Running in Park City Utah is FUN!!

Hello my fellow friends, family, and followers of my blog!  I'm a few days past my last weekly report, so I better get everyone caught up!  Soooo, this past week I did something new!  Has anyone reading this ever done Hot Yoga before??? 

I have never attempted it and was talking to a friend who does it frequently.  She encouraged me to try it out even though I stressed to her that the reason I've never tried it is that I get bloody noses.  Yep...  I'm the dork that you may see every now and again with toilet paper stuck up my nose while running errands.  I get the kind of bloody noses where they just don't stop.  So, instead of waiting around impatiently hoping they'll slow down, I just push something up my nose (whatever it may be, but usually toilet paper), and go on my merry way.  I've gone grocery shopping, skiing, working, studying, you name it... all with a wad of you know what up my nose!  Here I am several years ago in my friends wedding as a bridesmaid... I know, right????  Thankfully it stopped before the actual ceremony!

I have found that I often get bloody noses when I sit in Sauna's or any hot/humid place.  So, you can guess my hesitation.  However, I am in this mood lately where I'm pretty much up for trying anything lately, so I tried Hot Yoga!  Not gonna lie, I absolutely love it!!!  I am going to throw it out on a limb and encourage everyone reading this to go try it!  It's awesome! 

I really like it for my training as I've been running and biking and stair-stepping my way through my workouts, and I've noticed that my muscles have gotten really tight.  I've always been hesitant to do yoga as I am the type of person that really like to "feel" the workout.  You know, sweat... breath hard... that kind of stuff.  Hot Yoga is a great middle ground as I sweat more than I have ever in my life, however you're doing all these hard movements that stretch your entire body.  I've done it 3 times now, and I'm still sore!  I'm in love!!! 

I will say that I did get a bloody nose after the second time I went.  But it wasn't bad, and stopped very soon after it started, so I'm gambling that it's going to be okay!  Woo hoo! 

Okay, so training is going good!  Before I get to that though, I must say that donations this past week were PHENOMENAL!!!!!  I raised about $600 last week!  You guys are all amazing!  I would not be able to do this journey without you, so thanks for ROCKIN' last week!  Keep it up:-)

Now, back to training.  Two Saturdays we had to run 10 miles.  Here's a picture of me as I'm finishing!

I know!  It's a horrible picture, but I mean... I had just ran 10 miles!!!  So I'm kinda diggin' the tired look!  This past week we were required to run 6 miles on our Saturday run.  I was not able to run with the normal Team in Training Group as I was out of town.  I drove down to Salt Lake City, UT to see some great friends of mind this weekend, both who just happened to be on my Freestyle Ski Team in college!

Their names are Kelly Hoerger and Heather McPhie.  If the second name sounds familiar to you, it may be because she's an amazing Olympic Athlete on the US Freestyle Ski Team.  Yeah, I hang out with cool people... I'm kind of a big deal:-)

Kelly and I had a great run on a trail on Friday afternoon.  We most likely ran about 4 and 1/2 to 5 miles. It was beautiful!  I wish I had my camera.  We were just running in the mountains, with a constant amazing view!  Then on Saturday, I drove over to Park City, UT and met up with Heather to run a 6 mile trail with her.  It was more hilly, which I love.  To make it even more difficult we talked to whole time, which is REALLY hard when you're running uphill!  It was worth it to get caught up with life though!

I also did some more mountain biking this week.  I think Mountain Biking is hard... but fun.  However, I still am not in love with going downhill.  I need to get a little braver.  However if you look at this next picture you'll see why mountain biking scares me sometimes...

If you look closely you can see a big 'ol cut on Travis' knee.  Yep, he had a mighty fall!  It looked pretty scary where I was at.  He was going up a really steep hill when instead of going up, he started to fall back/sideways, pretty much off a cliff (or hill, but it was steeeep!).  He gouged his knee and ankle pretty good, but I think he's all right!  Still, that is scary!  However, I like the challenge, so we're having fun riding together!

Okay, I'm rambling, so I'll end this blog here.  Except to say... duh, duh, duuuh... this Saturday I am running 12 miles... 12 MILES!!!!  That is almost a 1/2 marathon!!!!  I'm hitting the pavement, so if you feel the love, hit me up with some donations, and I'll see you on the flip side!!!!

Rachel