Everything Counts

8.1 miles easy on Rail Trail and through the Freeport Center with Denver, Bryant, Dave, Jared, and Ben, avg pace 7:26/mile.

ONE-HOUR FARTLEK: 20X60 SECONDS ON/OFF AND 20X30 SECONDS ON/OFF

I met Bryant and Albert at Farmington Station. We warmed up three miles with a few strides and then did the fartlek. Bryant and I averaged roughly 4:51/mile for the 60-second pickups and 4:38/mile on the 30-second pickups. It was great to see and run with Albert again.

AM: 8.75 miles easy with Denver.

PM: 4.55 miles from Adam's Canyon trailhead after work and before helping my brother move, avg pace 7:15/mile.

8.6 miles easy from Uintah Trailhead, up Adam's Toll, down thru Terrace, and back on Parkway, avg pace 6:58/mile.

2-HOUR LONG RUN WITH 60-MINUTE AEROBIC BUILDER

I met Bryant and Hales at Kent's Market. We ran South on the Rail Trail to Gentile. From there we started our hour tempo, down to Syracuse Trail and then back up on the SR-193 trail. Hales and I got about 10.7 miles in during the hour at 5:34/mile pace. Cool down back to the car, total pace was 6:15/mile for the whole run.

10.25 miles easy with Ken, Denver, Ben, Matt, Jared, and Dave, avg pace 7:23/mile. Daylight Theft Time finally came to an end! Glorious day! There was light at the end of our run.

4 miles easy around my neighborhood at 4:00 am before a long day of travel to Ibigawa, Japan, avg pace 6:26/mile with 4 strides included.

No run. This day basically doesn't exist when you travel across the International Date Line.

6 miles easy in Ibigawa with Denver and Michiaki (our host), avg pace 7:54/mile.

5.3 miles easy with Denver up and down the canyon, avg pace 7:37/mile.

These photos are all mostly on the race course for this weekend:

3.25 miles solo in the morning, avg pace 6:46/mile. Then another 2k with Michiaki and the kids in a running club he coaches; they are elementary school aged. This was one of the highlights of the trip. The kids had so much fun.

IBIGAWA HALF MARATHON

What a great experience! I was talking with Scott after the race was over and I mentioned to him how my expectations and desire to run well just kept increasing each day as the race got closer. Going into the trip, I wasn't really worried about how well I'd run in Japan. I knew it was still pretty close to STG and I knew my legs weren't fully back and my fitness was down. Plus with the jet lag and difficulty of the course, it wasn't reasonable to expect a fast time. Then we arrived and as the days went by my desire to run well kept increasing. The day before the race Rosy, the STG women's winner, told me that the winner got basically enough rice, potatoes, onions, etc to last a year. That was a prize I wanted to win for my host family. They were incredibly gracious hosts and their hospitality was off the charts. So, I really wanted to win that for them. So, come race day I wanted that W!

My plan was to go out conservative and keep the leaders within reach and then slowly work my way into pace/effort and close hard. Well once the race started, my expectations to run well increased yet again. The first few miles felt really easy and I was running up the hills at a very good pace. Now I got greedy and wanted the win and a fast time. I ended up paying the price for this greed on the second half of the course as I just didn't quite have the legs.

Backing up a bit to the morning. We left the house at 6:40, even though the race didn't start until 10:40. We had to get there early and they had all of the STG runners speak to the crowd. We had a the second floor of the library right by the start line designated for us. They had all kinds of food sitting out for us to eat. But of course we weren't going to eat before the race. All I ate the whole morning pre-race was a UCan bar, a Honeystinger waffle, and two servings of Ucan.

They told us we needed to be done with warmups and bathrooms by 10:10 at which point they'd take us to the front of the starting line. Scott and I were given bibs 1 & 2. So, the Japanese runners were then given bibs 3+ based on times. At the start line the guy with bib 4 came and spoke to us. He was very friendly and spoke a little English.

The race got started and there were probably 10+ runners in front of me for the first kilometer. I didn't take any splits on my watch, but I will lists the splits that Strava shows (even though Strava had it long at 13.25, so the splits will show a little faster than they most likely were). Around 2k in I worked up to the leaders and just after 2k I took the lead and injected a little pace. By the time we entered the canyon at 2.5 miles it was me and bib 3 right on my heels. Going up the hills I felt really good, really strong and the pace was encouraging. This is where I got greedy and pushed hard up the hills and started shooting for a 1:06-1:07, thinking I could go sub-5:00 easily on these hills coming back down.

At 5.2 miles in the marathon splits from the half and then there's a really good steep hill. I pushed up this hill and finally got a gap on Bib #3. You then have a good downhill stretch to 10k and then another steep uphill to the turn around at 6.6 miles. You now proceed to run back down the same section you came up. I had about a 14-second lead at this point on Bib 3 guy. Splits 1-7: 513, 514, 504, 515, 516, 513, 515.

Mile 8 is one of the harder miles on the course and then it's get substantially easier coming down the hills. I was breathing pretty hard, but that was to be expected working up the hills. I figured I'd be able to regain my breathing and really roll on the downhill. But, that never happened. I just couldn't get my legs to turn over as fast as I wanted them to. In fact, I ran basically just as fast up hill as I did downhill. They had the first mile or so after the turnaround coned off to where I had the far 3-feet of the road to run on. But then the cones ended and right around this time I hit the major bottleneck of runners coming up the canyon. The road was only as wide as one lane here in the States. The race has 4,000+ runners. So you can imagine the next two miles were not easy to navigate at all! I was constantly yelling, waving, weaving, stopping/going, etc. to try and get through this mass of runners. While I was using all this energy clearing a path, bib #3 guy behind me was getting all the benefits of a clear path. By the time the masses cleared and we got out of the canyon I heard footsteps right on my heels and he was right back in the race. Miles 8-10 530, 510, 510.

I was feeling terrible now and I had second place bearing down on me now. The crowds, while I couldn't understand what they were saying, clearly seemed to be cheering for him and giving him a lot of energy. He tried to make an initial pass when he caught up and I sped up, not letting him by. He ran on my heels, clipping them every 400 meters or so, all the way to 13 miles. He made 1-2 minor attempts during that period to pass and I answered each time, staying in front and not letting him even get to my side. The weather at this point was very hot, 70 degrees with 70% humidity (thank goodness I wasn't running the full). At this point, I figured if he could've moved by, he would've. He's likely holding on the same as me. I knew the closer we got to the finish with me still leading and him on my heels the better shot I had at winning. I knew I had a strong kick in me. My watch hit 13 miles and I knew we had to be close, but I couldn't see the finish. As soon as I saw the finish I kicked hard. I think he responded a bit late to my kick and I got a good gap. With 30 meters to go and a quick look over the shoulder it was clear I had it. I waved to the crowd and crossed the line, beating him by 2 seconds. Splits 11-13 were 520 523 512 and 435 pace for last 0.24.

I congratulated him at the finish, but he seemed quite angry and looked away without speaking to me, but did shake my hand. I then got interviewed by the local tv station with an interpreter of course. I watched Scott come in 3rd place with a very strong 1:10.30 effort! Great race for him.

At the awards ceremony I was given a trophy, two certificates written in Japanese, two medals, and the food I mentioned earlier. They gave me the barrel of rice to hold up for the crowd to see. They also had each of us speak to the crowd from the stage.

It was an awesome experience that I'm really grateful for. Thanks to STG Marathon for this awesome trip and to the Koishi Family for hosting Denver and me.

8.2 miles easy with Scott for our last run in Japan, avg pace 8:29/mile. We both ran along the river 2+ miles until we met up and then we headed toward the mountains. We saw a statue up on the mountain and aimed to reach it. Once we got there, we saw some temples and another trail going further up Jodaisan Mountain. We reached what I believe is the top and then ran back.

10 miles on the South Weber/Uintah Loop, avg pace 6:40/mile.

9.3 miles easy with Denver, avg pace 7:42/mile. We met Ben for his cool down and I did the last 90 seconds of his tempo with him.

8.1 miles in the snow and wind with Dave and Ben, avg pace 7:40/mile. My legs are still pretty tired, going to take it easy until at least Saturday.

8.2 miles easy with Dave at work, avg pace 7:18/mile.

LONG RUN W/8-MILE AEROBIC BUILDER & 5X45 SECOND PICKUPS

We had a good group meet up at Kneaders in Ogden, including Dave, Ben, Trace, Manny, and Jake. We ran the parkway out to West Haven. At that point Trace, Manny, and Jake looped back to Kneaders, while Ben, Dave, and I started an 8-mile builder. 5-Minute jog after the builder followed by 5x45 second pickups with about 1:05-1:10 jogging rest.

8-Mile Builder - 5:15/mile pace

45 pickups - 4:30/mile pace

10.3 miles easy in the rain with Ben and Dave, avg pace 7:34/mile. I came down with a sore throat and cold yesterday, so I will just take things day to day this week.

No run - sick.

No run - sick

No run - sick

No run - sick

No run - sick

AM: 6.4 miles with Denver around the neighborhood in the snowstorm, avg pace 8:01/mile. I'm not completely over my cold, still have some congestion. But my energy levels feel decent.

I think this run puts me over my yearly total from last year and my new highest mileage year ever!

PM: 5 miles easy on my new treadmill, compliments of St George Marathon and Icon Fitness, avg pace 6:52/mile.

10.5 miles ice skating on black ice with Ben and Jared in the DC, avg pace 8:06/mile.

AM: 11.15 miles easy in Western Davis County with Dave, Jake, Denver, Moss, and Jason, avg pace 7:14/mile.

PM: 5 miles on the treadmill, avg pace 6:31/mile.