Friday's Training -

Am: 90 mins easy + Weights

Pm: 60 mins easy

I was greeted on Friday morning by a glorious sunshine but again the wind was going to be pretty significant. I had my usual cup of coffee and toast and had a little chit chat with Lorie (Julie’s mum) before I got on my way. I wanted to try out a new run along the canal that I had found online but after taking the exact directions to the start of the run, there was nothing there and I wound up in a Lexus fore court! I got back in the car and drove to the gym and decided to start the run from there. I ran to South Mountain (5miles) and hit the Mormon loop (5 miles). This is a great loop but it is a steep climb up and then a steep descent down so you have to be really careful. It actually didn’t stopped me from hurtling down the trail and it reminded me of my hill running days. I always enjoyed the technical descents as I had learned very early on in my running days, running with my club back home that you can’t be scared on these trails as you’ll only slow down (I got over my fear of falling by being chased by the older runners when I had either tripped them up or thrown mud on their head). Once I got back to the road though my quads were burning but at least I had the wind behind me the whole way. I finished off the run and did a bunch of drills and strides in the car park before heading into the gym to lift. I was a little more energised today so it was easy to get through it all but it still took a long time and I didn’t get back to the house until 1pm. I thought I would pass out after this and sleep for a long time but I only nodded off for about 10 mins and I was wide awake.

After cleaning my car in the lovely 80 degree weather and catching a few rays while I was at it, it was time to get my 2^nd run done so I laced up and got out the door. I felt pretty tired but after taking it pretty easy for the first 4 miles I almost suddenly felt good and started to pick the pace up and cruised the last few miles home. That brought my days total to 24 miles. I spent the rest of the night eating dinner with Julie's family and waiting for Julie to get down from Flagstaff as she was travelling down with a co worker. I was still in 2 minds about when to do my long run the next day as it was going to be a long one and I would be needing a lot of fluids on the run. The dilemma was to either run at 6am before our 10am engagement photo shoot and run with a camelback or wait until after and do it when the temperature would be peaking for the day. I decided on the latter as Julie arrived in late and I felt that getting a good long sleep and a good breakfast would be better for my body.