Week of December 5-11

Monday: 9 miles (60 minutes)
Did a fartlek today, 8x 3 minutes with 1 minute rest. I never felt very good throughout the run. My hamstrings were really tight and moderately painful. All of my intervals were at roughly tempo pace instead of the 10k pace I intended them to be. But all in all a good start to the week.

Tuesday: 11 miles (1:22) ~2500 ft.
Went up the fire road to Penegally Ridge. Ran over the top of Sentinel and down into Hell's Canyon. 

Wednesday: 14 (1:37) ~1500 ft
Saddle of Jumbo the standard way. Felt pretty good all the way through. Worked the climb up the road and cruised down the back, feeling pretty smooth.

Thursday: 14 (1:59) ~3000 ft
Went up Hell's Gate Canyon to University Beacon. Really long climb, but it was the first time I had gone that far up. It was amazing to get to the top and view miles around. I dropped off the back of University Beacon, and went up Radio Mountain.

Friday: 12 (1:25)
Just did the standard loop up into the Rattlesnake. Nothing special about today, just putting the time in.

Saturday: 18 (2:07)
Well I put in my longest run since August today, but it was somewhat of an odd run. Did a loop through town to pick up some Gu, then headed up the Rattlesnake to keep it fairly flat and consistent. It was really nice to break over that 2 hour mark again, its something I've been missing alot lately.

Sunday: 5 (36 minutes)
I headed out to the trails in the dark, only to have my headlamp die. So turned around and went into the gym to finish up on the death machine. I could not handle running on it. After a mere mile I got off and went back through town in the lights.

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This week was another great one. I was so glad to get out into the mountains a few more days and really log some miles and some vertical gain. As much as I thought my mental state was at an all time high last week, this week was even better. My five miler Sunday was nothing special, but I know that it was what I needed. As the week has progressed my left knee began to give me a little soreness, so a down day was probably good for me.

As for now, back to the books; time to crank out the finals.