Nate's Blog

very slow and very short run today. Gorged myself at Logans house after the landscaping and was just glad to get any kind of run in. Happy Bday Logan!

started off the frist 1.5 at 8 min pace. Then dropped to 7 for 1.5 then 6:40 for 1.5 then 6:00 for .5 and was feeling so good that I dropped to 5:20 for .75. then I was close to home and thought I should cool down so slowed back to 8 for the last bit. Did foremaster loop.

Ran to airport to pick up my car that I left there earlier. Was feeling great and ran it in 49:51 so 6:56 miles. Did not intend on going that fast but couldn't help myself.

mile 1 7:03 riverside to Maverick

2 6:26 around formaster on riverside to river road

3 6:21 along riverside trail towards convention center dr

4 6:27 riverside to bluff

5 6:41 up bluff from riverside (startinf the climb)

6 7:23 starting to wear out on bluff uphill climb

7 8:05 up airport hill, the real climb (it's a half mile long)

.2 at 7:10 pace to cool down a bit

8 with the running club. Ran down to trail and on to riverside then to red cliffs and back to store.

Did not wear my garmin so I am not sure how fast we went but Bill and I got kind of carried away at the end and started going pretty good down red cliffs. Such a wild guy that Bill is...

What a great day for a race and what a great race. We ahd Bill, me, Dustin, James, and Hayden, and ran in that order, 5 miles each leg, two legs each. Bill ran the first leg and was in 3rd when he handed it off to me. We were just a few minutes behind and I started off at about 5:50 pace. I ran Dam to Dam 5 miler in Hurricane a few weeks ago at about 6:07 pace and so when I looked at the Garmin and saw sub 6 I decided to just see how it went. My splits were:

5:48, pretty level, slight uphill at the start

6:11, good uphill climb, saw 2nd place guy cresting the top as I came around the bend

5:39, slight downhill, wind at my back, felt great

5:39, same as mile 3

5:55, pretty good steady hill but I had passed #2 guy and had #1 guy in my sights at this point

.4 at 5:11 pace trying to catch #1 but he got there just ahead of me, maybe 10-15 seconds

Overall about 5:48 pace I think, which is awesome considering Dam to Dam at 6:07!

Now what about 2nd leg?

Dustin held our place against a strong 3rd leg runner for the High school team (+ Ross Decker, fast, but his son was on the team and is a Sr. in H.S.) While we waited for Dustin I ran a cool down with James who was warming up for the handoff with Dustin. As we finished our cooldown we saw the 1st place team coming in and then Dustin coming too. James didn't even have his bib number on so we lost 20-30 seconds waiting while Dustin gave the shirt off his back to James. Pretty tense for a minute but it turned out okay. James gained a bit on Ross and handed off to Hayden about 1 minute back. He smoked his leg at 5:13 pace and came in 1:30 ahead of 2nd place and handed off to Bill again. Bill's leg was all uphill along the river and the high school team's runner passed him right at the end of his leg. Their next runner sprinted out and Bill handed off to me just behind. I caught their runner less than a mile into it and never looked back. Splits:

5:52 feeling okay but could tell early that I did not have the energy to hold it

6:00 trying my best to keep it under 6, but I knew the 2nd place guy was struggling

6:12 really hard to focus, I knew 6:30 pace would keep me at least a minute ahead of 2nd place by the end but didn't want to settle for slower pace

6:08 ran past my house and my wife and kids were outside to cheer me on. dropped to 5:30 for .25 then the last hill from riverside to 3050 (costco rd) took it out of me

.4 at 6:30 figured there was no point, I knew I was done...

Overall 6:05 pace, pretty good considering I had run 5 miles at 5:48 and, once again, beat my Dam to Dam pace!

 We had a couple minutes on them by the time I handed off to Dustin again. Dustin did well on his leg and increased the lead even more even with a huge hill at the end on Washington Dam road. He handed off to James who had a straight climb that may have been close to .75 miles. Ross gained on James a bit and we had about a 3 minute lead when he gave it to Hayden. Once again, Hayden smoked it in, this time avg about 5:24 and we won by about 6 mins.

The day was awesome, had some great people to spend the 5 hours with, and we took first place, what more could we ask for? Maybe the course record? well we got that too! (first year race...)

Easy run today. Felt pretty good. Ankles a little ginger at start but warmed up quick.

felt a twinge in the hammy during the first 2 miles and it got worse as i ran. ran faster and it seemed to go away... we will see how it treats me tomorrow.

Hammy still sore and not sure I should run on it. Had a similar feeling with the calf a month ago and pushed through it and ended up having to take it easy for a week...

Easy pre raceday jog... hammy felt great so that is good news for tomorrow!

What a great race today... Sunny, nice temps, and great company.

Got to bed a little later than I wanted to last night but woke up feeling great. Got to the race to check in and get on the bus. Started to realize that I was a little dehydrated but no way to hydrate after getting on the bus. Did a few miles warm up with James, Dustin, Bill, and Ruth (Ruthio). But after having to "go" a couple times before the race thought maybe it was not dehydration, just dry mouth and lips.

Race started about 10-15 mins late, very unusual for St George City race, but had good company at starting line, even with the rogue runners...

Race started and a couple guys really took off. Ryan Newman and Dustin went off after them and James and I kind of held back just a bit. First mile in 5:12 but downhill quite a bit.. By the park exit it was just Dustin with a guy from up north I think, and then Ryan then me. Shortly after I passed Ryan thinking, "he is just gonna let me go by for now but I better watch my back..." About mile 4 I passed the second place guy and could tell he was starting to labor a bit. So it was Dustin leading by about 20-30 seconds, then me, fighting the urge to look back and see where Ryan and James were. As we rounded Snow Canyon Parkway headed to the church I glanced back and saw Ryan and James not too far behind. Ryan freaks me out cause he just doesn't look like he is really struggling ever and at any moment he could just drop a couple sub 5:00 miles...

Going up the hill from the church got me wondering if I started too fast on that downhill but after chasing that thought out of my head I told myself, "just over a mile to go and if I was going to catch Dustin I would have to go now." I gained on him a bit but by the time we finished the hill I needed a few seconds to ward off fatigue. By the time we hit the roundabout with .2 to go I realized I had lost focus and relaxed a bit too much and Ryan was right on my heels. Without thinking I just decided to pick it up until I couldn't sprint any faster.

I put a little distance between me and Ryan and realized I had gained quite a bit on Dustin so decided to keep it going and see if I could catch him. Soon realized I coundn't and started to back off a bit then I saw the clock....

34:50!!!

I was shooting for somewhere in the 36:00-37:00 range! But at this point I was not going to go over 35:00 and gave it one last push. Ended up finishing at 34:59!! My last 10k was almost 41 mins at summer games in June '08 and so this was a great surprise. I let Dustin beat me by 3 or 4 seconds so it is hard to be 100% excited but I really could not be happier with the time.

Splits:

5:12 -like I mentioned, quite a bit of downhill

5:43 -settling into a comfortable pace with a few hills in the park

5:30 -feeling good, more downhill

5:47 -hitting some more uphill through the houses

5:52 -everyone just kind of holding their place and waiting to make a move

5:53 -deceivingly slow as we had the uphill from the church, but this is where I was trying to make my move on Dustin

.21 in 1:02 -4:49 pace, but garmin says I got down to 4:06 pace at one point. I wish I could hold that pace for a mile!

Congrats Dustin and everyone else!

got up early to get some miles in with the intention of doing some more in the PM but never got back out... have to make a point of getting up early or I end up missing my runs altogether!

Ran washington feilds loop. started out faster than I wanted too then couldn't hold it back. Ended up doing about 6:30-6:40 pace until the last mile when I decided to slow myself down and relaxed at a 7:10 pace. I just felt so good today!

AM -5.55 Good slow run this morn. Felt a little slow after the long run at tempo pace yesterday. Try to do 4-5 more this afternoon to get the miles in but wanted to split it up to let myself recover.

PM 4.55 in the afternoon sun! Such nice weather out until you start to run! I guess I shouldn't complain as it is only going to get hotter!

Slow run today. Couldn't get going. But at least I got out. Tried to get out again in the afternoon with the club but wasn't able to make it.

Good long run today. Longest I've done since St. George Marathon. Feel pretty good after. didn't really get tired but the last mile I could start to feel my body telling me it was done.

I ran from my house down riverside then under the freew way at convention center and to my little bro David's house (new blogger, bundydavid.fastrunningblog.com) and did about 6 with him then ran home.

Kept a good 8 min pace pretty much the whole way. Picked it up to 7:00 at mile 19-20 just to see how I felt and felt pretty good. I am getting way excited for my next marathon to see how the whole 26.2 goes...

Not a lot of time for a run today so I jsut did the Foremaster loop. Good run but very windy!!!

Ran the fields loop. Ran it probably too fast but I had some aggression to get out of my system. Ran the first 8 at about 6:30 pace then backed off the last 2 and did them about 7:30. Felt pretty good the whole time until I backed it off!

Easy miles today. had to keep reminding myself to relax and loosen up. once I did, I felt pretty good.

Club run tonight. Was going to run the 4 miles from work to the store then run with the club but got out of the office a bit late and by the time I started running only got about a quarter mile before realizing I would not make it in time and ended up turning around to take the car instead. So ran about 9.4 with the club...