9.5 mi 1:16:00 7:59 /mi

A lot has happened since not posting on Trackster for a while (yeah that’s my fault). So I’ve graduated from my student command (and I’m not longer a student!) Now as it turns out I’ve came back to the great state of Illinois and one of the first things on my mind was to do a repeat like last time and go on a run with arguably one of the greatest coaches of all time, just so happened to be the one that mentored me through 2 years of running conditioning. The run was amazing, after nearly 2 years I managed to pull off a waterfall loop while talking the entire way, and yeah when you talk, the run goes by way too quick, talking does great things. Either way it’s great to hear from yall and hopefully you all get on with the season and keep it moving, now I do understand that with the current situation, sometimes things might be under the radar. Behold this: just a few weeks ago I drove to my step dad to get my car checked up. As we were listening to the engine, my step dad (a fantastic mechanic) heard a slight rattling in the engine. I had always assumed it would be a normal thing but he disagreed so begrudgingly I had to leave it behind. And that sucked because I had JUST checked into my new command and now I had to go a WEEK without a car, just walking to work. So after a grueling week, I came back and we began working to fix the problem. There were MANY components that got between us and getting to what we thought was the source of the problem: the oil pan. So working working, AGH AC compressor gets in the way, get out of there, cool move on, oh great theres the radiator, theres the subframe, theres the this and theres the that. And FINALLY we get to the oil pan. As we're lowering it down, we hear 2 little small clanks. My step dad naturally starts getting mad because he knows thats not supposed to happen. After looking in the oil pan, we see 2 little small bolts. Obviously an oil pan is meant to CARRY OIL, not SPARE PARTS? So, we find the source of where the bolts came from; the tension threader plate. Below i've attached an image of the said component. After a good look at the plate, my step dad turns to me and says, "your extremely lucky and fortunate that your engine just didn't give out on you." Well why is this? Theres a chain thats connected to some component of the crankshaft, which goes around this plate that spins some gears. If the plate is loose, this can allow the chain to fall off, and this in turn will cause the whole engine to sputter and stall. So as it turns out, this entire summer, I've been driving with a seriously dangerously loosely fit tension threader plate, and by some stroke of goodwill it didn't yet fall off. Take a close look at the bottom 2 holes where the bolts fell from. Their so badly eroded, that there's just a strip of metal keeping the plate from falling off. And the middle bolt was a SCREW, which was fantastic (horrible) work by the previous mechanics. Not only that, strips of metal are peeled off, missing, misplaced scratched, I mean how lucky can you possibly get? So let me relate this. Running. I know things have been a little bit in the dumps as of late, but that's not to say there's no hope? Hope is impossible to get rid of, if you can get rid of hope, then this means IT NEVER EXISTED. I felt the same exact way in February of 2023, sitting on that track with the worst running pain ever. From there on out, I changed things, and those things helped me a lot. If your "tension threader" plate is not how it should be, It might take a while, to get through all the little things in the way, but with proper maintenance, good care, heart, it's almost like miracles can happen. By some stroke of luck, your still going, it's important to recognize that sometimes. I really appreciate this, and coach thank you so much for the run, hopefully I'll progress smoothly throughout life, for those still wondering, I do still run, I try 10 miles a week minimum, but sometimes more. But yeah yall ty peace