18 miles. I had some anxiety before this run after how bad I felt running in American Fork Canyon last month, exhausted, seeing spots, felt like I just wanted to lay down and sleep, etc. Melanie and I met Kim and Jane at Kohler's Grocery Store in Highland, 2.5 miles into their 22 mile run. We headed up American Fork Canyon about 2 miles away. The 7 miles going up the canyon were hard. Melanie and I took a shorter stop 2 miles from the top because we were going .5 farther up than them, hoping if we made quicker stops we could catch them on the way back down. Kim and Jane changed their plans and ran father up than us to get the GU they stashed with their water, deciding to end their run at Kohlers instead of where they started, so we passed them coming down and didn't see them again.
When we turned around we had an average 7:38 pace. Melanie asked me if I thought we could get it down to 6:59 and I said, "No, we'd have to do 9 miles at 6:22 pace!" After how hard I ran the first 9 miles up there I didn't think I would be able to or even want to try to go down that fast. We decided to just run and see what we got. Well, American Fork Canyon is a constant up and therefore a constant down and we miraculously ran a bunch of the miles at about 6 min pace. Even our last two on the flat part were 6:20 pace. Our average pace down ended up being 6:10 and we got our our average for the whole run down to 6:54. I was pleased with how fast we were able to go and also with how good I felt, so much better than last time. I was able to run to the point where I was breathing hard and have my body still feel good. It's amazing what some sleep will do for me that way. I wish I would have slept better all summer. | 