Trying to improve my running

3.75 miles time 34:05 9:05/mile. Had 1 real hill the middle miles were slow, and were the uphill miles.

3.13 miles, 28:07, 8:57/mile 2nd half of first mile was slow. I was post call this week so I think that has affected me. I ust don't feel I am going as fast as last week.

6.14 miles, 1 hour, 9:46/mile. the whole run was pretty fast except for the middle 0.5 miles when i decided to go over the top of the hill and had to go slow because of the cactus overgrowing the "trail".

didn't run. Too tired worked until 2230 last night.

3.47 miles, 32:56, 9:29/mile average pace. Hard run this AM. The first mile I was really sucking wind. pushed through and felt better towards the end.

Here are the mile splits.

 had 2 stretches of 150 ft elevation gain.

I fell down running on Thursdays run.  Didn't think much of it just scuffed my knees and my hands. My knee has been popping since around that time maybe a day earlier. After today's run though I developed a large knee effusion. I had no pain or problems during the run. I started to have some pain after the run witht he effusion and the knee felt pretty unstable. I am not sure what is causing this. I hope only patellofemoral problems. I am worried about a meniscus. I guess I will take it easy next week. maybe try biking or swimming. if anyone has advice I would love to hear it.

Average 8:21/mile  the middle mile was 7:45/mile. I developed a knee effusion saturday after the 10K. It was better today and didn't hurt but I thought I should take it easy. I hope this goes away.

I am slacking off about entering stuff in here. Average time 8:04/mile. I would be really happy if this was my marathon time. I think more realistically it might be my 5k time. I don't get on the computer that often and it won't le tme type entries from my phone. I did 2.78 miles this day. I was going to do a long bike ride, to give my knee a rest. So I decided to go for a fast short run. Then i started running and didn't want to stop. So I turned out doing almost 3 miles. It felt pretty good. My knee hurt at the start, but after it loosened up felt fine. It did swell up after not as much as before, no pain after.

average time was 9:36/mile. This was my second run in the barefoot shoes. It felt so good. I didn't want to stop. I read the previous night about the 100 up exercise and did the minor exercise. I felt like it helped to focus me on proper technique. I think that my technique got a little sloppy towards the end, d/t fatigue.

So I tried to go biking this morning. I rode my bike 1.5 miles hoping to go for 9-10 miles, but my tire blew out after only 1.5 miles. I then had to walk back home with my bike. I then went and ran 1.5 miles in the barefoot shoes. It was a pretty frustrating day. average time was 9:51/mile.

Average pace 9:13/mile. It felt really good today. I ran in the barefoot shoes and did the minor workout for 100 up first. I felt like my form was really good throughout. It was hard to maintain at the end but I was able to focus and finish. the knee felt great no swelling or pain.

Felt really sore running today. The Barefoot shoes take some getting used to. Consequently my time was 9:36/mile

Took a day off to recover from the workout for these muscles I didn't know that I have. I felt better today. I really focused on my form. I found that if I got distracted it deteriorated. Toward the end of the run it was harder to maintain the form as well d/t tiredness.

Pretty good run I tried to go faster today. I did pretty well for the most part but I took a shortcut just after the 1 mile point and got stuck in the cactus, so I had to walk for a minute. Average pace was still 9:16/mile.

Not as sore today and was able to average 9:04/mile. Best pace yet w/ good form.

Pretty flat run. Felt really pretty good. 8:49/mile. I started to tire out and form was getting worse at the end.

It was hard to get going today. I didn't feel really good until about 1 mile in. Unfortunately was late for work so had to head back. 9:02/mile.

Today I drove to the biggest hill close by my house and ran up it a couple of times. It is only 100 feet of elevation gain over 0.2 miles but I guess it is a start. I ran up and down that 2x plus up several other smaller hills. average pace was 9:10/mile

Slow I was sore from playing football on Thanksgiving.

Average was 9 min miles. I didn't want to hurt my knee, which was still a little sore from football on Thanksgiving.

Tried to speed things up a bit today. Two of the miles were faster than 9 min/mile. The middle mile was at 9:09.

Not much time today. I decided to do hill work. I ran the hill by my house that is a bout a 9% grade again. It is the hill on twin peaks road going into aura valley if anyone reads this that knows about Tucson. The hill is about 0.2 miles and I did it in 50 seconds, I think. Figuring it out that gives me just shy of a 5 min mile and that doesn't seem right. I need better GPS. Oh well I tryed to sprint the hills.

I seem to remember thinking about this time that I was having a hard time breaking through 9 min/mile with the barefoot shoes. Today it was  9'02",  9'23",  8'53".

Changed into the tennis shoes today and ran up the steep hill by sombrero peak. I did that relatively easy especially compared to how I felt running it back on Oct 15. The time wasn't great I think partly because going down there where a ton of loose rocks and I had to slow down. 34:51 min Splits were 8:36, 11:02, and 10:58. The big hill was in the second mile.

Thought I should try and do 1 mile as fast as I could. 7:34/mile in barefoot shoes.

Tried for some consistently fast pace. Averaged 8:04/mile. I can't remember but I think this was in the barefoot shoes.

Tried for more distance today. I was able to get the pace faster than 9/mile though. I felt pretty tired today and I guess that is why I took the day before off. Ran in the tennis shoes today. 8:45, 8:31, and 8:36 for splits.

Went faster today. Partly because I slept in and needed to get done quicker and thought I would do a shorter run before the weekend. I ran in the Barefoot shoes. Splits were 7:44 and 7:58.

Had to work today and wanted to put up the Christmas lights so I didn't get to run like I wanted to during the day. So I decided to instead go for a quick run at night. Only ran for 12:53 average pace 7:42.

Tried for 8/mile average. Made it did the run in 24 min. Splits were 8:02, 7:54 and 8:04. Afterwards my feet were throbbing at work I started to worry about getting a stress fracture so I think I may run in regular shoes the rest of the week.

Wore the tennis shoes today and went a bit slower didn't hurt at all. 19:37 was time.

Did another quick run in regular tennis shoes. 16:12 7:52/mile.

A little bit longer and slower run today. My splits were 8:43, 8:49 and 8:39.

I wanted to go for more distance today since it was the weekend. I was feeling really good after yesterday. I did 7 miles on trails and the road. I felt super good after. I was a little sore but not bad. Here are my splits 8:03, 8:11, 8:28, 8:29, 9:13, 9:17 and 8:55. I obviously tired out after the first couple of miles but i was glad I was able to pick it up a little bit for the last mile.

I didn't get started this AM as I would have liked. I did it pretty quick though splits were 8:20, and 8:24.

I had the day off today so I went for a long run. It was really nice ran the first couple of miles through the desert off road part of it was even without trails. the splits for the first part through the deserrt were 9:05 and 9:29. After that I wanted to run on this trail that goes along the Santa Cruz river. I didn't really know how far away it was but I knew I was kind of close to it. I jogged down Ina (splits 8:30, 8:36), which is a nice hilly road and then went down the trail by the river. I was hoping to go for at least 10K. (splits for the river 8:52, 8:51) I reached the end of that and was still at the river, which is apparantly 2 miles from home. I finished the 10K in 55:21.  Poor planning but I did get to do an extra 2 miles (8:34, and 9:07) and the river was awesome. I will see if i can upload the picture from the run. 

I love this route it has some decent hills in the 2nd and 3rd mile. felt good I did this in barefoot shoes after not the long run yesterday in tennis shoes. Splits 8:21, 8:57, 8:41 and 8: 54.

ran 5k this AM. I was pretty tired after a long week. It was feels good after I get done though. It was also pretty cold at least for Tucson (32 degrees). Splits were 8:21, 8:20 and 8:41.

I felt tired today but it was nice and sunny so that helped to get out and get going. the first mile was painful then I loosened up and the next 3-4 miles felt pretty good. the last mile was hard. here are my splits: 8:25, 8:28, 8:29, 8:25, 8:36 and 8:55.

Wasn't able to run yesterday b/c was working. Felt good to go again today. I got my new GPS watch for Christmas and ran with that it was nice. fairly slow pace in the barefoot shoes. 

Here are my splits

Split	Time	Distance	Avg Pace

1	8:32.3	1.00	8:32
2	8:43.1	1.00	8:43
3	8:44.6	1.00	8:45
4	:56.5	0.11	8:18

I ran with the new watch today. Just did a regular route. I went a little farther because i didn't have conference this AM. I didn't go super fast. My average HR was 151. Here are my splits.

Had a swing shift today. I decided to go out and try some hills. I was able to run in the light, which was also nice. this course had 197 ft elevation gain mainly up until just past 2 miles and then back downhill. The second mile was the steepest and hence the slowest. The 1st mile had elevation gain of 64 feet. The 2nd mile had elevation gain of 123 feet. Then 0.14 up 26 feet before turning around.

 Here are my splits:

I did hill sprints up the hill on Twin peaks. The first hill was 7% grade and 0.2 miles the next 3 were about 0.25 miles but 6.9% grade. Splits for the hills 9:55, 9:36, 10:04 and 9:38.