Anything Will Burn If the Furnace is Hot Enough

80 minutes -- Tempo for last 10 minutes

85 min -- some sort of pickups. i don't remember

50 minutes

roller coasters with Colton

50 minutes

60 minute hill workout -- 5x1 min uphill and 1x85 sec last rep. Jog down recovery with extra minute after 3rd rep.

Really solid workout from everybody. Had a lot of guys pushing really hard.

45 minutes + 8 striders

Felt like poop today and we went to Sandberg's and swam across and it was exhausting. Bad idea

80 minutes

Went out to Hurricane to try and find the sick Canal place that coach spoke of. Failed pretty bad because we thought we would get out a lot sooner than we did, so we had to flip before we could even get down on the canal trail. Alex and Julien took a detour on the way back to check it out, and we just drove and picked them up at the park. Definitley going to run it again some time soon.

Well I'm back! Haven't blogged in about two weeks and I'm sad to say that I have no valid excuse. I'll update the last two weeks in the mornign because it's pretty late right now. Can't sleep because I'm thinking really hard about a lot of things.

*Warning* super long random venting of feelings ahead

Well once upon a time I wanted to be a state champion and run on a state champion team. I also wanted to race at Nike Nationals. I once was so dedicated that I went to bed on time every single night and I blogged everyday and I worked hard at everything I did. Lately, however, I've made all of this seem like a dream. I haven't been fully focused on what's most important to me. I'm not entirely sure why. Maybe it's because it's summer. Maybe it's because I think I'm already good enough. But maybe it's because I'm scared. I thought a lot this week and realized how hard these goals are going to be. I think about all of the people who thing they are too unrealistic. People who are close to me and who I really wish would believe in them too. And that's what scares me. The fact that it's going to be difficult and not everyone will stand by my side. But I have come to realize at this late hour that it doesn't matter. Any dream can happen if you just be persistent and follow through with the plan. We've made our goals for this year and I've improved so much and I know that I can improve a lot more, and become the amazing athelete that I want to become. And I know I'm rambling but I can't sleep and I'm just coming to the realization that I can do it. We can do it. I just need to remember why and how I was once so committed, and start living that way again. I'm gonna start blogging every day and doing everything that I need to do in order to be great. This week has been really chill and I've liked it, but I'd rather be pushing just a bit harder in life and doing great things, then sitting at home in December having a "chill" time.

95 minutes 1-2-1-3-1-3 minute pickups with 3 min recovery

7:27 avg pace

Felt super good today. Not as much distance as usual, because we went up like 500 hills and started out pretty easy. Back started tensing up in the last 10 minutes. Getting some physical therapy sessions scheduled so hopefully I can get into those soon.

20 + 20 on grass + 8 striders

7:30 avg

Nice grass run today. We finally got the nice baseball field back because all of the scrubs are done practicing every Tuesday. Felt really good this morning

2.9 miles in 20 min then weights after

Had to run before weights today because I had work at 4. Also had a captains meeting at 2:15 so I ran at like 1:30. Felt really good because I haven't ran by myself in a long time. Thought a lot about how epic it'll be when one day people are like "Hey, I used to see that guy running by my house every once in a while, and now he's famous!" That would be the cooliest thing ever

75 min

Went and ran the Sand Hill to see exactly how long it is. Coach wants to do some sort of workout time trial thing on it. Sounds like a good idea, but it was freaking hard. SO MUCH SAND. 

60 minutes

Good workout today. I felt super great and could've gone longer for sure. Not sure about the rest of the guys. Our goal was to have 5 of us for most of the workout, and we barely had 3 at the end. Some people are out of town, but it still would be nice to know that we have a lot of depth. I'm pretty sure we'll all get to where we need to be once the season starts. I trust that everyone will step up and do what needs to be done. 

60 + 6 striders

7:30 avg pace

Went to Bloomington Hills Park, AKA the region course AKA time trial course AKA Desert Relays course AKA the place where I sucked super bad last year and I'm not very fond of because of my memories there. Ran the 2 mile loop and it made me excited for our time trials and our Desert Relays. Ready to do very well in those. Went and ran out on the river trail and found a beast pink semi-deflated ball and KICKED IT for quite a while, until I shot it up in the air and the wind carried it down to the river. Pretty sad moment for all of us, but especially me. I made a very strong connection with that ball, and then I accidentaly killed it. The rest of my day was pretty bad because of it.

80 minutes 5x1 minute pickups w/ 4 min recovery

8:56 avg pace

Well today's run sucked for all of us. Grant Julien Mikey and Jose. We went and ran Chuckwala trail and it was all fun and stuff and we got to the cool lookout cliff, but we were only 20 minutes out, so we decided to run down the mountain on Scout Cave trail and go check out the cool caves in the wall. Stopped for probably a lot longer than we should've and had fun climbing and almost dying. The run back up was incredibly exhausting and it sucked. We were going pretty dang slow and it was super hot and we were tired from stopping and running up the super steep hill. Julien was pukin and stuff and Jose flipped early and ended up getting lost and Grant Mikey and I were just dead tired. Went to Orange Peel after and got some nice yummy *healthy* smoothies. 

95 minutes Hard push up and down sandhill

Well if that isn't fun then I don't know what is! Ran up the Sand hill in a pushing the pace type of effort, and it was definitely hard. It was hard to keep pushing the pace once we got to the top and it got flat, but I managed. Pushed way hard down and Julien kept creeping up on me trying to pass me at the end and I was dying. All I could think of is "this is gonna be Nike, and if this dude passes me, we don't go to Nationals." and I pushed freakin hard and held the lead. Stopped for a while to get sand out of shoes and wait for people. I definitely agree with Anakin Skywalker and his thoughts about sand. Rest of the run was pretty chill. Really tired but we kept going a good pace.

60 total

Got like 5 minutes of warmup was all and then cooled to time after the race. Stayed the night in Enterprise with Colton and Logan so that was dope. Ran like a solid 5:55 pace for the first two miles, even though we did like 3 pickups to try and go quicker. Scottie was freakin killin it and Colton kinda died at the end and Logan had to poop so it was just me and Scottie and I just picked it up barely enough to beat him by like one second. I felt pretty fine and definitely could've gone faster, but I was treating it more like a workout than a race so I just stuck at 5:55 pace. I noticed how different the mindset is going into a race than it is when going into a workout. We ran the race at about the same pace that we do tempos, but we do Tempos for like 25 minutes and they are a nice push, whereas this race it seemed like it required a lot of effort to push any faster. Not sure how to explain it better than that, but overall just a nice insight I had.

60 min 8.3 miles 

7:25 avg pace

randomized workout of 3 sets of 5 Tempo Threshold or CV, and 1 set of 3

Felt perty good. My back started hurting after the third set and I thought we were done but coach surpised us with another one. Wasn't too bad so I just finished the workout and ran the cooldown. Paces were a lot better this week than last, so an improvement for sure.

Afternoon:

30 min 4.3 miles

6:55 avg pace

Ran at like 9 because I felt like poop all day and took a 4 hour nap. Then when I was getting ready for bed I was like "yo how committed are you" and I put my shoes on and went for a run. It felt nice because it was late and not burny hot outside.

100 minutes last 15 minutes fast finish

Felt super good today. Really long run but luckily it didn't feel like it. Stopped a couple of times for people's potty breaks, but I would've liked to just keep going. Came home and drank chocoalte milk and a gatorade protein shake so that's good. Been doing stretches for my back and I think it's getting a little better.