do or dont there is no try

Easy 6.5mi aerobic run doing the Coal Mine Rd. loop. Felt pretty good doing 7:50's.

AM: Woke up to go on a long run with some guys on Toothpick Trail in Ashland. We had to stop a few times cuz Cody was having IT Band problems so I ended up running with Branden. We ran for approx. 45mins and it was a pretty good pace for hilly trails.. I guess when you run trails with Branden it's never an easy run though.. he is one strong guy!

PM: Since I didn't get much of a run in this morning I decided I would make time for a run in the evening. All day I was riding bikes around and swimming with friends so I didn't expect to feel good but whatever I decided I wanted to go fast. I did 6.50mi running down towards Good Bean Coffee and doing a few loops around there. I took a GPS and I ended up running 6:45, 6:32, 6:27, 6:25, 6:25, 6:42, then 3:40 for the last half mile, my total time was 42:55 and it felt absolutely great the entire way! Maybe I should run at 11pm everyday..? Overall, a great day and great week of running.

Woke up, ate a little something then headed off on my run. I started the tempo portion after about 1.5mi of warmup and it felt okay. I ended up running 3.53mi of tempo @ 6:14/mi pace, it was alright but I guess it's still early. I felt pretty non-energetic and my legs weren't feeling great, maybe its cuz I was up like all night trying to fall asleep. Also, the tempo was on rolling hills so it wasn't easy. Overall, good day, I hope Thursday's tempo will  be a lot better.

AM: Did 5.1mi easy then 6x30sec strides on Cherry Lane hill.

PM: Did 5.1mi with Ethan and it felt like 10mins of super easy running! I should probably run with people more often, it makes it a lot easier.

6.5mi Coal Mine loop felt great. I'm starting to get excited for next Tuesday's 5k I'm doing! I think tomorrow's tempo will be a good indicator on how I'll do.

AM: Tempo run today. Did 7.8 total and 3.5 of it was tempo, my splits were 6:15, 6:09, 6:07, then like 3 something. The overall pace was 6:11 and I felt fine so I was alright with it, most of it was on rolling hills.

PM: 4 miles around 4 or 5 in the afternoon in 90+ degree weather with my dog Jimmer. Felt alright, I had just gotten home from riding back from Nick's house. I did like 16mi of biking today cuz I went to Nick's and back then rode my bike to the pear farm to pick later in the evening. It was a pretty tiring day.

6.5mi Coal Mine Rd. loop. Felt good, I'm going camping today up at Mcloud so hopefully I'll get to have a fun long trail run tomorrow morning.

Today we were camping near Mcloud, California at this place called Camp Alhoma. I decided to do my long run going from my camp all the way to the waterfalls in Mcloud so I could meet my family there. The route was about 10.2mi there then I knew I would want to get another 2 in when I got there. So I set off at 3800ft of elevation (kind of an altitude run!) and started running on Highway 89 towards Mcloud. I felt super good the whole way and my splits ended up being: 7:56 (uphill), 7:08, 7:16, 7:12, 7:15, 7:09, 7:04, 6:58 (downhill), 6:52 (downhill), 7:27 (hard uphill), 6:57 (down the hill), and 7:21 (up the hill again). Plus like another minute and a half of running.. My average pace was @ 7:13/mi for 12.2mi and I was really happy with it! There was a net loss in elevation of like 290ft, but still overall I felt great and it was a successful day! Oh and I got a super nice ice bath in the 55 degree Mcloud River afterwards!

6.4mi easy this morning because I'm racing tomorrow!! I'm pretty excited and I hope it goes well, it would be nice to go 17:30's and I think I can since the Crater XC team plus a ton of other fast people are running it! I'm super antsy to finally get out and race, the forecast is 80 degrees with rain so it should be a blast!

I was excited all day to finally be able to race, I really needed a confidence booster before the start of XC season. The race at Bear Creek is one I'd already done in the past and I knew a lot of people doing it, so I thought it would be a fun one! In fact, the course is super fun. We get to run on plenty of different surfaces, jump over creeks, and have an awesome time! When 5:00pm rolled around, the local news sent out a warning that severe thunderstorms were heading our way.. I didn't know what to think so I just decided to go to the race and run my best! When I got there, I did 2mi of warmup then I realized the race started at 7:30 not 7:00! Oopss. So I kinda had to warm up twice but whateverr. 7:30 came and there was no sign of rain, thunderstorms or anything! Super fortunate. At the starting line I spotted a ton of Crater XC guys that were super fast and good friends of mine. I knew that there was plenty of competition and that this was going to be a great race!

The race started and I got out pretty good, I ran with Nate Edwards for most of the 1st mile which we hit in around 5:40, it felt really good. The 2nd mile I cruised through mainly on my own and I don't know what my split was but it felt fast. And lastly, the final mile I pushed it feeling pretty good and ended up crossing in 17:26!!! At the finish line I got to talk with a lot of the Frosh/Soph Crater guys (whom I beat!) and do a 3mi cool down with them. Overall, the race flew by super quick (with perfect weather) and it felt great! I definently exceeded my expectations and I know for sure now that big things are coming this fall!

Today was the 1st day of my school's (South Medford) cross country camp! On our way to camp at Lake of the Woods, we stopped at Fish Lake and did a 6-7mi run on this sweet trail. I ran with Branden, Cody, and Gabe and we went pretty fast so I ended up getting pretty tired having not yet fully recovered from yesterday's race. Every year camp is an awesome experience! We pretty much just run, eat, and have fun so it's like one of the best week's of the summer!

AM: Today is the day we run up Mt. Mcloughlin as a team. The night before Coach Wallace divides us into groups based on fitness and the slowest groups leave early in the morning while the fastest leave later. The group I was in left at about 8:45am and it included about 10 guys who were all varsity capable runners. We started at the Pacific Crest Trail (2.5mi longer than everybody else) and did some light jogging first to get warm, then we started doing 60/60's for awhile. There were lots of breaks because a few people in the group weren't in great shape but we ended up getting it done! Long story short, we finished the run/climb together in 2:35mins doing 8mi approx on the way up then ran down. The round-trip was 13.5mi for my group but I'll just say we ran 10.5 since there was a good amount of breaks and walking.

PM: I had to like beg Coach to let me run a little more today! He's worried about me getting injured but I told him I'm used to this kind of mileage so he let me. I did 3.5mi with Carmen pretty easy just to get in a extra few miles, it felt good.

AM: This day of camp is my favorite cuz we do an awesome adventure race! The race consists of 8 teams of 6 (you don't get to choose), and each team is divided into 3 partnerships from there. You get to choose your partner and you have that partner for the whole race. There are 3 legs: 1. 2.5mi run, 2. 5.5mi bike, 3. 1.5mi canoe. You have to stick with your partner at all times through these so your pretty much only as fast as the slower partner. I was pretty excited cuz I was fortunate enough to have Gray as my partner! We had a great time doing all the events together even though he's not in great shape and we ended up finishing 5th as a team.. not too shabby. Overall, I had a great time and it was an awesome race!

PM: I did 4mi in the evening with a group of about 5 people to get in a few more miles.

AM: 4mi early morning with the team.

PM: I didn't even start my run till like midnight cuz I got back from the stake dance late!! I knew I needed a speed type of workout so I decided to do 4xMile with 2min recovery in between. I did the repeats on North Phoenix going from Juanipero to Calle Vista. Splits were 5:56 for the first (downhill), 5:48 (uphill), 5:38 (downhill), and 5:41 (uphill). Overall a good workout and a great week!

Today I woke up and ran with the team. The workout was 15min warmup then 6x1min hard on surrey hill with 3min in between plus 8x30sec hard with 2min in between. Felt good and ran with the stronger guys, I needed the speedwork. Afterwards we did about a half hour of cooldown.

AM: 5.5mi with the team. Had to cut the run short cuz of an appointment but still had fun and ran about 7:30's with Gabe.

PM: Ran 4.7mi at a good pace, felt real good.

Went to Fichner Park and decided to do a Fartlek/Interval type workout. 2mi warmup then did 5 hard, 5 easy, 4 hard, 4 easy, then 3, 2, 1.5, and 1 with 1:1 work to rest ratio. It was a pretty hard workout because the grass was super thick!! I definently needed the speedwork and over all it felt pretty decent. I don't know the distance so I'll guess it was 2 warmup, 3.5 workout, and 2 cooldown.. 7.5mi total.

AM: This morning I woke up and went out to breakfast with my sister Christine who is leaving for college tomorrow. I got home and immediately set off for a run hoping to beat the heat. From the start, I wasn't feeling good at all. As the run progressed, I continued to feel lightheaded and itchy in wierd spots. By the time I was finally almost home, I was feeling absolutely terrible. I felt super hot and itchy so I hosed myself down and started itching a ton. My dad (he's an allergist) saw me itching uncontrollably so he gave me zyrtec and also prednesone (don't know how to spell that word). My face then began to puff of really bad and I started to barely be able to breathe! My dad got a special inhaler which I took 4 puffs of plus he gave me a shot of something in my arm through a needle. After that, he quickly rushed me to his office 10mins away and long story short, I was okay after that. Apparently I had an anaphylaxis which I have know idea what that is. Overall, it was pretty scary but whatevs I got 6.5mi in even though I almost killed myself!

PM: I felt a lot better throughout the day, I slept for like 3 hours cuz of all the drugs that made me tired. I got out for another run at about 10:30. 5mins in I saw Ethan so I ran with him and ended up doing 6mi total! oops. Whatever, I felt great so it don't matter.

60min with the team, ran with Gabe for most of the time up at Surrey. Got back and did 3x300 at a little faster than 5k pace, everything felt great.

Today I worked 5 hours, made bank, rode my bike around, and hung out with friends like all day so I didn't get out on my run till about 8pm. It was super nice weather though! I knew I would probably be tired from my long day so I decided to do 12 at goal pace 7:30. The run consisted of going up Cherry Lane, down Hillcrest, down McAndrews, a few miles around Cedar Links golf course, and back home taking a detour down Black Oak to Barnett. I was averaging like 7:10's and feeling pretty good up until about 9mi in. Then, I think it was my achilles that started to ache slightly? It went away within a mile though so that was a relief. I definently felt tired the last few uphill miles coming home.. My legs were just done from a long week of working, running, and not quite enough sleep. But I'm super happy with the week! I hit some high mileage while continuing to stay healthy and work hard! Overall, todays run was 11.9mi @ 7:23 ave pace.

Today was the start of what I call the hard weeks. In my opinion, the next 5-6 weeks are the hardest training we do all xc season. Today I went to practice at 4 and apparently it was a long run day.. What! I just ran long on friken Saturday but apparently Coach is changing long runs to Monday's throughout the school year so whatever. It was pretty dang hot so I wasn't exactly prepared to run a "super hilly" 11 miler. We started out the run and I felt pretty good so I ran out by myself in front but I got super tired going up the HUGE hills so I got caught by Gabe and Tristan 4.5mi in. I ran with them pretty quick for another 1.5 then Tristan started throwing up so it was just me and Gabe booking it under the sun in the middle of nowhere. I was literally feeling like crap, it was so hot and I totally underestimated the hills and heat. By mile 8.0 Gabe had left me and I was running alone once again. I don't know how I made it back to the school.. It was truly a mental battle and I definently prooved to myself that I can do hard things! Overall the run was 10.2mi at 7:29/mi pace! This may have been the HARDEST long run of my life.

Didn't think I was gonna feel good in today's workout cuz of yesterday's hard work plus the 95 degree weather, but I though wrong! Today's workout was 8x 3min hard/ 3min slow jog around the baseball fields on grass. I started out feeling okay and ran in the front with Cody for the first few but he dropped off cuz his calf hurt like interval 4. Then Gabe and Tristan started to push the pace on the next few, mainly Gabe though. We were really haulin and it was friken hot! The last one we went pretty hard and Gabe barely beat me.. darn. Overall it was an amazing workout though!! I felt pretty darn good for a hard day and I averaged 5:24 pace on the hard efforts and did 4.47mi hard. Afterwards, I cooled down and stretched and Coach told us that next Saturday we have a 3200 time trial! So I'm looking forward to that!

Got home and did 3 easy miles cuz I needed them.

Ran with the team but had to cut my run short today because I was going to a friend's party, 6mi total.

Today was super friken hard. The workout was 2mi warmup, 7mi cruise intervals (5min hard 1min jog for 7mi), 2mi cooldown. All in 95+ degree heat at Fichner Park. I was at the lake all day before practice so I felt pretty tired, but I promised myself to give it a solid effort cuz I know this workout will make me better. I started out in a group of 5; me, branden, cody, gabe, and tristan. But suprisingly, they ALL stopped before we even got 2mi through the intervals! Actually, it's not that suprising, they made up a bunch of semi-true/lame excuses for not doing the workout. So I had to do the workout on my own and I definently felt it. I definently went to hard the first few miles cuz I could feel it really bad later. The heat got to me REALLY bad and I don't know how I finished but I did! Without a break for water. Overall, the workout wasn't great timewise.. I got slower as I went but I still averaged 6:30/mi including the 1min slow jogging! And.. I threw up major bad afterwards. I got done and EVERYTHING came out. Coach insisted on giving me a ride back to South and by the time we got back I felt a lot better. Did 1.5mi cooldown on the track. Overall, a great day! I can feel the fitness improving every run!

AM: 7.5mi easy (7:50 pace) with one of the new coaches, Coach Crick. He's a cool guy. Then 3x300m strides when I got back. Might run again this evening to get in a few more miles.

Today was an "on your own" day so I decided to do a little tune up on speed. I came up with a workout I thought would help, 2mi warmup, then 8x.41mi hill intervals with a jogging .41mi down the hill recovery, then finishing with a 2mi cooldown. I felt like crap during the warmup but when the workout started I began to feel better. I did the repeats on Calle Vista going from Fieldbrook up to Lone Oak, it's a good place for intervals cuz you're on a steady incline (90ft total gain) so you can go fast and it's not like super steep or anything. The whole time I felt really good and I ended up finishing feeling like I didn't push myself all that hard (I think this is because of the long rest). Whatever, I needed a speed workout and I think it helped! I'm very pleased with my training over the summer, especially these last few weeks, and I can't wait to see what's to come!