Week 10, Days 5 and 6

Didn't run on Thursday because just too busy. Got in a short one yesterday after I came home from the agility trial, and then did the stride interval workout that was scheduled for yesterday, today.

Okay, first up, let's talk about yesterday. Not too much to say about it. I wore my new Nike Pegasus 29s. Felt just like the 27s and the 28s, except maybe a little smaller and snugger and that is probably good. Did the EBE route, finishing up by going around the neighborhood, which put it at 3.1 miles on the GPS in 34:02 or 10:40 pace. Felt a little tired from the agility trial but not bad.

Today I needed to do the stride workout. This is described as 55-70 minutes of easy running with 10-15 strides of 25 seconds or so and recoveries of 1 minute, with the strides done either at the end of the workout or somewhere in the middle.

Hmmm. Oh, and the strides are supposed to start out around 5k race pace and build up to like mile race pace by the end of each interval, if I understand this correctly.

For a run that long outside I was going to need water, and if past experience is any guide, probably a bit of fuel half way through. The intervals were best done somewhere that I wouldn't have to cross streets or encounter a lot of traffic, either pedestrian or motorized.

So after thinking about it a bit, I decided to start out with my regular Park loop, then return home for water and a GU, then go back up into the park and do the strides around the pavillion. And when I finished that up, I could just jog back home the shortest way.

This worked out pretty well. I ran the park loop, including jogging down the trail right to the front door, in 35:02, which the GPS said was 11:04 pace for 3.1 miles. That's actually not a bad time for that route. I made it to Custer, my traditional checkpoint, in 26:49, which is a good pace for that run.

Then I had a glass of water and a GU pack, as planned, and headed back out. Instead of running up the street as I normally would at the start of a run, I went up the trail to Observatory Ave. I felt good. Better than I do at the start of a run. I guess that is the effect of the warmup!

I jogged up the hill for 9 minutes, which put me up near the left side of the pavillion. Then I walked for a minute and started the intervals, running clockwise around the pavillion and gardens. I forget what I had the GPS set to display but it worked out well for keeping track. I know I had one of the displays set up for manual laps, and I knew that I was going to need 21 manual laps to finish the workout (1 lap to jog up the hill, then 10 laps of fast running and 10 laps of recovery). Maybe the other display was total distance or something like that. Yeah, I think that was it. The main display was the manual lap time.

For the recoveries, I walked for 30 seconds and jogged for 30 seconds.

The time of each lap varied a little bit depending on how accurate I was at looking down at the watch and hitting it to stop the lap, but the important data point is probably average speed for each of the intervals:

1) 8:09 (just figuring it out)
2) 7:48 (slight downhill)
3) 6:41 (more downhill)
4) 8:34 (slight uphill)
5) 7:00 (more flat?)

I was feeling better than I remembered feeling the last time I ran short, fast intervals. I think when I tried a similar workout during my last training cycle, I was running the intervals too fast. I think I had been doing them just about all out for 30 seconds, instead of starting at 5k pace and gradually accelerating. I tried to concentrate more on my form---because that is part of the point of the exercise---and then really speeding up the last ten seconds.

After the fifth interval, which put me on the right side of the pavillion (if you are coming uphill from Observatory), I switched direction and did the other five going counterclockwise.

6) 7:17
7) 6:28 (downhill)
8) 7:44 (uphill?)
9) 7:11 (flat?)
10) 7:35 (not sure why it was slow because I think it was downhill)

Anyway, I probably could have done 5 more but this was enough.

Then I just jogged back home on Observatory and stopped my watch just before I hit the trail. This second half of the workout was another 3.1 miles, in 32:15 or an average pace of 10:37.

I'm pleased with how this workout went. Overall, I should take confidence from having done all of the important workouts so far. I don't think I've missed a single speed session or long run. Have I? And when has that ever happened before.

No matter how the race turns out, I will have done the work.

Now the only two things I'm worried about are getting sick, and the struggle to get these last few key weeks of training in. The wedding really figures into these concerns, because it is a big stressor, and also I will be exposed to a lot of germs!

I've started trying to remember to take my vitamins again, and I'm going to have to work on getting plenty of sleep.