I went back to the track for my 3rd workout in the past month. I missed last week’s because I was away on vacation. The plan was to do 3x 1mile repeats around 7:30 with a ¼ mile jog in between. Even though it had rained earlier in the day the cinder track drained well and was in good shape. It was pretty warm out but there was a strong head wind that would make one of the straight-aways tough to run.
After a mile warm-up I started immediately on my first mile repeat. I knew my pace was faster than the planned 7:30 but I couldn’t bring myself to slow down. I could feel some groin pain caused by the weakness of my sacral-iliac joint but it wasn’t bad enough to make me want to quit. The first mile felt pretty easy and I finished in 7:17. I know it’s too fast but I haven’t been able to get a feel for what a 7:30 mile feels like. I run so few (aka none) miles at that pace so it’s difficult to recognize when I’m actually running that fast.
I made a conscious attempt to start out slower on my 2nd mile. It wasn’t long before I picked up the pace and was running too fast again. This mile was a little harder than the first but still fairly easy. I crossed the line in 7:21. There’s really no need for me to run my repeats this fast. I am not going to run a road marathon and my trail marathon pace will likely be between 9:15-10:15 a mile. I could run my track workouts at an 8:00-8:30 pace and still get some benefit on race day. But what fun would that be? It feels good to run fast!
Ok, one more to go and I can get back to work. As I start out for my final mile I feel the “rumbling” of an impending biological interruption. I wanted to get in one last mile but I knew I would be cutting it close. I was a ½ mile away from work and still had to make it back in time or suffer an embarrassing “situation”. Sorry, too much information. Oh well, I cut it short at a ½ mile in 3:40 (7:20 pace) but it was still a good workout overall. I skipped the usual cool-down and hurried back to the hospital where I work as quickly as I could. No time to stop and smell the flowers!
It feels like spring again……
Great Job Dan!
ReplyDeleteI think the faster miles will pay off more than you expect or think they will. If you can lower than threshold for comfortably fast miles it will make the longer stuff seem that much easier. Just as long as the faster stuff isn't tweeking your legs too much.