Oaks Christian senior (CA) Payton Godsey won her first CIF State Division 4 Cross Country Championship title last season. She set a new 5K personal best of 17:00.06 on the Woodward Park course. The following week, she claimed a national title at the Garmin RunningLane Cross Country Championships with a performance of 17:28.
As the calendar turned to 2023, she finished second in the 3,200m at the CIF State Outdoor Championships. Godsey posted career bests of 2:11.90 in the 800m, 4:44.13 in the mile, and 9:57.77 in the 3,200m, all ranked among the top performances in the country. She later committed to Northern Arizona University.
Monday, August 14 - 0 Miles - Wisdom Teeth Removed
Today I actually had my wisdom teeth removed. This was something I knew I had to get done sometime soon, and with cross country season beginning I wanted to get it out of the way. This was not ideal timing, but it was the best I could do and the safest choice. The last thing I would want is for my wisdom teeth to need to be removed in the middle of the season. The surgery went well and I rested all day.
Tuesday, August 15 - 0 Miles - Recovery From Wisdom Teeth Surgery
Today was another day of no running since I had surgery yesterday. My face is definitely sore and a bit swollen, so I am taking it one day at a time until I start running again.
My first day of school is tomorrow, so I spent the day finishing some summer homework and packing for the next day. Supposedly the second and third days after surgery are when the worst swelling takes place, so I could potentially be in for a very swollen face on my first day of senior year! So excited for that!
Wednesday, August 16 - 40 Minutes On The Bike
Today was my first day of senior year!
It was great to see all of my friends again. My classes were pretty good and I have high hopes for the year. My face was barely swollen so I was super lucky and I barely felt any pain. I was feeling good enough, so I rode a stationary bike for 40 minutes after school. I felt really good so I am probably going to try to run tomorrow.
Afterwards I did some homework and went to bed.
Thursday, August 17 - 4 Miles
Today marks the first run post wisdom teeth removal!
I was feeling pretty normal today at school so I gave running a go and it went great. My teeth and body felt good, so I did a track warm-up, which was a 1 mile of walking/drills/jogging, and then I had a 4 mile run. It was a warm day but it was good to be back with the team.
After school I got some homework done and relaxed. I'm assuming my mouth and body still feel good tomorrow so I should be back on a normal schedule.
Friday, August 18 - 7 Miles
Today I had a simple day at school and it went by quickly. After school, we went to practice.
We had a fartlek workout on the track. We started out with a 2 mile warm-up off campus. Then we did some drills and strides before changing into vaporflys. The workout was 4x400 and 4x200 with equal jogs in between.
The 'on' lap was 2 mile pace, so for me around 75s and the 'off' was just under 2 minutes per lap. To simply put, it was 3 miles of continuous fartlek at 2 mile pace.
The workout seemed to go really well for the whole team! It went by fast and I felt strong. After, we did a 2 mile cooldown and ended with 7 miles on the day.
Later that night we went to the football game!
Saturday, August 19 - 8 Miles
Today was long run day. We do our long runs on Saturdays, so we often go to the beach to run. We met at Zuma Beach, which is in Malibu, and it is only about 15 minutes away. I ran 8 miles with the girls today at 7:07 pace. It was a bit shorter and more controlled than I would usually go, but I wanted to make sure that my mouth was going to continue getting better.
After the run, we played volleyball and spike ball on the sand. Over the water, we could see some storm clouds getting closer.
I have zero experience with hurricanes, so I am interested to see what Hillary is like.
Sunday, August 20 - 5 Miles
Today I slept in a bit and ran an easy 5 miles from my house.
Hurricane Hillary was being hyped up on my phone, so I wasn't sure what the weather was going to be like, but it wasn't bad at all. My run was nice and there was a slight drizzle with some wind but nothing crazy at all. I was super excited to get home and watch the World Championships in Budapest, but I was crazy upset to come home to a weather special replacing the track meet. Instead of watching the 1,500 semis, and the 10K and 100m final, I got to watch people report on some light rain. Quite disappointing that I couldn't watch, but at least I had a good past few days of running.
My teeth feel really good and this coming week of training should be full again.
Total Mileage: 24 Miles + 40 Minute Bike Ride
This is the third of several training blogs written by various athletes as the 2023 cross country season begins to ramp up. Check out our training blog series page for more content.
