Tuesday, March 13, 2007

Awesome workout

I just wanted to crow about my workout today. I ran an extended warm-up of just over three miles, then six 800s (not sure of the exact distance, but it was pretty close to 800). During the warm-up my legs felt heavy and sore, and I was on the verge of postponing the intervals until tomorrow. But when I circled around to the stadium, I decided to just go for it. My persistence paid off! The workout went perfectly. The only thing was, I wish I could be more exact with the distance. I knew it was close to 800, but it was almost certainly at least a little short. But anyway, the one thing I did know was that I was doing the exact same distance for each rep. The splits were: 3:10, 3:09, 3:06, 3:08, 3:07, and 3:06. The pace was actually too fast; but it felt comfortably hard throughout the workout. Since I'm pretty sure I was short of 800 meters, I think I'm okay on that score. I was worried that I'd started out too fast, but the first one was actually the slowest one!

If I was worried after my disastrous long run on Sunday, I'm not anymore. I feel pretty confident now, and I can't wait to tackle another race. I also can't wait to do another long run, so I can feel more confident about that too.

Also, I just want to say how much I LOVE Daylight Savings Time. It was absolutely HEAVENLY to run my entire workout in the daylight, arriving home as the sun was setting. It was an indescribably wonderful feeling to jog slowly home after my workout with the last rays of the sun warming me, feeling deliciously worn out and proud of myself. This was how I used to feel after a successful track workout. I love running!

4 comments:

Al Durham said...

Great blog! I discovered it while searching for bog posts about the upcomming Bayshore Marathon. Good luck!

Nuke Runner said...

Nice 800s....that's a strong session when you run each one a little faster.

Russ said...

thanks for stopping by..good luck in your training for bayshore..if you've never been to tc area it is absolutely beautiful!

GB said...

Hey great job on the 800s! You've got some impressive PRs and I am sure you will be improving upon those very soon. Do you use a pace calculator to get pace recommendations for your workouts? Like McMillan or something similar? I ask this after reading your post about your recent 10K. I had a similar race experience. At the end of January when I thought my training was going awesome, I ran a 5K and I was so disappointed with my finish time (it was almost slower than my workout/training paces). I knew I was not doing something right. It didn't feel like I started too fast (but I probably did). I didn't get a very adequate warm up, but I don't think that was all together the cause of my poor race. I sought the advice of a very experienced racer on the Runner's World Forums. He recently ran in the Masters category for the XC Nationals in Colorado and placed in the top 10. Anyway he looked at my training and thought that I was racing my workouts too much. He recommended that I run as close to my recommended paces as possible during workouts (and warned me that it would feel slower), and cut down my recovery times between repeats. It took me a while to really catch on, but I shortened my recovery times and it made me slow down just a bit during the training runs. As a result I got into a groove with my pacing. To test it out I ran an 8K one month after the 5K and ended up with a pace that was 13 seconds faster per mile than the 5K. I was ecstatic! Anyway, I've probably rambled on too much about stuff you already know. Looking forward to reading your blog regularly! You are one fast gal! Keep up the great running.