I Eat PAIN-cakes for Breakfast

Today was the Wasatch Invite. It was a great meet overall. My 3200 went well,  it wasn't quite the time I wanted but I'm happy with it. I panicked a little on laps 6 and 7 so that slowed me down. My mile was great. I was aiming for a BYU time. I didn't get it but I got my second fastest mile ever. I've been stuck in a rut this track season. My times have been a lot slower until recently. I've figured out how to hurt again so my times should start coming down. The mile hurt, but it was a solid race. I had a good position from the start and every lap was strong. My kick needs some work, but all the speed Coach Hill has been giving should help. Even though he assigns speed workouts all the time, I really think they've been helping.  S/O to Kedric for ripping it up in the 1600 and the 3200. 

Practice was more condidtioning today. Not a lot of people showed since it was spring break. Coach Hill had us run a bleacher lap followed by an 800 (or 400 for sprinters/throwers). Then we hopped the bleachers followed by an 800. Then push-ups up the bleachers flowed by an 800. Next was 50 sit-ups followed by 800 and then 50 burpees. I did a few laps after to cooldown. I felt pretty good overall, but I'm tired. I've raced two solid meets the past week plus all the speed coach Hill assigns. It's working for sure though. I feel a lot stronger. 

Today was speed. After the mile warmup, coach assigned distance a pretty killer workout. I was the only distance runner there. The others were either sprinters or throwers or they are racing the underclassmen meet at Wasatch tomorrow. So lucky me, I got to do 3x800, 2x400, 2x300, and 6x100 with 400 recovery for the 800/400 and 100 recovery for the 300/100. That was fun to do by myself. I felt pretty good, but my hips are pretty sore. 

I finally got a Distance day!!!! Coach Hill gave Distance an easy 40-45 minute run. Reagan and I went at a good pace for about 5.5 miles. It was cooler this morning. I felt great. I haven't had a solid run for a few weeks. It almost felt like XC again. 

Evening:

Another half mile in the evening. I volunteer with the local special needs soccer program as a buddy. My job is to help a kid to understand the basic rules of soccer and facilitate their play. Sometimes though, they don't want to play and choose to run away instead. So I got a solid hour of child wrangling  tonight. 

Today was pretty solid. Coach Hill left Clayton in charge, so we did a good core workout. We ran a lap in between each exercise. After, some of the team ran Flume, but I opted out. I am quite talented at getting hurt (the definition of "accident prone" is Rylie) when I run Flume. I have a meet Saturday so I wanna stay healthy.  I did a little more after they left. Overall, I felt good. 

I'm pretty sure I have skin cancer. My sock tan line is super bad. My feet are literally the color of paper compared to my legs.🤷🏽‍♀️

Just an easy 4.5 today. My legs felt pretty good. I'm super excited for tomorrow. I can feel the 5:48. 

It was a pretty solid day. I've stayed consistent. I ran a mile in 5:55 for the seventh time. It's a little frustrating but I'm very happy with my race. I was strong the whole time. There were like twenty girls in my race, it was crazy. I had to use a lot of energy to get around the pack. I didn't get boxes in and I managed to stay with the front pack. 

My 3200 went well too. I didn't PR, but my form was a lot better. I ran in no man lands for most of it. I was sixth though so I scored points! Considering I was one of only three athletes from the team there and I had no coaches, I'm very happy with the meet. 

Coach had Clayton choose the workout, so it was a three mile tempo. Rachel and I went 7:00 pace (6:48, 7:12, 7:00) with a half mile at normal pace at the end. After that coach had us do a few 400's. Those felt good. It started raining pretty hard and got super cold so we skipped cooldown. Probably not the wisest decision but aw well. I felt really good during the workout. 

Mile warm up, fast 400, and then a workout with coach Cumbee. My quads are sore because he had us do weighted squats and leg extensions. I also did 300 turns on the jump rope. That is super good for me because I have no coordination. Cumbee also helped me with my long jump for gym because I'm really bad on it and I want to do better next time we test. I ran another three miles after. My calves were tight.  

Just one mile today since it was the underclassmen meet. The coaches wanted varsity to help. My job was getting people on the start line and putting them in their lanes. That was stressful. I had a lot of fun though. I treated today more like a rest day. My quads and calves are pretty sore. I think jumping yesterday really hurt my calves. 

Today was an easy recovery since we have a meet tomorrow. My legs feel better but are still a little sore. I'm not worried about it. As long as I keep them stretched out and get in a good warm up before each race, I'll be good. 

I'm crippled now. Hopefully it's only for a week. I was on pace to qualify during the mile when I got this horrible cramp in my calf. I over extended it and it did not feel good. I finished with an ok time, but I was very disappointed. I could tell something was wrong after my race. I massaged the calf. Eventually, my other one started to cramp a little. As I was warming up for the 3200, I noticed that they were sort of pulsing: getting tight and then very loose. The coaches told me to try the 3200 anyways. They pulled me out a mile in. Both of my calves had locked up and it was very painful. I was crying and it was not good. They stopped hurting when I stopped running, but they had developed huge knots and hurt when I moved them or tried to put weight on them. The pain went away eventually. Now they are just really tight. I'll probably be out a few days. Being crippled is not fun. 

The Cripple Diaries: Chapter 1

No running today. My doctor informed me that I will be out for about three to five days. That is very annoying, but I'll survive. All greatness must overcome adversity. Also S/O to my mom for helping roll out my calves because I can't do it well enough. 

The Cripple Diaries: Chapter 2

So today looked like a good workout. Sadly, I did a solid hour and a half of core and push-ups. Hopefully I just have to bare this for two more days. My calves are starting to feel better so that's good. 

So it was region today. My calf started hurting like no other agin during the 3200 so I pulled out. I can barely walk so I can't race the mile tomorrow. I wasn't going to get to state anyways. Now I can just heal and get ready for XC. 

Finally got to run today. It wasn't very long, but my calf felt great! I'll take it easy for the next week or so as I ease back into it. Hopefully it doesn't hurt. 

Another solid two for today, and my calf felt good. My leg was sore but that's to be expected. It feels nice to run again. 

Another easy two today because I'm still trying to be careful. My little brother came with me because he signed up for the junior high cross country program. I'll train him to be a true champion. He did very well considering this was his first time running. I'm proud of him. 

I finally got to run with Reagan again today! It's been a while. We're both coming off of injury though so it was still very short and easy. I think I'll try doing three or thee and a half tomorrow. 

Another easy three today. Luke came with me, he did well but was slightly dehydrated. 

An easy five with Reagan this morning. My calf felt good so I think I'll push it a little more next week. 

Today was a solid workout. Luke did a mile and a half with me for my warmup and then went home. He's starting to get better I think. I ran the first mile and a half of my workout with Teagan and then finished the remaining three miles by myself. They felt really good. I pushed the pace but I didn't have my watch so I don't know what it was. My heart was pumping pretty hard though so I assume it was probably fast. My calf didn't hurt either. I'm going to continue slowly adding to my workout. 

AM-

Three and a half easy miles for recovery. However, I took the last mile fast because I was feeling good and felt like it. 

PM-

Half hour of core, followed by a half out of lifting, followed by 25 minutes of swimming

It's been a few months since I swam last. My shoulders and hips and lower back are sore but that's okay. The cross training is good. 

Today was supposed to be a distance day but I was sore from last night. My calf felt a little off so I eased up. I think I did a little too much yesterday. My calf feels better though. I iced, heated, and rolled it. I'll plan my cross training and lifting for my off days. Luke cam with me for a little bit. The hill's that lead out of our neighborhood hurt his knees a little so I'll have him run a downhill course tomorrow. I'm glad he's sticking with it. 

Seven miles today with Nathan. We did a few repeats. Idk about times because I didn't have a watch but Nathan said I was on track for 6:30-7:00. I think that's pretty good considering I'm coming off of injury. I wasn't trying to push very hard. The trail we were on was sort of hilly (small hills, not terrible but I hate any sort of hill) so I rode the downhills and maintained a good pace on the flat and uphill parts. There was some wind too but it wasn't so bad. So it was an overall solid day. 

Everything was pretty sore so I did a very short shakeout. I went to the rec center in the evening and lifted for a while and swam after that. I really think that the lifting and swimming are going to help a lot. 

I did five miles at a good pace (idk what it was but it wasn't slow or fast) and then went back home to grab Luke. He did the last two miles with me. He's getting better, he just needs to pace a little better. Overall, it was a solid seven. I did my daily core later. 

Six miles at normal pace this morning. I felt pretty good for most of it. Reagan and I went cliff jumping later so I got a little cross training with the hiking and swimming. I did some daily core in the evening. 

I started my new job today so I didn't get to run until the afternoon. I would have waited for it to be cooler but I didn't feel like it. I knew that if I put off my run, it just wouldn't happen. So I ran at 4:00 pm in 86 degree heat with limited cloud coverage. It was a stupid thing to do but I don't care. I'll do some core later. 

I promise I ran Wednesday-Saturday last week. I just didn't log it in the blog. I've been really busy. (One doesn't become a world class Subway Sandwich Artist in a day.) I've also been keeping up my swimming and lifting. Anyways, I attempted to do a 70 minute run today. I can defiantly tell my endurance needs some work, but not as much as I thought. I think I'll get back into the 70 minute groove soon. The run felt really good until about 4.5 miles in when I needed to find a bathroom. That was rough but I finished. I'm going to try again on Friday probably. 

After the usual mile warm up, I did what was supposed to be a 3.5 mile recovery run. However, the pace ended up being a bit faster. I didn't push myself hard though. I have the day off from Subway today so I'm happy about that. I also saw Kenny running laps in the walking park so S/O to him. #grind

Today was supposed to be a longer run, but my legs were tired so I cut the mileage down and increased the pace. I'm going to try a 70 minute tomorrow. 

Today was an easy run down to the rec. I lifted for a while after, it felt good. 

No running today, I instead took a rest day. I ended up going out of town which was nice. Before we left, I did some core and 200 turns on the jump rope. After we got back, I did another hour of core exercises and 100 more turns in the jump rope. Overall, it was a good day. 

Easy shakeout before traveling today. 

Today was supposed to be a long run, but it didn't workout. I got chafed bad and decided to call it good. I will for sure tomorrow though. The run felt really good. I averaged about 7:45. I surged a few times and hit about a low 6:30. I didn't hold it for a whole mile but I tried to for about a quarter mile each time. It was a solid run.

Haha, finally got a true long run in, and it was freaking fabulous. My legs hurt, but in the good way. I didn't have any of the mental blocks either. I didn't really ever tell myself to stop. I averaged an 8:03 pace so that was pretty cool too considering I haven't run 8 miles straight for almost 8 months. I saw Coach Henderson running when I was about four miles into my run. We passed and gave each other high fives. That's was cool. After the run, I went and lifted a the rec for a bit and then did a mile cooldown to add up to ten. I also did my daily core and jump ropes. It's been a good morning. 

Easy recovery

Tempo run with race pace surges. I felt good overall and there was no calf pain. I lifted after and then did my jump ropes. I'm skipping core today because I need to rest. I'm taking a rest day over the weekend but plan on my jump ropes and core still. 

Today was an intended long run, but I was pretty sore. I only ended up doing six miles at about 7:45 pace. It felt pretty good though other than the soreness. I'm starting a life guard certification class so that will be good for cross training. 

Haha, I am so tired. I didn't end up getting home until late last night because of my guard class and then I had to work. I got up and did another six. About half way through the run, I hurt my knee a little. I'm sorta clumsy and I was trying to get on a sidewalk to avoid a car but ended up falling. #grace 😅 So instead of a gain doing a long run I cut it shorter. I came home and iced it. I don't think I really hurt it, but I don't want to take any risks. Tomorrow will probably be more of a recovery day and then Thursday I'll for real do my long run. We start team practices tomorrow. I'm super excited to meet the new freshman and to see all of my teammates again. 

I'm having an easier time staying motivated. It's helped to just concentrate on myself and my training. My goal is to make state again, this time with my team. More importantly, I just want to get stronger and improve my time. That's the reason I started running two years ago. I just want to be healthy and the best version of myself. 

So today was the first team practice. It was cool to see everyone again. The coaches had us do a 5-4-3-2-1 tempo workout. It hurt, not going to lie. Granted, that was my third hard day in a row. Tomorrow will definitely be easy. I've done a lot this week with running and my life guard training (which I am loving, I'm so excited to be certified). But overall, the workout was fun. 

Today was an easy recovery run. I just needed to shake out the muscles, we are practicing some hard saves today in my lifeguard class so I need to prepare for that. 

Today was a 70 minuter. Well, I guess not quite. I finished 8 miles in an hour and three minutes. That's a 7:58 average pace. I had time to do one more mile but I didn't feel like it. Plus I wasn't quite sure where to run to because I didn't want to back track. I am super happy with this workout. My course was not at all flat and that's the fastest I've ever run 8 miles. I didn't do a running cooldown, but i walked around and stretched  the run today was a lot easier mentally, which is weird when you are running alone  I guess I need to start planning 9 mile courses now. 

Today was just an easy shakeout. However, I managed a 6:45 mile but that was going down hill. I just wanted to see how fast I could go without pushing too hard. 

Today was an easier long run at about 7:45 pace. I ran with Reagan and Rachel, that was fun. R'Cubed is back. 

I ran all last week, I promise. I just never updated the blog. It was a busy week. I took Saturday and Sunday off because my run Friday left my knee feeling a little tight. I'm trying to exercise caution after my calf injury. Anyways, today was a long run. I ran with Tachel for the first little bit, but then separated after a while. I intended to do a 9 mile run, but I felt crappy today. The pace was awesome though, it was a 7:59 average. I just didn't feel good at all. I think I may have been slightly dehydrated. Also, I was a bit sore from not running for a few days, so that was a factor. I'm going to do a shake out later tonight probably. I'm just happy to have finished today. I've always had a hard time with the crappy runs.

I did a two mile shakeout in the evening. It felt pretty good. Luckily, I finished before the bullet rain came. That was evil. My mom and I had to book it back to the car. S/O to Eugene for running in that. 

Today was just an easy recovery. After, I lifted and did my core. I'm a little sore but feel good for the most part. 

So today at practice, Coach Henderson had us do mile repeats. That threw me off as we've never done them this early before in a season. I didn't mind them though. He just had us so three in all. My times were 6:34, 6:42, and 6:40-50 (Coach and I weren't quite sure on the last one but the girl behind me came in at a 7:03 and I was about ten to twenty seconds ahead of her). All in all, it was a solid workout. My hips went sort of numb because they were sore from yesterday's lifting, but that's ok. I stretched and they felt better. We have a lot of potential on the team this year. I was worried because the boys team had so many graduate and the girls team has been going through injuries, but a lot of people are starting to work hard so I think it will be a solid season for Uintah XC. 

Today was another recovery day. After the run, I lifted and did my core. I felt pretty good. 

Today was a moderate, shorter long run. I felt pretty good for the most part. I haven't been getting the sleep I need. During the run, my coach (who is also a driving instructor) scared the heck out of me. I was running in a sketchy part of town (i don't know it very well) and I heard a car pulling up behind me. I got on the side walk but the car never passed me. I turn around to look at it and all of the sudden the car honks. My heart stopped. I then realized it was Coach Galley. He smiled, gave me a thumbs up, and had the student driver drive away. I'm pretty sure Galley and the two students in the car got a good laugh.

Today was an easy shakeout. 

After the mile warmup, Henderson sent us on a long run. I was supposed to do my seventy minute run, but coach wanted to see how fast I could run six miles. I averaged about 7:30 pace. The course has a good amount of up hill so I was happy. Henderson was too. Our first meet is August 12th. I'm pretty excited to see what I can do. 

Today was an easy recovery day with a lifting session after. I felt pretty good. 

Today was a Farrell run. We did them in four minute sets. We did four sets of four minutes fast and four sets of four minutes slow. I ran most of them by myself because Reagan and I decided to split up the girls team so that it wasn't such a big group.  However, she and I ran the last four minute fast set together along with Kedric. We were all going pretty strong. I felt really good. I don't know my pace, but it was definitely sub seven. 

Today was another recovery run. I went a bit longer today because I was feeling pretty good. 

I finally did my seventy minute run today.  I felt really god today. My pace was about 7:55, so I was happy. I lifted after and felt pretty good. I took a much needed nap after. I'm really excited to see what this season has to offer. We have a really good meet schedule. It's going to be great. 

I've decided that Sundays are just going to be short and easy shakeout days. I've found that if I take two days off, my legs and hips get sore. 

Today was supposed to be long run day but was cut short due to some stomach issues. I felt really good other than that. My pace was really strong even with the hills. They weren't really steep, but they were long and gradual. They get tough after a while. 

I made today my long run day. Tomorrow will probably be speed at practice, but two hard days ina row won't kill me. It was lightly raining outside, which felt really nice. I like running when it's sprinkling outside. The run was okay, it wasn't my strongest. The pace was a little slower than what I usually run my long runs. It's was an 8:02 average today. I'm usually about seven to ten seconds faster. Not every run can be an awesome run. I was chased by two dogs at one point. (For those of you who don't know, this is quite a scary thing for me. I was mauled by a dog and it was very traumatic. I don't like them.) I stopped and let them sniff me and then they left me alone. They barked at me for a while though. They were really fat staffordshire terriers. 

Today was a harder day at practice. Coach had us drive up to yellow hill. I was scared because that usually means ladders, but not today. He just had us run straight up, which isn't much better. It was considerably humid today. I know there are places that have worse humidity, but here we typically are very dry and have 0%. So you can imagine my surprise when it got super hard to breathe and I started felling this cold sweat. I thought I was dehydrated at first, but I've been drinking water like crazy so that wasn't it. I checked to weather after the workout and it said that it was 68% humidity. 

Other than the evil humidity, the workout was good. I would have liked to make it up the hill a bit faster, but I haven't been running hills for very long plus yellow hill is very steep. It's basicallly a 45 degree angle for a half mile. Once I got to the top though, I got my pace faster and going back down was fun. My watch said I was going at a sub six average pace. Hills are always fun. 🙃

Today was a recovery/core day at practice. Coach had us so a few core exercises after the warm up. After that, he sent us on a 20-25 mi ire run. My quads are super tight today. They usually are after hills. It also doesn't help that the day before I ran 10 miles. So the slower recovery run was much needed. I ran with a new freshman named Jody. She is super cool and I see a lot of potential in her. I've talked to her a few times. I was really surprised though because she asked if she could run with me. I was more than happy to say yes. She has a lot of determination. I hope she keeps at it because we need hard workers like her in order to get to state this year. 

So after the normal warmup, coach sent us on an easy 15 minute run. I was worried because he said we were doing speed after and my quads were super tight. After the run, he had us do four sets of 90-60-30's. We had a break after the second set. Those are killer. My quads were okay for the most part. I feel really good about how I ran today. It was definitely strong and I tried to focus a little on my form, which helped me go faster. However, after the workout, my quads got really tight and are currently very sore. Same with my core. I've been rolling my quads out, but nothing seems to really loosen them. Awe well 🤷🏽‍♀️. No pain, no gain. I'll be a stronger runner for it. 

Normally, I would do my shakeout today, but due to minor shin splints, I'm taking today off. They're only in my left shin. They aren't that bad, but I just want to get rid of them before the season starts. 

Tomorrow is the first day of my team's XC camp. I'm super excited. We do all kinds of fun things. Tomorrow is our long run. We run about four miles to this dam and play around in the water and then run four miles back. The next day, we do mile repeats on this hill. They're fun because you get a really good down hill. The team does a bunch of other stuff too. It's really fun. I think it's good for our team bonding. 

Today was the long run at camp. It was four miles down hill followed by four miles up hill. It was very hot. I had to stop and walk a little but only for about 20 seconds. The run was challenging but I did really well. I was the third runner to finish overall and the first girl. My shin splint was ok. 

Today was mile repeats. My first one was 6:15. I wasn't able to finish the second repeat as my shin splints acted up. My 800 split was 2:45. After that, I stopped. I need to heal and recover. 

Today was the hill challenge. My shin splints felt better so I gave it a try. Sadly, they acted up. I was unable to finish. I was bummed but it's important that I heal. Henderson is having me take the rest of the week off and start fresh Monday. He assured me that I would be fine for my meet next Saturday and time trials on Tuesday. 

Finally got to run today!!! I felt really good. My shins didn't act up. They were a little stiff, but they felt normal after about a half mile. My hips were sore, but I was expecting that. I'm super happy with the workout. We have time trials tomorrow. I'm pumped for those. 

Today was time trials. I was actually very happy with my time even though I wanted faster. My lower back and hamstrings tightened up during the race. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't go faster. That's was to be expected though. I never do well when I take time off. Also, since I wasn't allowed to cross train, I had a lot of lactic acid build up. So all things considered, it was an awesome race. My team did well too. It is very encouraging. I think if we keep working and pushing, we could qualify for state. 

Today was easy recovery and core. I concentrated a lot on my form. I over extend my stride so I tend to heel strike. I've been working on trying the correct that as well as pumping my arms more. Better form means a faster time. 

Today was intervals. We did two 1 mile repeats and two 800 repeats. For the mile repeats, coach had us partner up. While our partner ran, we were supposed to stretch. As soon as they finished the repeat, we went while they stretched. I was partnered with Rachel. We both killed it. We both hit around 6:45 for both repeats. I felt pretty sore today. However, a lot of people had the same soreness I did, so it must have been the core from yesterday. After we finished the mile repeats, coach split the girls and boys up for the 800's. The boys went first. I ended up PR'ing in my 800, twice. I personally didn't measure the course, but multiple people told me it was a full half mile. I ran a 2:38 for the first repeat and a 2:37 for the second one. It all felt really good! I think the speed helped moved the lactic acid out of my system. Our first meet is the Premier Invite on Saturday. I am very excited.