2 mile w/u + strides
Target: 8 mile tempo @6:00-5:50
Actual: 6 miles in 35:40, one mile jog (8-8:30?), one mile @5:47
2 mile c/d
Total: 12 miles
Originally I'd planned on joining Caitlin for her nine mile progression run on Friday, but after Thursday necessitated a 14 and 4 double I knew I needed an easy recovery day before cranking up the engines again. Fortunately the all-star trio of Paul, Spada and Mike Beigay were gracious enough to extend me an invite to their Saturday morning session, so with Jordan in tow I set off toward McMullen just as the sun was rising.
After an unexpectedly gorgeous day on Thursday, in which the weather gods mercifully offered low humidity and a tinge of crispness to the morning air, I was hoping against hope that Friday and Saturday would bring more of the same. Friday morning felt downright cool, albeit with slightly higher humidity, but I could tell as soon as I stepped outside this morning that we would get no such respite for today's workout. Oh well. Our warmup jog was easy and relaxed, and I took solace in the fact that I wasn't completely drenched by the time we returned to our cars. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad after all. With a few final encouraging words we set off at a brisk pace along the dirt path, Paul leading the charge with the rest of us flanked in a "V" formation behind him. I tucked in and hoped to just get carried along.
To be honest, I never truly expected to be able to hang with them the entire way. Maybe some people (i.e., Jordan) would respond that with such a negative attitude I'd already sealed my fate before the workout even began. I knew that running with them for at least five miles was realistic, but the end result would depend on just how much they decided to drop the pace during the second half. I felt relatively comfortable at our four-mile U-turn, despite dropping a 5:50 for mile three, but once we started heading back the other way I could feel my effort level rising precipitously. Mile five was also 5:50 and my breathing was noticeably labored. Each time we hit a bend or slight incline in the trail I could feel myself losing contact with the group by another few meters. Jordan gamely held back, offering encouraging words and entreating me to stay focused, but I knew I was done. I made it to the sixth mile marker before coming to a stop and waving him ahead to catch the group.
After catching my breath for a few seconds, I slowly began to jog back. I was disappointed that I wasn't able to finish the workout, especially since this is my goal marathon pace come winter, but I also knew that the purpose of a tempo run is not to run yourself to exhaustion. As I approached the penultimate mile marker I decided I'd pick up the pace and try to bring it in with a sub-5:50 effort. If I hit the 800m mark slower than 3 minutes then I'd shut it down, but I passed the marker comfortably in 2:53 so I continued homeward. I finished with ragged breathing and heavy legs, but I was satisfied that I'd somewhat managed to salvage the workout.
Overall, I had a great time mixing it up out there with a different workout group. And it goes without saying that I'm thrilled to have Jordan back in action, not to mention the fact that he cruised through this tempo as though he'd never missed a beat. With the workout behind us and a holiday weekend ahead, it's time to relax and enjoy some much needed recovery!
3 mile w/u + strides
Target: win some Great Harvest Bread, then 3xmile on the greenway w/3 mins. jog
Actual: 17:44; 5:39, 5:38, 2:38 for 800m
Results
1 mile c/d
Total: ~10 miles
Last year Jordan and I had a blast running the Great Harvest 5k and winning plenty of free baked goods to boot. Because I am a fat kid trapped inside a skinny kid's body, I knew I couldn't pass up the opportunity to do the same this year. Plus, the race was taking place just down the road from the TrySports grand re-opening where I'd be hosting a group run later in the morning (which sounded like a much better idea in theory than after actually running a workout and a race), so there was really no reason not to participate.
As I warmed up on the first mile of the course with Billy, Paul and Eric, I came to the sobering realization that the course was much, much hillier than I remembered. To be honest I could recollect very little about the course from last year, and I'd sort of assumed that everyone who complained about its excessive hilliness were just being big babies. It didn't take long this morning for me to admit that they were correct. The first mile started on an uphill grade and only got worse from there, its difficulty further exacerbated by the number and frequency of sharp turns. I made the game time decision to consciously be conservative on the first half of the course so that I could truly run a "tempo" effort and save something for the mile repeats I had planned for afterward.
I have to say, standing on the starting line of a RFYL Grand Prix race without Jordan by my side was a little strange. For at least the millionth time in the past month I wished he were there with me, but fortunately I was still surrounded by a solid group that included Rebecca, Michelle, Danielle, Alice, Lat and several others. The clock ticked past 7:30 as we waited for a tardy Mike Moran to scramble over to the starting line, and then we were off into the morning sunshine. I found myself pulling up alongside Billy and Chad, both of whom I knew would be running close to 17-flat, and was surprised to see them starting so conservatively. For a few minutes I had inclinations to surge ahead, but then I reminded myself that they would be picking up the pace soon enough and it would serve me well to try to hang on then. Sure enough, just before the mile marker Chad kicked into another gear--they probably split 5:40ish to my 5:44--and before long I had another companion, my warmup buddy Eric. For the rest of the race he and I would work together, occasionally exchanging the lead but otherwise matching each other stride for stride. The second mile came and went quickly due to its mostly downhill nature--I split a controlled 5:41--but the final mile meant several long uphill sections as we retraced our steps toward the finish. With about 800 to go I could see John Fillette almost imperceptibly moving backwards toward us, and I quietly encouraged Eric to focus on John's back and reel him in. (John, if you're reading this, it was all in the spirit of friendly competition!) Sure enough, as we rounded the final uphill turn into the parking lot (who decided that was a good idea??) Eric took off and pulled up alongside John. I finished a few seconds later, more exhausted than I'd hoped to be and pretty happy to be done. I'd originally planned to take just five minutes before starting my mile repeats, but I could tell right away that there was no way I'd be recovered by then. Instead I took about 10 minutes to cheer in some friends, guzzle about a gallon of water and wring out my sweat-soaked shirt before begrudgingly making my way down to the adjacent greenway. (As a side note, how is the greenway so flat when the nearby neighborhoods are so hilly?? I liked Danielle's suggestion earlier today of running an alternate Great Harvest course out and back along the greenway--sure, it might be a tad congested, but it's still bound to produce speedier times!)
Top 4 women: me, Alice, Michelle and Danielle, Photo courtesy of
Danielle (and Chad) Crockford
Originally I'd made tentative plans to round up Johnny C. (the decisive men's winner), Alice (female runner-up) and Lat (her trusty sidekick) to bang out these repeats with me. When the time came, however, I couldn't spot John anywhere and failed in my repeated attempts to get Alice and Lat's attention. Rather than extending my recovery even longer, I opted to begin by myself. The first two intervals went surprisingly well; as expected, my legs felt fatigued, but my breathing was controlled and I never felt like I was straining to hit the pace. If anything, the biggest obstacle was the congestion from other runners and walkers, cyclists and people cooling down from the race. Tired and thirsty, I'd already decided to cut out the final repeat when I ran into my race partner Eric cooling down. He agreed to help lead me through a final 800 and did a great job of keeping the tempo honest when all I wanted to do was sit down and take a break. We finished up just in time to jog back over to the race site for the awards. As expected, I received the awesome prize of Great Harvest bread and cookies and a set of Great Harvest oven mitts. These will make a great addition to the apron and chef's hat I won last year for all those hours I spend slaving away in the kitchen.
4 mile w/u + strides
Target: mile (5:40), 1200 (4:10), 800 (2:44), 400, (80), 400, 800, 1200, mile all w/2 mins. jog
Actual: 5:42, 4:08, 2:44, 75, 76, 2:40, 4:07, 5:38
1.5 mile c/d
Total: 11.5 miles
For the second Wednesday in a row, I had the best possible weather scenario for my mid-day workout: sunny, 70 degrees, breezy and low humidity. We may only get a few weeks of springlike weather in Charlotte, but it's amazing while it lasts. For the second time this week I ran skins (plus sports bra), so I fully expect my runner's tan to be in full awkward bloom by the weekend.
Looking for a change of pace, Jordan suggested we venture down to McMullen greenway for this workout. I was pleasantly surprised--to be honest, I sort of forget that this venue exists, though it's located a mere ten minutes' drive from our front door--and was definitely excited about the prospect of running somewhere other than the Booty Loop or McAlpine. The few workouts I've done at McMullen have gone really well, so I felt optimistic that today would continue that trend. It also helped that Jordan designed (read: come up with 20 minutes before we left the house) a ladder workout with splits that should be relatively easy to hit, albeit with a short rest. My longer tempo workout will come this weekend in the form of the Race Fest 10k, so today would serve as an opportunity to hit some faster-paced, shorter intervals instead. After a longer than normal warmup (coach's orders) and a few strides, I was ready to begin.
From the first few steps of the initial interval, I could tell the pace felt easy. Turns out it was a bit too easy, as Jordan took me through the 800 in a pedestrian 2:53. We worked a bit harder the second half to make up the deficit, but in the end decided to let the gently rolling and winding terrain dictate the pace. If a few intervals were a second or two slow and others were a second or two fast, I wasn't going to stress about it. In the end this wouldn't matter as the leadoff mile was the only "slow" section. In fact, the middle 400's were quite a bit faster than the prescribed pace (5:00 vs. 5:20) due to the fact that Jordan made me lead these and apparently I decided it was time to sprint. Oh well. To be honest I'm surprised I can even run sub-80 pace right now so I'm definitely not complaining. Once he took over again for the final ascent up the ladder we maintained a controlled tempo, if slightly quicker than on the way down. I felt relaxed on every interval except for the final mile, when the dirt terrain and the uphill finish had me laboring quite a bit the final 400 meters.
Since I know you're all wondering, I'm happy to report that my knee/ITB was a non-issue during the workout itself. Predictably, it tightened up immediately upon finishing, but after stretching and walking around for several minutes I was able to cobble together a relatively comfortable cooldown. This is a marked improvement from last week and hopefully an indicator that this injury is headed in the right direction. In addition to a regular dose of ART and acupuncture with Dr. Greenapple, I have also begun seeing Caitlin's massage therapist Byran Bullock. Tomorrow he will be bringing the hurt with a 60-minute lower body massage designed to flush out my legs and break up all this pesky scar tissue around my knee and ITB. This ain't your grandma's massage, but it's absolutely what I need right now to rejuvenate my legs and bring me back to good health.
Target: 20 miles w/last 10 @MP (6:20)
Actual: 21 miles in 2:24: 10.5 easy, 9.5 @6:20, 1 mile wog
Time is running out.
Houston Marathon is a mere three weeks and one day away, and my flight isn't going to book itself. At the end of last week I told myself I'd make the call by the end of this week, and for better or worse that decision would all come down to how I performed on today's long run.
The run started well before daylight, when I met Alice Rogers and Ann Falcone at the entrance to the McMullen Creek greenway. The last time I was here I nailed a crucial workout with Jordan and B-Mac, and I was hoping to continue that trend today. Fortunately, I would have lots of company--at least at first. The plan was for Alice and Ann and I to get in a few early miles, then loop back to meet a group of CRC folks at 7, who would then loop back and meet another group of CRCers at 7:30. From there I would have another 2-3 easy miles out on the greenway before commencing the marathon pace portion of the run, which I thought would occur on a simple out-and-back route along the paved path. Unfortunately, I didn't foresee rain on Friday night and below-freezing temperatures on Saturday morning; to our chagrin, we discovered on the first few miles that many sections of the greenway were slick with ice. This can be annoying at best and quite dangerous at worst, particularly when trying to run fast, so it became apparent early on that I would have to readjust either my workout or my expectations, or both.
By the time we looped back to the parking lot to pick up the 7:30 group I already had 7 miles under my belt. Mainers agreed to help me out with my tempo, although he had to be back at his car and on the road by 8:30 at the latest. This meant that by the time we started picking up the pace at 10.5, he would only be able to accompany me for 3.5 miles back to the parking lot. Much appreciated for sure, but I knew it would make for loneliness in the late stages, particularly when my other companion B-Mac also bailed at the parking lot. From this point, 14 miles under my legs and only a third of my tempo done, I had three options: 1) Turn around and run back down the slippery greenway, adjusting the pace to allow for the ice; 2) Abandon the greenway and make up my own route through the rolling nearby neighborhoods; or 3) Run out and back on the single dirt mile (i.e. hard-packed but fortunately not frozen) for the remainder of the run. Option 1 would guarantee a slower run and, as I mentioned before, hold the potential for falling. Option 2 was equally unappealing as I didn't have a Garmin to measure pace, nor was I familiar with the neighborhood streets. Option 3 promised to be super boring and would involve executing a 180-degree turn every six minutes or so, which was also likely to slow things down. With no stellar options--among those, the desire to simply say "forget this" and head home--I opted for door #3, the dirt mile out-and-back.
Was it super fun? No. Did I feel easy and relaxed? Definitely not. But as I closed the workout with my fastest mile of the day, 6:09, I felt surprisingly strong. And that strength leads me to believe that if I can run marathon pace by myself, in the frigid morning air, bouncing back and forth like a yo-yo along a single mile stretch, in trainers, taking no water or nutrition unless you count the half cup of coffee I threw back at home--well, then just maybe it will be possible for me to do the same thing three weeks from now in Houston. If nothing else, it's worth a shot.
I booked my ticket.
2 mile w/u + strides
Target: ~5 miles uptempo (~6:30 pace) down the McMullen Creek Greenway; then in-and-out miles back (3 hard @6:00)
Actual: 35:35 for 5.8 miles (6:15, 6:06, 6:05, 6:04, 6:03, 4:37 for .8); 6:30 (.8), 5:52, 7:28, 5:50, 7:30, 5:58 (on dirt)
1 mile c/d
Total: 14.5-15 miles
Praise Jesus, I'm not as terrible as I thought. In fact I would venture to say that, not unlike the greatest runner of all time, I'm contemplating coming back from brief thoughts of retirement. (Obviously that's where our similarities end.)
Details to follow soon, but suffice it to say I felt about a million times better than on last week's tempo run. I was able to run controlled and relatively relaxed throughout, only truly fatiguing on the final few "in" miles. The tempo portion in particular felt surprisingly easy, as I was able to approximate the pace I ran for a five mile race last month with significantly less effort.
Whew. I needed this.
