Adventures In Running

Saturday, May 23, 2009

My own bizarre triathlon

The beautiful day was calling my name this morning, so after talking with my daughter in Italy for a while, I headed out the door. This time I carried a little more water, some Gatorade Endurance and some Gu Chomps (first time trying these).

I rode my bike a little over 10K to Draper and parked at the Draper City Park. After locking up, I headed out on the equestrian trails along the Draper Canal Trail and Porter Rockwell Trail. I did a 7.1 mile loop and alternated running and walking to let my legs recover from 2 hard days. Strangely enough, the grass rubbing along my legs on the way out irritated me, but running back I was in a wall of chest high grass and loved my own little 'tunnel' and the feeling against my arms. By the way – I really like the Gu Chomps – maybe even more than ShotBloks.

Climbed on the bike and headed back home. The first hill I hit really made my quads whine, but I told them to shut up and they did. My butt was a lot happier about having a break partway through the ride than when I just ride to Draper and back.

For the third leg of my triathlon, I stopped at Gold's Gym and did 45 minutes of weight training on my chest, back and biceps. There was a great bicep workout in the latest issue of Oxygen magazine and I wanted to try that out.

Once more on the bike for the last 1.3 miles home. Whiny quads again – but I didn't care because I caught some nice definition in my legs in the mirrors of the gym.

Tomorrow will be a rest day. Monday I am meeting some other runners at 6 a.m. in Provo to run the Provo River Parkway Trail for 20 miles. It will be the first 20 miler for Marion and the last really long run for all of us in preparation for the Utah Valley Marathon three weeks from today.

My IT Band no longer bothers me at all. The piriformis is healing – but I can still tell it is not 100%. I will do yoga and core tonight and then do some serious stretching of my entire body.

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