Every Race is an Adventure!

After Saturday's run up Mt. Timpanogos, this morning's run wasn't much more than a "loosen up my legs" run. I can feel a little soreness in my quads, but surprisingly I feel pretty good. I only averaged a 9:11 pace this morning, but the first mile was 10:54, so I did gradually speed up as my legs loosened up.

At lunch time, I ended up running alone again. It was probably a good thing. I wouldn't have been able to keep up. My quads still felt a little sore, especially as I started the downhill halfway through. My legs didn't have much zip in them. I ran the 5 miles in 41:55 (8:23/mi = 8:48/mi up, 8:00/mi down).

Larry committed to help Kent pour concrete at 6am this morning, so Wayne and I skipped going to the track and ran the Lindon loop instead. I was up early so I ran 1.3 easy miles before meeting up with Wayne. I felt fine during the 1.3 miles and the first mile with Wayne, but then I started feeling some tightness and a little pain on the backside of my right knee. My legs have been a little tired from the long run up Timp on Saturday, but generally they've been feeling really good lately. I'm not sure what triggered this pain today. I didn't run hard yesterday, and we weren't pushing the pace very hard this morning. In addition to my quads being a little sore from Saturday, I also felt a little tightness in my right calf. Maybe running the steep Eagles View hill yesterday stressed the already fatigued calf causing it to tighten up into my knee. I may have also bumped my mileage up too quickly over the past couple of weeks. I think I'm going to have to back off a little until I can figure out what's up with this pain I felt this morning. Bummer! I was feeling so good about how my running was going. At least I still have some time before St. George.

I ran the 20-miler from Trefoil to the lake this morning with Larry, Wayne, and Nathan. It was overcast with a light rain falling for most of the run. It was nice not having the hot sun bearing down on us, but by the end of the run I was so wet water was dripping off my shorts.

We all ran together until Nunn's Park, then Nathan and Wayne gradually pulled away never to be seen again until the end. When Larry and I stopped at Will's Pit Stop, Larry convinced me to try to catch up to Nathan and Wayne. I averaged 8:00-8:15/mi for the next four to five miles but then I started to feel the pain behind my right knee again so I backed off and ran the last couple of miles quite slowly. It didn't hurt at all at the slower pace, and wasn't really hurting too badly at the quicker pace, I just didn't want to risk aggravating it.

All in all it was a good run. I finished in under 3 hours and had pretty good energy throughout.