Tuesday Quality Workout (5 x 1600m: avg pace 7:04)

The Cherry Blossom Race has been completed and I am now preparing for my next race - the Armed Forces Week 5K. Today's workout was run at the local track:

Standard warm up. Run 5 x 1600 meter repeats at 5K pace. Jog for 400 meters between repeats. Cool down with 800 meters of jogging.

The total mileage was 7.75 miles in 1:02:21.

Intervals

Mile 1 - 6:45

Mile 2 - 7:03

Mile 3 - 7:10

Mile 4 - 7:08

Mile 5 - 7:17

It was a miserable rainy day at the track at DuVal High School. I shared the track the DuVal track team. Since I arrived before them and was putting in the work the coach used my effort to shame them into trying harder. It was nice to have the company. I found myself wondering what kind of short distance wheels I have. They must've done a dozen 200 meter sprints. Maybe one day I'll see if I can run with them.

My workout on the other hand was not exactly as planned. I hit the first mile interval in 6:45, which is right where I planned to be, but I did not hold the pace through the remaining intervals. Nevertheless, I am satisfied that I did the workout in spite of being in a cold rain the whole time and struggling with a stiff neck from a bad previous night sleep.

Wednesday Key Workout 3x1 mi intervals (6:44, 6:50, 6:56)

First things first, I totally kicked butt in today's interval workout. I did three 1 mile intervals in 6:44, 6:50, and 6:56. This was not really expected. The target was to run a 10K pace, which I thought was around 7:15 min/mi for me. My splits were as follows:

• Warmup - 1 mile (8:35 pace)
• Interval One - 1 mile (6:44 pace)
• Rest - .25 mile
• Interval Two - 1 mile (6:50 pace)
• Rest - .25 mile
• Interval Three - 1 mile (6:56 pace)
• Rest - .25 mile
• Cooldown - 1.77 mile (7:41 pace)

Total - 6.52 miles in 55:43 (including rest)

The mental side of running has been my current focus. I have finish many "tough" workouts without gasping and feeling totally expended. Do I have the ability to push myself to achieve my best? How long has it been since I have left myself "gassed" with my hands on my knees? How come I've never puked from a really tough run? I used to ask myself all of these questions and have resolved to no longer do so. Instead I will relax. Relaxation is the key.

The endless, doubting questions were a waste of time. I needed to clear my mind and focus only on running easy, with good form. I didn't bring my iPod this time preferring to uncomplicate my mission of finding the pace I thought was most probable for a 10K effort. I have not run an official 10K in a year and a half but last Summer I gave a personal 10K a decent go (48-ish), so I knew that a mid-seven minute mile pace was in my reach. I ran until I felt the need to mouth breathe just to get enough oxygen, but I knew I had enough leg strength to keep from having to walk. Each interval felt about the same in exertion, but I played around with stride length to hold back the fatigue.

I am happy to have found this kind of results in my efforts. I think that it is a measure of my fitness to have tried a workout such as this and exceed my expectations.

Wednesday Key Workout (6.01 mi - 51:09 - 8:30 min/mi)

One mile warm up followed by 3x1 mile repeats at 10K pace (7:03 min/mo i) with one lap walks in between. Finished up with a 1.25 mile cool down lap (at 8:00 min/mi). Not too hard a workout. I don't really believe that I am at that 10K pace, but I'll try to prove it soon.

12x200 fail

I ran a 12x200 interval workout on the base today at lunch. I've run only three track workouts since I've started marathon training. I didn't know what I was doing. I did a 1 mile warm-up and proceeded to do the intervals. I ran one 200 pretty fast but didn't time it because I programmed my Garmin interval workout for 400s instead of 200s. Also I am not sure Garmin measures in track lengths. I put my interval distances in at 0.13 miles, which is 209 meters. So after reprogramming, I ran the 12x200s. Now for the fail.

I made the recovery period 100 meters, well actually 0.06 miles (96.6 meters). My 12x200s averaged 48 seconds each, which is pretty slow I think. I did not realize it until after the workout, but I conserved my energy because this recovery was not long enough.

I have been pretty fast in my brief high school track career. I have run fast 200 meters before. So after reconciling this with my McMillan predicted 38 second 200m I found that I was supposed to make my recovery roughly three times the length of my interval time in other words 1:10 minutes of rest. If I want to call this speedwork, I need to shoot for 30 second 200m interval times with one minute recovery jogs. I'll do better next time.