Park City Marathon

Holy Schnikies,

   That was the toughest course I've run yet. I planned on finishing in 3hrs 45 min and did it in 3:46, so I hit my target basically. From start to mile 5 was rolling hills, to 13 was a consistent climb, and then the fun began. The halfway point had an aid station and a band playing, then you turn a corner and start the climb up to the Lodge at Deer Valley. One guy I was running next to said, "only 4 miles of climbing". I wasn't quite sure, but did he say "4" miles? 3.8 miles later we got to come back down. Then it was more rolling hills to the end. We actually ran across the bridge over main street but then there's this hill that's maybe 40 yards long but so steep not a single person was running. I will say this was the most scenic course I've run. 

   So 4 weeks until Top of Utah in Logan and then 2 weeks after that for St. George. I'll download some pics here shortly, but till then, it's off to bed for a 5:30 run in the morning. I'm getting tired of the long drive to Utah County every morning. 

OH -- Football season starts this weekend! The U's first game is a road game in the "big house" (100,000 seats compared to 42.000 for Rice-Eccles), but then it's boy time in the south end zone a week later! I am a Utah man sir and I live across the green.....   For those who don't know, the brothers-in-law (Russ, John) and Grandpa Clark and I have season tickets. That's fun stuff.

Watch your head

Calendar update -- tomorrow is the Park City Marathon! I'll be flying solo on this one as none of the Salt Lake Farmhands were men enough to attempt it. I will give kudos to John as he should be up there to watch or run a few. This is stop #4 on the road of the Grand Slam (Salt Lake, Ogden, Deseret News, Park City, Top of Utah aka Logan, and St. George).

Random road rage:
I was driving to work (in dangerous Cougar town – I have my Crimson Kevlar vest each day just for protection) and passed a semi pulling a big tractor on the trailer. On the back was a big sign that said “Wide Load”. I was close to Pleasant Grove and thought I’d take a picture and send it to my friend Mac who lives in PG and as a joke say, “what are you doing on the freeway heading south? Don’t you work in Salt Lake?”
About 10 seconds after I took the photo (trying to get it from my phone to the IT box), as I was trying to change lanes to pass him, I hear this loud BANG. I look up to see a cloud of dust and shrapnel flying everywhere. Rock chips, glass shards, and brake lights were all I could see. It was like being in a desert windstorm (not that I have, but this is what I imagined it would look like). I slammed on my brakes and started praying that the glass I saw wasn’t from my window.
Turns out the semi clipped the American Fork exit’s overpass and smashed the cab of the tractor that was being pulled. Talk about excitement for the morning. Funny thing was, it kind of reminded me of Mac (he’s definitely not overweight), just tall enough to forget to duck when walking under doorways and hits his head every now and then.

Thought for the day:
"Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed.
Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve.
It doesn't matter whether you're a lion or a gazelle -- when the sun comes up, you'd better be running. "

Where'd you go?

So we were at a ward BBQ last night and Allen, Melissa, and Brooke were giving Em a hard time about not updating her blog in the last who knows how long. So I realized I hadn't updated mine either. I'm just glad no one knows about mine yet. :) I want to but by getting up at 530 to run takes it's toll after the kids go to bed and I just want to eat my cereal and hit the pillow.

So I'm making another effort. This morning I pulled out an old CD to listen to on the drive to work and forgot how good it was. Here's a line for the day from this fabulous album of Dave Matthews. I partially pulled it out because I heard that Leroi Moore passed away a couple of days ago. Anyway, here's a cool line that may give you a flash from the past:

"I can't believe that we would lie in our graves, dreaming of things that we might have done".