times when all three of us run together, that Michelle's Garmin 405 says that we've gone slightly farther than my Garmin 205 says we have. That seems to consistently be the case. And so this morning we did the 6 miles based on what my Garmin said, and it was a little bit farther than Michelle has gone when running the same route based on the other Michelle's Garmin. I don't know why it's like that.

AP: 9:44. Splits: 1.4 miles to Michelle's house @ 9:52 pace, mile splits with Michelle - 9:43, 9:25, 9:38, 9:34, 9:32, 9:19, back to the hill sprint hill - 9:22, .18 @ 9:08 pace. Pace on hill sprints: 6:20, 7:24, 6:20, 6:28, 6:34, 6:26, 7:04, 6:27, 6:32, 6:00.

Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day everyone!

Incidentally, I didn't purposely make Garmin 205 a link. That happened automagically.

I felt good on my run Monday morning except for a little tightness in my left calf from running 4 miles in the VFFs last Friday. A couple of hours after my run, my left knee started hurting fairly significantly on the outside - ITB area. So I didn't run or do any exercise yesterday and was quite depressed all day about the knee.

I did some stretching during the day and iced the knee last night and it felt better this morning than it did yesterday, though it's not 100%.

Under normal circumstances, I would have run 8 miles today and done the shred. Because of the knee, I decided not to run again today, but with the extra time that gave me, I did my Jillian Michael's No More Trouble Zones video instead of the shred because it is almost an hour long, while the shred is only 20 minutes. Also, this video focuses on strength instead of doing a mixture of strength and cardio like the shred does. I didn't get up quite early enough to do the whole video before the drive to seminary, so I had to pause it in the middle and drive to seminary, and then finish it when I got home. There was only one exercise in the whole thing that hurt my knee, and I only did it for about a minute.

I've got an appointment with my ART guy this afternoon. I'm hoping with rest, stretching, ice, and ART, I can nip this thing in the bud and get back to running soon. On February 1 I start a marathon training plan for the Newport Oregon marathon. I'd rather take time off now than once I start that training plan. I hope I can get this issue resolved by then.

I went to my Active Release Technique (ART) guy yesterday afternoon and he really worked my legs. My knee is feeling okay today, but I decided to hold off running for one more day. So I went to the gym at my office and stuck needles into my eyes did the elliptical for a half hour and the bike for a half hour. I did not work terrifically hard on either one of them.

When I pointed out the location of my pain to my ART guy, he said that it was low for the IT band. And so now I'm thinking that maybe my problem wasn't the IT band, but something related to the calf soreness I acquired when I foolishly ran 4 miles in the VFFs last Friday. I think I'll try a short run tomorrow.

Easy run + level 3 shred.

6:50 am, 30°F, 66% humidity, winds calm, cloudy.

I flirted with the snooze alarm for over an hour this morning. My kids don't have school today and it turns out that my need to go to work, when you take away the need to get kids to school, is insufficient impetus to get me out of bed in the morning. I finally got up when my husband called me when he got to work at 6:20, as is his habit.

My knee felt fine until the last mile and then it just felt a little fatigued. I plan to run tomorrow, but just a normal length run, not a long run. Then Sunday is off, and I'll take a relatively easy week next week before starting formal marathon training the week after that.

AP: 9:50. Splits: 9:57, 9:59, 9:55, 9:41, 9:35, 9:54.

Easy run.

7:15 am, 24-35°F, 40% humidity, wind 5 SW.

We had a little miscommunication about the meeting place this morning. As a result, Ali, who ran with us last week and twisted her ankle, didn't run with us this morning. So it was me and the two Michelles and we ran on the streets rather than the trail. I further messed things up by pausing my watch and while waiting to cross a street and then neglecting to restart it until over 2 miles later. So I'm not posting splits today because they're messed up. And I had to use mapmyrun.com to figure out my total distance and a pace calculator to get my average pace, so I just have imprecise stats today. I'm figuring my average pace as about 9:48.

In any case, I ran 1.4 miles to the meeting spot, then ran with the Michelles, and then ran about 1.5 home. When we were almost to where I split from the Michelles at the end, Michelle #1 wanted to pick up the pace and boy did she sprint to the end. I couldn't keep up with her.

My knee felt a little strange but I wouldn't really call it pain.

Short easy run.

5:47 am, 25°F, 35% humidity, wind 3 SSW.

I had a fair amount of pain in me knee the rest of the day Saturday after my 10 mile run. The knee felt somewhat better, but not pain free, on Sunday. So I decided to just do a short run today in order to determine whether the problem on Saturday was that I ran too long or that I ran at all.

I had a couple of little twinges in the knee that just lasted for a second during my run this morning. Since then, my knee is feeling about like it did on Sunday, but I'll just have to see how the rest of the day goes. I think another visit to the ART guy might be called for this week.

AP: 9:35. Splits: 10:03, 9:30, 9:14, 0.42 @ 9:26.

My short run yesterday didn't make my knee feel worse during the day yesterday. But for some reason it's feeling just a little sore this morning. So I didn't run this morning. I'm hoping that a day or two of rest can heal this thing up. It's not bad - just a minor pain. But I can't seem to get it to go completely away.

My not running is a boon to my seminary attending son. I normally make him walk on Tuesdays while I run long, but I drove him today. I saw the Michelles out on their run this morning when I was doing the seminary drop off.

Easy run.

5:31 am, 27°F, 59% humidity, winds calm.

My knee felt okay but not perfect on this run. I'll just have to see how it feels the rest of the day. If it doesn't bother me too much during the day, I'll run again tomorrow.

I could hear a car alarm going off somewhere for about the first half of my run. The sound carried well in the early morning quiet.

I saw stiff-arm old man running when I was driving to seminary after my run. I thought he only ran on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but I guess I was wrong.

AP: 9:50. Splits: 10:09, 10:01, 9:46, 9:41, 0.57 @ 9:21.

Easy run.

5:17 am, 26°F, 88% humidity, winds calm, a very light dusting of snow on the ground and slick in spots.

My husband is out of town, so I had to get myself up without the help of him also getting up at 4:30. I hit the snooze alarm some and made it out the door just in time to run for one hour before driving to seminary.

The knee was tolerable.

When I was driving to seminary right after my run, it was very foggy in spots. I had just run through one of the really foggy spots, but I didn't notice the fog when I was running. I don't know if it was there and I just didn't notice it, or if it rolled in right after my run. I'm inclined to think it was the latter because now it's really foggy and possibly snowing. I suppose I ran during the best weather we'll have all morning, or maybe all day.

AP: 9:36. Splits: 9:45, 9:50, 9:50, 9:27, 9:26, 9:26, 0.24 @ 9:12.

I went to Michelle's house last night and we did a yoga video together. We talked to much and didn't pay attention to the video because her son had to keep telling us we were doing it wrong when the video switched to a different pose and we didn't.

Easy run.

5:11 am, 24°F, 89% humidity, winds calm, full moon.

It was a little foggy at the beginning of my run but then the fog lifted.

Right after I started my run I tried to turn on the backlight on my Garmin. In so doing, I apparently hit the Stop button with my fat-gloved hand. The next time I looked at my watch I was at about the 2 mile mark, but my watch said 85 feet. So once again, I don't have good stats today. I ran the same distance that I ran yesterday, but I think I was a minute or two slower today.

I've been having trouble getting out of bed on time this week. Undoubtedly it's because I've also been having trouble getting to bed at a decent hour. I've really got to do better next week, particularly since I have longer runs scheduled.

I have about 5000 things I need to do today in addition to my regular full-time job.

Medium-long run.

7:35 am, 27-39°F, 31-16% humidity, wind 2 WSW.

I ran the Highline Canal Trail today with Michelle, Michelle, and Carly. There are still some snowy spots, but the trail wasn't too bad. Carly was running 7 miles today, so we did that with her and then Michelle, Michelle, and I did 5 more. Carly got a side stitch and so we slowed down and stopped some during the 6th and 7th miles for her. Michelle likes to do a fast finish, and so we sped up when we had about .4 miles to go. I should have hit the lap button so that I would have an average pace for the fast portion, but I didn't. However, I think we averaged right around 7:00 pace. I thought maybe we sped up a bit after Carly stopped, but we really didn't until we got to that last fast bit.

My knee was bugging me just slightly yesterday and this morning, but it felt okay during the run.

AP: 9:53. Splits: 10:04, 9:48, 9:45, 10:03, 9:53, 10:22, 10:01, 10:01, 10:00, 9:57, 9:52, 8:49.