Psalm 91:1 NKJV He who dwells in the secret place

I didn't have a lot of energy today to get up and run, because our two year old son kept my wife and I up all night, because of sickness.  He had a 102 fever and was losing is voice.  My wife and I seriously only got about 3 hours of sleep.  We took him to the doctor at 9am this morning and he has a rapid respiratory infection, and has to use a Nebulizer every 4 hours.  If it doesn't get better by tomorrow the Clinic wants us to take him back, because their concerned with his breathing.

 I did run today though at 6:40am with the dog for 6.5 at a 7:19 pace.  Then I ran little faster to get some marathon pace miles in  (6:31, 6:27, 6:07) for being tired the first one was hard but than the last two seemed easy.

I ran the race course that I will be running Saturday this morning.  What's nice it starts at our University Football Stadium. and ends there.  The gym is right next door where I can take a shower and go to work.  I get in free because I'm an University State employee, which is nice because I don't have to drive all the way home take a shower then go to work.

Back to the run....
I took the first two uphill miles easy (which I'll probably do in the race 6:54, 6:54) then I started to pick it up (5:47, 5:24, 5:47) and the last uphill mile at 6:08.  After that I ran 4 cool down miles (6:44, 6:57,6:30,6:58).  Its a fun route except for the first two uphill miles and the last uphill mile.  

Total 10.05 miles at a 6:25 pace in 1:04

This might be the fastest all run it than the actual race, because I might have to work from 9pm Friday night to 7am Saturday morning, and the race starts at 8am Saturday morning.  We have to bring down everyone of our computer systems at our University for a power upgrade, which has never been done before, so I'm thinking it's going to take time to bring them down and up, and I'm sure there will be issues.  I'm hoping this won't take all night, but if it does I'll be doing the race on tired dead legs.  

 14 - 16 miler tomorrow on Pocatello marathon course (early, dayoff).
 

Today I got up at 5am to ride to the Pocatello Marathon course. I got 3 hours of sleep last night because of our next door neighbors lighting fireworks till 2am. I can't remember the last time when I woke up this tired and no energy it was awful.

My pastor, sister-in-law, cousin and his friend were also going with me. We were all running the course, because they are also doing the marathon. This will be my pastor's first marathon, and my sister-in-laws second marathon, my cousin's first marathon, and his friend is actually doing the TOU marathon and he's done three marathon's with his best time at 3:25. Now they were going to run at a 9-10 minute mile pace so I won't be running with them because I wanted to do some marathon pace miles on my new Ohana Ascis Racers which I only had 17 miles on. I want these to be my marathon shoe so I needed to test them on a long training run. They fit so good where the DS Trainers are really tight on me. 

I really ran with little effort. I was amazed how easy the 17 mile run was at a finishing pace of 6:29 ( I cooled-down the last three miles). Was it the new shoes? Muscle memory from running the course so much? The fact that I was dead tired and no energy before we started? I was thinking I wish the marathon could have been this morning. Sometimes I think your running is all in sync and everything comes together. I've had several runs like this lately.

Splits

1. 6:40 (warming up)
2. 6:21
3. 6:22 (feeling good)
4. 6:12 (was easy but want to stay consistent around 6:30)
5. 6.22 (too easy)
6. 6:14 (little effort still)
7. 6:21
8. 6:21 (still feeling no effort needed at this pace)
9. 7:45 (Alert Brown Code, good thing I carried toilet paper)
10. 6:08 (easy)
11. 6:09 (easy but still need to drop pace to be consistent)
12. 6:22
13  6:17
14. 6:28 (still easy pace)
15  6: 42 (Start cool down up major hill)
16. 6:44
17. 6:45

Totals 17.22 miles at 6:29 in 1:51.

Easy run today, 8 miles with the dog and 2 by myself at a 7:35 pace overall.  My hip was hurting a little when I woke up.  Because last night I was vacuuming my truck to get ready to go camping all next week and I leaned my hip on a bolt sticking straight up.  It actually developed into a good bruise and it hurts a little. I was going to take this run easy anyway.  I wanted to do 10 x 100 strides afterwards, but the time was too late.

I ran 6.37 miles today only, at a 6:56 pace. I wanted to be somewhat fresh for tomorrow's race since I have to work all night. I may get done to at least get 3 hours of sleep I'm hoping.. Normally I would run longer, but I wanted my body to be more rested. I did do 10 x 100 strides after the run just to get a little speed in before tomorrow's race.

I really don't know how I'll do, it depends if I can get some rest today. The course to the race is very hilly which really doesn't bother me at all. It will be fun. No prize money for the winner or anything, Pocatello doesn't do that with any of the races. I'm definitely going to wear my Mizuno Idaten racing flats to make my feet feel light.

This race was fun and memorable. First off I had to work all night . Our staff had to power off every system, router, and device in our Computer Center so rewiring could be done in our Computer Center. I did get two hours of sleep from 2am to 4am during the rewiring, power phase, then we powered everything up and got done at 7:10 (to power everything up and make sure everything is working takes quite a bit of time!). I raced home got my bib number and headed up to the start of the race which was at 8am. This left me no time for a warm-up.

The first mile I felt tired and sluggish, and my legs felt like bricks (1 mile 6:36p). The first 2 miles are very hard uphill miles so being tired and running this course definitely wasn't to my advantage. The next mile, "still feeling like I was dead on my feet", I was in second place at (6:42p). Now mile three is one that I've ran a lot in my training, and I enjoy running because of the rolling hills. I past the guy that was in first place here (5:47p). I knew I would eventually caught him because he shot out like a cannon the first 2 miles and ran too fast, but I still wasn't that confident that I would, because I didn't feel in a groove at all. Now the 4th mile is downhill for almost half a mile, and the rest of the half is flat (5:20p). I was feeling better on this mile, but still not in a groove. In fact my wife drove by me and told me I was a minute ahead of the guy in second (so I thought I was in first place, more about that later). The last two miles are a gradual uphill and I did those in 5:53, and 6:14.  I didn't really push the last two miles as hard as I could have I just floated along thinking that a vault zero soda with caffeine sounded good.  I probably should have tried to push  hard, but I was worried about injury with being tired and not having a warm-up.  Also according to my Garmin  the race was 6 miles rather than 6.2 so it was 200m short according to my garmin.

Now I thought I finished first at 36:35, but there was another runner that finished in 32:59. The funny thing is I never saw this runner through the whole race ahead of me. But runners behind me told me that he turned up the wrong road. He turned up the shorter road before the big hills, Alvin Ricken Rd. rather than American Rd. so he basically ran a shorter route. This road that he turned down will come out at the same place as the other road and allow you to get back on the race course again, but like I said it's a shorter road and the wrong race route. I bet it cuts off at least half a mile or longer on the course. I didn't complain to the race director, but other runners did. I would have if it wasn't just a fun run and no real price for the winner. But this explains why I never saw the runner.

Later that day I ran another 9.8 miles.

5 mile run on my 36 birthday right before heading out for a week of vacation to ride my Atv's, fish and do some mountain running, but most of all spend time with my family. (average pace 6:40)

All my runs from Monday to Saturday will be done at Pebble Creek Big Springs Campground with the altitude starting at 6300ft.

Started at 6300ft and went up to 6700ft on a trail then went back down to around 6330ft.  Overall pace 7:12 for 6.5 miles. 

Today's I started at 6300ft and went up to 6900ft in the first two miles on another trail at Pebble Creek Big Springs camp ground.

I ran 8 miles at a 7:02 pace. The altitude hasn't seemed any different when running in Pocatello around 4500ft.   I really haven't noticed a change.

Wednesday was a pretty cool run, because I can actually say I run from the top of Pebble Creek Big Springs Campground to Lava Hot Springs at an altitude starting at 6,300ft and ending at 5000ft.  The run was 19.5 miles at a 6:45 pace.  Really about the first 6 miles is downhill and the rest is sort of rolling hills.  After that my family drove to Lava and we went swimming at their awesome swimming facility

Ran more trails at Pebble Creek, basically all over the campground. I ran up boundary trail, Inkom Pass trail and I saw four deer, and one was a two point. The hill and altitude training I'm getting up here is awesome. I couldn't ask for more fun. 8 miles at a 7:31 pace today.

I also did a lot of ATV'ing with my family today.

Pretty much the same run as yesterday.  I ran mill uphill than anything.  Pebble Creek has an amazing amount of trails you can choose from.  Pace was 7:24.

Today I ran 4 miles downhill and 4 miles back up the hill.

Overall pace 6:39.  This would be my last run at Pebble Creek Campground so I pushed the pace to finish my final run. 

Morning run I did 10.3 miles.  The last 5 miles I picked up the pace to finish with some tempo miles on a flat course (6:23, 6:14, 6:04, 5:58, and 6:24).  The first 5 miles of this course is uphill on my standard Satterfield St. route.

Lunch I did 3:3 miles on the treadmill.  The last two miles I did at 6:00 minute mile pace with the grade at an average of 1.5% and max at 3.5%.  I wanted to go faster but the treadmill was limited to 10mph.

I need to caught up on my runs from last week

This morning I ran 11.04 miles at a 6:31 pace.  Good run and felt strong through the whole thing.  I ran a different route that was mostly flat with a small overpass to go over.  I felt really good staying at a consistent pace where the effort didn't seem to hard. 

Missing the Des News marathon this year is really upsetting, because I really want to run it.  Yet I don't think I could consciously talk myself running it as a training run.   I really like and enjoyed the course last year. 

Ran with the dog today for 6.3 miles at a slow 7:21 pace.  I didn't have any spare time at all today to run more, because I had to run my Grandma up to the hospital in Idaho Falls for problems with her retina.  Also my daughter has had a urinary tract infection since Saturday and her temperature hasn't gone below 100, so for the last two days we've had to run her up to the hospital for IV treatments.  What a week after a wonderful vacation.

Running statistics today 11.2 miles at a 6:17 pace in 1:09.

I did a tempo run today, but I couldn't hold the high 5 minute mile pace, because beginning the 4th mile the high winds knocked me down (5:51, 5:57, 5:46, 6:04, 6:17, 6:08, 6:06) cool-down (6:37, 6:45).

Also my big toe has been infected the last two days and its starting to streak a red line down my toe. I'm probably going to the doctor tomorrow to get it checked. I'm sure I'll receive an antibiotic for it. Of course I've still been running on it. I banged my toe camping which cut it and bruised it and that's what caused the infection.

Here's the picture.

Today I ran 10.4 miles at a 7:01 pace in 1:12 I my infected big toe. This is probably not smart, but I do have a doctor's appointment at 10:30am today to get it looked at. My big toe hurt with every step a little, but I really did feel like I had to alter my running in anyway. I just ran with the pain, and got through it. Seven miles of the run I ran with my dog, who saved me from getting attacked by a unleashed Great Dane. He stood up to the Great Dane and wouldn't back down, because the funny thing is the dog was trying to attack me and not my dog. I really have a very special strong dog, and he deserved a big treat today.

Update on my doctor's appointment:

I had a 102 fever at the doctors office, my Lymph Nodes were swollen, and I had a staph infection going up the toe. They immediately gave me a oral shot in the butt and I'm on antibiotics for ten days. The doctor said under no circumstances can I run for two days, and I have to get rechecked Monday. The doctor gave me a lecture about running this morning. He said if you have pain doing something why complicate the issue and do it. Anyway no long run for me this weekend... BUMMER! The doctor said you are lucky you came in today, because the infection could have spread.

I don't think I could run anyway, that shot made my butt and lower back so sore that I walk like a penguin.

 (Past the 1900 mark today).
 

No running today, letting the infection in my Big Toe heal.  It's looking better and I should be able to run by Monday.

After two days off taking care of my infected foot with antibiotics and rest I ran this morning. I do have a doctor's appointment at 4pm today to do a re-check on my toe. There's still a little infection left, but I had no pain running this morning.

I ran 10.22 miles today at a overall pace of 6:48 in 1:09. After the two days off my legs felt fresh, but I didn't want to push the pace in the beginning so I did some faster miles at the end of the run (6:41, 6:28, 6:10, 5:57). I really need to get back on the track for speed work . I haven't done any speed work for three weeks, but I've done a lot of tempo runs in my runs to keep my speed up. I really need to start pressing harder in my tempo runs to drop the mile average down to at least a 5:40 I think that really needs to be my main focus to get faster, and accompany this with long endurance runs with tempo miles in them too.

 PM. two miles tonight downhill.  My wife let me out of the car about to 2 miles from our Dog's obedience class and I ran the rest home.  I wanted to get a taste of running in the 90 degree heat which I really did feel.  Probably because I only ran two miles.

Today I ran my standard Satterfield hilly loop 11.1 miles at a 6:39 pace in 1:14. Into the 6th mile I was caught into a thunderstorm that made me do a mini tempo towards the end (6:17, 5:55,6:06,6:01) cool-down 6:25.  I can't remember the last time I was this soaked, but it was a good soak because of the warm temperatures.  My big toe is looking great with no more infection even after the rain soaking my feet. 

I like this course because it's a challenge to get up the hill every week, and then you know how good your fitness is after you get up the to see how well your legs handle the flat part and the downhill part.
 

AM: Easy run for 7 miles with the dog than I picked it up for the last three miles (6:48, 6:22, 5:57). Total 10.5 miles at a 7:02 pace in 1:14. The run felt easy I had to push my dog over a couple hills. I've sort of done a mini tempo run on the last three runs. I'm just trying to mix the training up a bit. I feel my fitness is there for a good marathon time

Lunch: 3.5 miles (6:53, 6:34,6:10).

This morning I ran an easy 12.31 at a 7:02 pace.  I picked  it up the last four miles (6:34, 6:31,6:12, 6:19). Eight of the miles I ran with the dog.  Probably starting next week the dog is going to have to stay home so I can get serious running in before the Sept. 1st Poky Marathon.  The weather was overcast today so I wasn't burning up like yesterday.  But it was my own fault for getting hot yesterday, I picked the wrong type of clothes to wear. 

 
Tomorrow I plan on doing my long run of 18 to 20 miles, because I can't do it Saturday, because were having a church yard sale to raise money for kids to go to church camp, and that is way more important than my running.

Lunch:   6.2 miles at a 6:49 pace, and most of it in a nice drizzling rain. I ran a couple rolling hills which was good conditioning for the run. 

Today I ran 22.80 miles of the Pocatello Marathon course at a 6:44 pace,  just trying to keep it easy no fast miles.  I started running at 4:50am, and WOW! it's dark when your up at a 6100 altitude.  Every curve in the road seemed different and I definitely didn't follow the correct running Tangent for the course.  I felt really good, and new that I could really pick it up towards the end if I wanted too.  It took me 2:32 to finish which is great being on my feet that long, because I really wanted to test my Asics Ohana Racer shoes.   The course is a lot like Des News  except you have a decent hill at mile 20 that's less than half a mile long.  Now a nice recovery run tomorrow.

Morning run:

6.6 miles today with the dog at an easy pace. I ran late in the day in the 90 degree weather, and

I could tell my dog was feeling it. This was a recovery run from the 22 miles yesterday, and I just ran around our neighborhood.

Tonight at 10pm I went to the track and did some warm-up miles then ran 10 x 100m strides. Total mileage 5.1 at an overall pace of 6:44.

This morning I didn't even want to get out of bed, and I really didn't stay up late only till 11pm. Also for a bizarre reason I was sore, and I didn't even run yesterday. But I did spend three hours out in the 100 degree weather vacuuming out all three of our cars so maybe the twisting in and out of the cars caused my soreness. Anyway I ran 8.6 miles at a 6:57 on a hilly course. In order for me to perform well in the Pocatello Marathon on September 1st, I'm really going to have to do well on the rolling hills in the second part of the course from miles 16 -21. This is were most runners will be tested on their fitness level.

Lunch I ran 4.4 with the dog in 93 degree weather. It really didn't feel too bad, because I was only going at a 7:14 per mile. I just did a complete 4 mile loop around my neighborhood.

Today my morning was different than usual, because of the activities the night before. My daughter is in a fast-pitch softball tournament where she had two back to back games (they won the first one and lost the next, and their the top seed). We never got home until after 9pm and still didn't have dinner yet. We ordered pizza and I was so hungry I had eight pieces. The last time I ate was 1pm in the afternoon so I downed them like I was in an eating contest. Tonight we have same situation where she has two games again, but I will eat healthier tonight, I haven't been doing that lately.

The food I ate last night felt like it was stuck in my ribs this morning, and I wanted to do speed work on the track. It took me 4 miles to warm-up, because my stomach felt very heavy. I did 8 x 400 with a pretty decent jog of 200s in between, not really what you would call a rest. I was keeping track of my splits on my IronMan watch and I messed up. The first split was 1:23 and the next was 1:26, 1:20, and the rest were messed up. Then I did some MP miles (6:33, 6:27, 6:41, 6:24 and a cool-down 6:55). Totals 12.1 miles at an overall pace of 6:30.

My daughter's team messed up bad where they should have won both games, but they can redeem themselves tonight and still win the championship. I told her just have fun.

What watch would you recommend to keep track of spilts on a track?

I ran .3 with my daughter tonight.