Matt Todd Running

I'm back!

Last time I was on this blog was over 2 and a half years ago. Dope. I'm going to start running again. For a quick recap: I went on an lds mission (Calgary, Canada) and ran kinda sporadically throughout the two years that I was there. I impulsively signed up for and ran the AF half two days after I got home (not bad for taking 2 years off; 1:25:52 and 25th place). Then I stopped. I dabbled in bodybuilding for the last 6 months (and got frickin jacked), but I miss running so I'm coming back in 2018 with the hopes of getting into marathon racing.

Anyways, today I ran 3 miles at a 6:58 pace. Probably a bit faster than I wanted as I'm going to be easing back in and taking things pretty easy for the next few weeks. I felt good though and it was a beautiful day so I went for it.

More to come.

Kept it nice and slow today. I don't know exactly how slow because my watch is being ridiculous and kept deleting my run and restarting. uuugggghhhhh. What a bunch of str8 cattle excrement. I was mildly pissed, but have since repented so it's all good. I'll assume I kept it arround 8:00/mile.

I also decided that it would be a good time to finally make my belated switch to forefoot running so we'll see how that goes over the next couple of weeks.

Felt really good!

It was my little sisters' birthdays today so we went to Lowes Extreme Air sports (trampoline park) and I went frickin ham so that's gotta count for something. I had a coke, a scoop of preworkout, and a GU shortly before going in and I felt like I was on str8 cocaine it was nuts. Try to beat my American Ninja warrior time if you're ever in provo. 58 seconds booiii. 

Anyways, afterwards I ran off my remaining energy in a easy 3 mile. 

3 mile route up to the Provo temple, added a lap around it just for fun.

Ahhhhhh it was sooooo beautiful today. It felt so good. I love global warming.

Haven't quite figured out how to get a run in on mondays but its a work in progress.

Today I went for a Tuesday trail run up towards the Y. I turned back at 1.5 miles but the elevation gain was insane and I was feeling a bit like jelly. Felt good though! 8:14 avg pace.

Nice easy run with my roommates. They didn't do too bad actually. I felt really good. We ran out past the City Center temple. Went 8:55, 8:07, and 7:24.

Jaxon even agreed to keep running with me so we'll see how that goes.

Accidently sent 4 today with Jaxon. My legs are feeling a little sore but we just went nice and slow. Jaxon isn't even a runner but he's gone 3 days with me this week so I'm proud of him haha. Slowly but steadily getting back into it.

Avg pace was right around 8:35.

Ski day

Went on a nice morning run with jaxon, ended up getting a nice view of Provo before the sunrise. Easy pace uphill, we gained about 300 ft in elevation, and then pushed it a little harder for the next 2 miles.

Also shout out to my main man King Cheserek for getting that American indoor record in the mile. You inspire me. Back to back killer races homie.

Nice flat run today. I felt like going a little faster so we pushed it pretty good on the last mile. Still nothing life-changing, and I'm still just slowly working on my foundation, but it was nice to go faster than we've been going. Jaxon came with me again and kept up remarkably well.

Miles were 8:55, 8:04, and 7:14

Easy 3 mile night run. Almost forgot to run today haha but we got it in.

Jaxon needed to sleep in this morning so I went solo. it wasn't too bad though because I got to go fast haha. I went 3 miles without stopping as kind of a tempo run I guess but my pace was all over the place.

Miles were 7:35, 6:53, and 6:35.

It was a bit challenging, but it felt really good! It also felt really cold, and my toes hurt for some reason haha. Anyways, we'll be in arches tomorrow hiking, I might try to get one more run in but I'll have to see how it goes.

Got to run in the snow today! Played some basketball with the bros and then went for a quick 3 mile run. It was pretty cold and I felt like I was going really slow the whole time but it turns out that my pace was actually much faster than it has been the last few weeks. I was consistently around 7:30 and it averaged to a 7:33. 

I guess that's a good sign that I'm starting to get into slightly better shape. I'll try to keep all of my runs this week sub-8 I think.

Woke up a bit late and only had time for 2 today. Hopefully I can get 4 on Saturday or something to make up.

Easy 3 mile with jaxon. I actually felt warmed up by the time we hit 3 miles haha. My body was telling me to keep going. I guess that's a good sign, maybe I'll attempt a 5 miler on Saturday.

Went a little faster today, I was by myself. Felt really good! mildly challenging, but over all very doable. Just slowly getting faster line upon line and precept upon precept as they say.

Mile splits were 7:20, 7:02, 7:19, 7:16

Nice and slow, but a lot of hills today.

Shoulda gone in the morning before the snow hit, but I missed my chance and got to run in a blizzard with about 8 inches on the ground.

Guess I could have just hit the gym and ran there but death comes before treadmills in my life.

Almost died cause the whole thing was just running over snow and ice, but we made it. 

Longest run we've done so far! Not too bad, kept it nice and slow at a 8:24/mile pace.

Ran with Jaxon past the City Centre temple this morning. It felt really good, I was hyped after. I think I ran Jaxon kinda fast haha but he survived. We went 7:56, 7:24, and 6:51

I had a study session that I needed to make it to and all I kept thinking was that I needed to run fast if I was going to make it. So I ran fast. I felt pretty accomplished/exhausted after since it was the first time I've ran a sub-20 3 mile in a little while. 

Splits were 7:02, 6:24, and 6:09

3 miles in the morning

easy 3 miler, kinda bummed that I missed yesterday but I was studying for Finance literally all day long. ugggghhh. A little groggy this morning but we got it done.

This was the longest run I've done in about 8 months so that felt great. It was cool to just get outside of the usual bubble that I've ran in so far and see some new things. You can't see a lot only going three miles a day haha. 

Kept it nice and easy, never pushed the pace. I feel like I ran far, but it was a good feeling. My splits were 8:12, 7:59, 7:43, 8:00, 7:54, and 7:44.

Easy 4 with Jaxon this morning.

Shout out to Roger Bannister for being a fantastic example of what it means to push the limits of the human spirit. Sad to hear of his passing, but thankful for the legacy that he left behind.

Ran past the city centre temple.

Kept a pretty steady pace for this one, I was doing Finance all afternoon so I just got one in around 6. Shout out to the Jazz for their win tonight and to BYU for a valiant effort in the WCC tournament. 

Splits were 7:51, 7:43, 7:37, and 7:25

4 miles in the morning with Jaxon. I think that I am quickly getting in much better shape than he is. Initially we were about the same because it had been so long since I'd run, but he's never ran before so I think I'm getting back in the game a little quicker. I wanted to go a lot faster today but he was pretty winded.

To be fair, I'm just super impressed that he's stuck with it so we'll. He's killing it. Honestly I probably need someone who forces me to take it easy right now so I don't hurt myself haha.

Avg pace was 8:14

Ran up to the y parking lot in the afternoon. Felt super nice outside, I even popped the shirt off for a bit. Turns out we got like a 650 ft elevation gain over the course of about a mile and a half. That was pretty gnarly. Pace was about 8:40, which was really not too bad all thins considered.

Accidentally ran on a race course this morning and everyone thought we were that last runners in... awk. Still good though, I wanted to keep going there at the end, it was like I had finally warmed up on the last mile. 

Splits were 8:10, 8:10, 8:05, 7:43, and 7:05

Went running last night by myself, even got to pop the ole shirt off for a while so #blessed. It's warm and I'm so pumped.

My legs felt really strong today after the weekend. I took a nice slow warm up but I just had to go fast after that. I felt great! I think I'm definitely improving and will hopefully be back in decent shape soon.

Splits were 8:14, 7:09, 6:43, 5:55.

Nice and slow today with Jaxon. 6 am came too early.

1.5 mile warm up

5x400 meter uphill sprints @5:55 pace (continuous loop with downhill recovery)

1.5 mile cool down

Good run! I felt like I really pushed myself, I want to start having some hills at least once a week so that I can put on some good leg strength and get faster. They'll probably get more strenuous eventually. I probably ate too many krispy kremes today haha but other than that things went well.

Easy 4 miles in the mist. Averaged 7:55/mile.

Good  5 mile run with Jaxon. Proud of that dude, kept with me for everything but the last mile. We kept a steady 7:55 for the first four, but I felt really good and wanted to go fast on the last one. Also I took a scoop of preworkout before hand so that might be part of it.

Last mile was 5:43. Not bad for being fat. Honestly, I'm probably in good enough shape for sub 5:20 if I was fresh. I came in pretty quick though so I did a mile cool down after for good measure.

Can't remember how fast haha

Easy warm up around 7:40. Then I decided to see how fast I could run a 5k haha so I picked it up a bit. 5k in 19:48. If I ran that during senior year of high school I might have cried myself to sleep for the next month. But I'm outta shape so it was a good mark of where I'm at.

Nice and slow. pace over 8.

Decided I needed to step up my  game in the distance category. Jaxon didn't join me haha. My route was fairly hilly, but I managed to stay pretty steady on the pace so that was good. Nothing too fast haha, I averaged about a 7:47.

Felt good! That's the farthest I've ran since June. I may have accidentally signed up to race the St George Marathon yesterday so I need to stop messing around I guess.

Kind of a messy run this morning with Jaxon. Every dang road in provo is under construction so we made a lot of detours. Somehow we ended up hitting the mileage though and I was glad to finally wake up on time to get a morning run in.

Went a little faster today than yesterday, I still wasn't trying to push it though, just settling into a good cruise pace by the last mile. Splits were 7:56, 7:17, 7:30, 6:54.

I ate a ton of food right before running today so I went way slow haha. It was a beautiful run! I was super pumped to be running with all of the long grass and flowers and blossoms out until I almost went into a pollen induced anaphylactic shock. Grabbed some allergy stuff when I got back though, and after a brief coma, I was good to go.

All in all it was a good run.

Long run today. Well, relatively long that is. Kept my pace right around 7:30 for the whole thing so that was great. I actually felt genuinely fantastic when I finished. Also maybe a bit sunburned, but that's also a win.

Tempo run today!!

I warmed up a mile and then the plan was to hold a 6:30 for 3 and then cool down after to finish up 5. I ended up going 6:30, 6:22, and 6:21 so that was awesome. I felt way stronger (maybe just mentally) after my long run on Saturday, so 5 seems pretty easy now. It still felt really fast and I was way tired afterwards but it is definitely a sign of improvement to be able to average a 6:24 by myself on a training run.

Spaced out and missed the turnaround point by a bit (hence the extra .12), just got in some miles today. Average was exactly 8:00/mile on the dot, which is what I was going for. Just an easy recovery from yesterday before I hit some hills tomorrow.

Almost killed me. Day one of training for St Geezy 26.2 on October 6th

with @connorballer

Only 5, but actually pretty proud of how consistent I was for a first full week back at it.

Fresh New kicks. Wanted to go 10 but it was 10:00 at night and I ran past one too many sketchy warehouses with flickering lightbulbs and decided to just run back home as fast as I could. Adrenaline feels great though, averaged around 7:30/mile.

Roughly 7:40 average pace. It was hot. Sidenote I actually have no idea what my average pace was... that was just my warm up pace and then my watch stopped working. Happens every day. I guess that's what I get for rocking the frickin forerunner 10. Thing was literally carved out of mammoth tusk with a stone knife. I'm practically living in a third world country here. I mean, even kids from rural ethiopia probably at least have the 15. fetch. Maybe I'll have to mug some Timpview High School JV kid and take his watch. Stay tuned.

Super slow. tryna hit 8 again tomorrow so I needed a bit of recovery. I even did one plank at the end. That's one more plank than I did yesterday. Dope. Average pace 8:16/mile.

I feel like I just carried the one ring to mordor, collected and destroyed all 7 horcruxes, and beat alex honnold up the face of El Capitan. Holy Frick. My legs are seriously fatigued. I plan on hitting 42 miles this week, which isn't a ton, but it's more than I've ran in a week since high school. Probably a dumb move but yolo right.

Suuuper slow. I would've lost to my grandma on speed. She could probably amputate one of her legs and I'd still lose. Let's just say I had a lot of time to think. Nonetheless, I did it.

St george in 30 days. ya know, I may have only started running again and training the last 2 weeks but if I've learned anything from Nike the last few days it's to not ask if your dreams are crazy, ask if they're crazy enough.

7 miler. much faster than yesterday (not too much of an accomplishment), but it ended up being around 7:46 average. Turns out ice makes your legs less sore. How's that for a fun fact? 

Longest run I've done since last June. I feel a bit tired. mostly because I stuffed myself at a ysa thing right before my run... not a good idea. nice and slow.

In the smoke. made me literally sick and I couldn't run for three days.

Faster. Average pace was 6:55. I needed something to make the slow runs feel easier haha.

recovery pace. long run tomorrow

16 miles in 2:15. not breaking any records but that's actually the longest I've ever run in my entire life. Honestly it was pretty easy. I'll try to get a twenty in next week, but I think I might actually be able to run st George in 2 weeks.

I also found out that I need to try and grow a beard for this year's Savior of the World performance... Honestly might be harder than the marathon.

Ran up to the "Y" parking lot and then along the side of the mountain until the trail abruptly ended and I had to scramble down to the bottom. Maybe I wasn't actually on a trail at the end... whatever. It felt fantastic though! Air is clearing up; sun was setting; all of provo, springville, and orem was beneath me; good stuff. If I were a psychiatrist, I would most certainly prescribe a trail run to all of my clients.

Slow pace: 8:30ish but I had 781 feet in elevation gain so that isn't so bad after all. I feel like I need a bit more speed in my life so I did a 400m stride at the end in 1:21. Nothing crazy, just trying to get back in the "sprint to the finish" mentality. 

easy recovery pace. Did a bit of Fartlek-ish on the last mile and a half. Just threw in 5 or 6 30-second sprints to open up a bit and keep things moving. Depending on how I feel I think I'm gonna try to get in another long run tomorrow.

Also I went climbing with my man Hank and I looked like a total weenie. Turns out I have literally zero arm strength these days. Time to start doing some pull ups or something holy frick.

Almost died.

did 6-7 fast miles on a bike. just want to get my legs loosened back up after yesterday. 

Speed workout

Hit the BYU track, idk if that was legal but whatever.

1xMile all out

1x800

1x400

cool down lap and full recovery in between each. I just wanted to go fast. too bad my stomach was dying the entire time. ugghhh. No watch which was a serious struggle, but I'd peg my mile somewhere around 5:20. 800 and 400 maybe a little bit faster. Also I'm just gonna call it 6 miles, it was somewhere around there.

I just wrote up a big report for this and it got deleted... ugggghhhhhh

1 mile at 7:56

5 miles at 6:50

last mile was probably sub-6 honestly,  but my watch had died. rip.

Wow. I feel like I may have to amputate both my legs holy frick. I'm dead. I literally couldn't walk after I finished.

Play by play:

Got into the front right off the bat. ran the first mile in like 6:30 and I'm like "fetch, I haven't even ran a 6:30 in a training run the entirity of 2018." probably too fast, but my man Drake once said Yolo so I went with it. 3 miles were just under 21 and 10k was 42. I was just having a good ole time, but my legs started feeling it after the hill at mile 8.

I passed a ton of people up that hill. it was big. I felt a lot of lactic acid building in my quads though and knew I was probably going a bit too fast. I've only been running for 6 weeks, and 98% of that has been under 8 miles and slower than a 8:15 pace. My biggest drawback is my ego though, so I held a sub 7 pace until about mile 11. a big group came up behind me and I wanted to stay in front of them but the spirit whispered to me that it wasn't sustainable so I gave in and probably let 50 people pass me going through the first half.

Thankfully, I was saved by a clif energy shot with caffeine and hit a bit of a second wind. I took 3 miles to slowly eat it so my stomach wouldn't hurt, but that hit me and I dropped 3 or 4 6:30 miles back to back. Dope. I was back. I was hi-fiving kids, I was flexing at the spectators, I popped the shirt off, people were like "good work, you look great!" and I'm like "No you look great!" I was back.

I hit 20 miles at 2:20, maybe 2:21 but I felt like I was gonna die. last 6 were probably around 7:45 average. I don't think I hit an energy wall or ran out of glycogen per say (I carb loaded hard and my veins were flowing with at least .08% Gatorade), but my legs were finally spent. my form broke down, I sat down on my hips, hunched my shoulders, and slipped into heel striking. I felt like I was running on blocks of wood shaped like legs. If I'd tried to do a single squat, I'm confident that both legs would have snapped in half instantly. Nevertheless, I persevered. But my dreams of sub-3 disappeared, and slowly so did my dreams of sub-3:05. Church may be able to go sub 3, but I could not. I had everyone splash water at me as I ran passed, I let out a few mighty yells, but by mile 24, I was just praying for the finish line. I never stopped and I never walked, and by the end I even found it within me to sprint what I was sure was a 19.19 final 200 meters. However, after watching the video it surely was not and I looked like a 95 year old who got his walker taken away making  a valiant speed walk to escape the retirement home. But I finished.

All in all, it was a great experience and I want to use it as a foundation to build faster times on. I'm not at all satisfied with a 3:09 but it's honestly way faster than I thought I was capable of. good job to everyone else who ran and shout out to my homies D. Todd Christofferson and Dieter F. Uchtdorf for throwing down some fire talks today. if you don't know what I'm talking about, go to lds.org and look at general conference if you're into living a happier, more fulfilling life and such. peace.

Guess who's back?!

Took a week off because I'm not tryna injure myself, but I'm fixing to start small and build up again. I'm in the market for my next race too so hmu with ideas.

5 miles in 36 minutes

ran up hill and along the trail by rock canyon for a bit. my knee kinda started hurting though so I might take it easy for a couple days.

easy 2. suupper slow and lots of stretching. I think I've been neglecting the ole warm up+ stretch thing these days. I still have left knee trouble but I don't think it's an injury, just left over from the marathon maybe and it'll be fine soon. 

3 slow miles with Jaxon. nice 8:30-9:00/mile pace haha, tried not to be too embarrassed about it. spent a bit in the hot tub and my knee isn't feeling too bad.

Went fast. My knee has been hurting recently and for a while I was trying to ice it to no avail. Finally it dawned on me that it was likely an IT band issue, so I just started doing a lot of stretches for it and from wednesday on I was fine. Feels good to be back haha.

I warmed up slow for a mile and a half, stretched, and then picked up the pace a bit. I'd guess my actual run was around a 6:45 pace. That's super fast for me right now, but I feel like I'm starting to get back into decent shape after the marathon. I'll try to go at least 6 every day next week and focus on having a faster pace.

Big shout out to BYU XC for picking up yet another conference championship today. y'all are killing it and continue to inspire me. Also, good luck to my man Bernard Lagat on his taper this week.

Happy birthday to me!

Maybe 7. idk. 

Stomach was no bueno today so but I survived somehow and made it back. Possibly the 2 am Del Taco...

Ended up going pretty fast for the last 2, but it started off kind of rough. I think it just took my body 4 miles before its like "Oh hey, we're running. Ummmm... you need some carbs broken down or something? yeah, we'll start doing that. You need more bloodflow too?" After that though I felt fantastic and burned the last two. I gotta say, it feels really good to run so fast you freak out other pedestrians on the side walk haha.

Finished up with a bit of core.

Ran to springville!! solid run. pretty decent pace, but wasn't pushing it. I was going to stick with 6 miles but I had a lot of stress to run off so it ended up being 10. Solid. Felt really good. looking to hit 36 miles next week and throw in a bit of speed.