TRAINING UPDATE

Wow, I didn’t know the Vita trail would receive so much attention.

Nice to see our sport get a little press locally as Elizabeth Yetzer was named female high school athlete of the year by the St. Paul paper.

Here’s an update on my recent training. Saturday I pushed Katie for 20 minutes and then headed out for another 37 minutes. I called it 7 miles – giving me 51 for the week. So my last 3 weeks have been 32, 40 and 51. I’m going in the right direction and should be in the low 60s this week.

Sunday I headed to the local trails for an easy “long” run. Knowing the black flies are in-season I decided to spray on some OFF before heading out. I’m happy to report that it worked. While the flies were still swarming around my head at times, they never bit me. I passed one other runner and all he said was “Man, these black flies…” Even though I never got bit, the swarming is enough to drive someone crazy. Every time they came around I dropped the pace. When you think about it, it doesn’t really make much sense to speed up since the flies don’t seem to notice the difference between 8:00 pace and 7:30 pace. I guess getting out of the wood 1-2 minutes sooner will have to do. I ended up with 90 minutes and called it 11 miles – my longest run in 7 weeks.

This morning was an easy 7 miles; 1 with the dog from home and then 6 on the trails near my office. I finally managed to get off the pavement and onto the woodchip trails. The trails are awesome but it takes me 2 miles to get to them. I know there’s another way into the park that’s only about a mile from where I park. I’ll have to try that later on – now that I know OFF works.

I’m usually turned-off immediately when athletes start giving thanks to God. You know;

Interviewer: “How’d the race go?”

Athlete: “(pant, pant) I want to (pant, pant) give all thanks (pant, pant) to God.”

That’s great, but that’s not what the interviewer asked you. Do that on your own time. With that said, today’s quote of the day comes from the article I linked above.

“It's a great feeling to know you've pushed yourself to your fullest potential, especially on race days. If I don't do my best, it's pointless. I don't feel proud. It violates the reason I run: to go all out to glorify God. I try not to make that happen. I try to push myself to my fullest potential, but you never know what you have in you.” – Elizabeth Yetzer