I decided I wanted to get back into speedwork this week. My body has long been recovered from the marathon and recovered from the back strain.
Monday: 7 miles. Ran in the park and the neighborhood next to it on a chilly, rainy morning. I felt slow, and my paces reflect that. 7.23 miles in 1:05:12 (9:01 min/mile pace).
Tuesday: 6 x 0.25 mile intervals (1 mile warm-up and cool-down). Ran these in the park on a cold morning. It was still wet out from Monday’s rain, but fortunately it wasn’t cold enough to form ice (it was getting close, though). The interval paces were 7:39, 7:28, 7:42, 7:36, 7:27, and 7:24. The goal pace range for these was supposed to be 6:55 – 7:15, but my watch was set for 7:26 – 7:42… It’s probably time to clear out everything from Garmin Connect and redo all my workouts (spoiler alert: that’s coming). I started the morning with form drills and ended with some squats, single-leg deadlifts, and six pull-ups. Overall, 4.86 miles in 42:48 (8:48 min/mile pace). Right at the end, I took a few pics for #runChatHunt.
Wednesday: 4 mile recovery. And recovery it was. I felt slow, and this was slower than the norm. I woke up late… well, actually early but fell back to sleep immediately. I did manage to take a few pictures for #RunChatHunt, one of which was featured by @theRunChat. It was chilly, around 32F and a tad breezy. 4.22 miles in 38:24 (9:06 min/mile pace).
Thursday: 5 miles + 6 strides. This was so far the coldest day of the season. It was around 29F. I wanted to run, but I did not want to be in the cold (so I ran in the cold). I’m not sure what lit a fire under me, but I blasted through all except for a few of the 30 second breaks between the strides (and by “except”, there were 3 of those that went into the 9s… for 30 seconds.). Started this with form drills and ended with squats, single-leg deadlifts, and six pull-ups. Overall, 6.01 miles in 51:32 (8:34 min/mile).
Friday: 10 miles. Attempting to capitalize on the feeling from yesterday of not having my watch beep at me every mile, I set the watch to the workout distance and let ‘er rip. I did push a little, although maybe it was last night’s food (a cheap hamburger) slowing me down. It was warmer (43F) with rain forecast at 8 AM. I felt some drizzling rain with just under 3 miles to go, and that went away. Then, with 1.75 miles to go, some more steady rain, but it didn’t last long – maybe until 1.25 miles to go. 10 miles in 1:28:28 (8:51 min/mile).
That’s it for the week. 32 miles and speeding up. Nothing actually on the calendar, although I might try a trail race soon. I looked at a race recently, but the sheer mess of a website has me turned off from it… and this:
