Start time: 08/13/05, 6:00pm
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 5 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 10:55min/mile
Me: “Wow, it’s really hard to even maintain just under an 11min pace. What’s going on here?”
Julie: “Maybe it was the 20 miles that we ran on Saturday.”
Me: “Oh yeah, that.”
Honestly, I’d forgotten about it, the run had gone so smoothly then. Go figure, I’m blanking on 20-milers now. (Mind you, the 18-miler sucked so I guess it all evens out.)
Start time: 08/20/05, 5:00am
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 20 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 3:1
Average pace: 12:50min/mile
Saturday afternoon I had to be in Middle Of Nowhere, Pennsylvania, and in order to be able to leave in time… there was no way I could start at 6am with my group, with the two-minute-per-mile slowdown (putting us at a 13:00 for the training run). So… in a fit of insanity, I thought, “What if I start at 5am?” I could run 6 miles and be done with that part at 6:18am, at which point my group would just be getting ready to leave after announcements and the faster groups zooming off into the distance.
Julie thought this was a brilliant idea and decided to join me. This would mean I wouldn’t be running alone first thing in the morning, and in pitch darkness to boot. Yeah, it’s still dark out at 5am. I went to CVS and bought a cheap flashlight to bring with us, since very little of the W&OD Trail is actually lit. Miles 1-6 was the two of us, a flashlight… and no one else until the last five minutes. It was really quiet, and really calming to be out there. We nailed the new time easily, which I was happy with: having a new slowdown is often hard to really hit quickly. Right as we finished up the first six miles and got back to home base, our group was ready to head out.
Miles 7-14.5 were with the group, and it was actually a little frustrating. Our leader had problems hitting the right speed (which is not surprising, since like I said it’s often hard to hit it right out of the gate), and we were actually running a little fast for most of it. The part that was setting my teeth on edge is that we had two people take off ahead of us, and one of them A) has had problems finishing the long runs without dropping back, and B) was supposed to be the guy that would hang back that week if someone else had a problem. So, for someone else in the group, I found it frustrating to watch.
The last 5.5 miles were just me and Julie, and we fell back into our groove really well. When it was all said and done… I felt great. An incredibly strong 20-miler… and the first time I’ve ever finished an entire long run and done so before the fastest group came in! Woohoo! 🙂
Start time: 08/17/05, 6:00pm
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 5 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 10:55min/mile
On Wednesday, Julie and I went running with our friend Laura, as well as Laura’s dog Tischa. Tischa was adorable, needing to wade for a couple of seconds in every stream we passed (but then Laura would just catch back up with us) and attracting the attention of… well, just about everyone! We were turning heads, but it was because of an adorable dog rather than our stunning good looks, ho ho ho.
Start time: 08/14/05, 7:00am
Location: American University
Distance: 8 miles
Average pace: 9:30min/mile
Yay! More speedwork! This time was at our new location—the track at American University, my old roommate Marc’s law school alma mater. This was my first time actually getting to run speedwork on the track and I’ve got to say that for consistency’s sake you can’t beat it one bit.
I was supposed to be knocking out 9:30min/miles, and let’s put it this way: I don’t need to do the fancy little chart from last week because I was so on the money. I was hitting my times down to the quarter mile for the first five miles perfectly, and for the last three I actually came in a little fast thanks to running the initial eighth-mile about five seconds fast. (On the final one I also finished fast but I think it was due to excitement of being done.) But yeah, really consistent times for me: 9:33, 9:26, 9:31, 9:30, 9:31, 9:20, 9:21, 9:16.
Big props also go to those kind enough to wait; while I wasn’t the slowest person there, I was the slowest one that actually ran 8 miles so for the final mile it was just me on the track feeling a tiny bit silly. Maybe that also had something to do with deciding that I was drenched after five miles and ditching the shirt. (That breeze sure felt nice, though.) And having to dodge the randomly-activating sprinklers which weren’t positioned quite right, unless they really are supposed to wet the track a bit as well…
I’m really loving the speedwork program; I can’t believe I never did this before.
Start time: 08/08/05, 6:00pm
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 5 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 11:00min/mile
Start time: 08/11/05, 6:00pm
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 5 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 11:20min/mile
Two hot-as-blazes running days… Monday we were all still a little tired from Saturday’s 18-miler (unsurprisingly), but were also remarkably consistent, which was nice. Even despite the rain which (naturally) hit right at the turn-around spot, yay. It wasn’t too bad aside from one really huge burst, but it only lasted about a minute and was otherwise just sprinkling.
Today was just me and Mark, and unfortunately Mark wasn’t feeling it. A combination of not much sleep and heat started wearing him down more and more as we ran, and I ended up running the last half mile by myself. It’s hot out (I’d really be pleased if it was just in the 80s for a change) and I’d already knocked out 4.5 (slower) miles, but going over the last little hill before the basketball courts just felt good.
That said, the puddle of water around Mark after we were done from him just standing in one place? Hysterically funny!
Start time: 08/06/05, 6:00am
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 18 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 4:1
Average pace: 12:00min/mile
18 down and all is well. The temperature dropped a little bit for Saturday morning, and thank goodness for that. Melting Greg is not a pretty sight, believe you me. The run itself went pretty well; most of the group looked to be doing fine, and we did a nice job of staying on pace. The only downside was that we had some real communication problems with the group, where people just vanished with little or no warning whatsoever. We’re going to need to have a talk about that; on the marathon if they want to just disappear that’s fine, but until then… well, you get the idea.
Still, I felt really good when it was over and pretty strong. No aches the rest of the day or this morning either, which is always a very good sign. Knock on wood, this is my best training season yet.
In two weeks, 20 miles… and another slow-down. I know it’s the right thing to do, but just in terms of the sheer amount of time being out there, not looking forward to that aspect. Ah well, better safe than sorry.
Start time: 08/03/05, 6:00pm
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 4 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 12:30min/mile
Another ultra-hot day here in the Nation’s Capitol, so we decided that rather than die a horrible death we’d just go slower than normal. In retrospect, we should’ve changed the run:walk ratio to something smaller but instead, no, we just ran slower. Which can actually be difficult, on a hot day, because all you keep thinking is, “I’d rather be taking a shower.” In fact, that is literally all I thought for the last two miles, and there was no chit-chat when we were done; I leapt into my car, drove home, and practically threw myself into the shower. Ahhhhh…
Start time: 08/01/05, 6:00pm
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 5 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 10:40min/mile
Back out on the trail today, despite rising humidity and having run my speed training yesterday. We were trucking along pretty good but after 3.5 miles, Julie and Mark both decided to slow down; the combination of the speed work and the weather was just beating them down. I actually felt really good, though; maybe it was the Starburst I ate a half mile earlier. Whatever the reason, I creamed that last mile and a half (9:50min/mile pace for the last mile and a half). Outside sucked, but inside I was feeling great.
Start time: 07/31/05, 8:00am
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 6 miles
Average pace: 9:30min/mile
Well, it was time for another round of speed work… I’d missed the four mile session two weeks ago but I had hustled when running up and down the hills of San Diego to get to my group run that Saturday, so I figured that was good enough.
After hearing how great the track at Wakefield High School was for the four-miler, I was all excited to be there for today’s speed work. The guy showed up to unlock the gates at 8am… and told us that there was an event starting at 9am and they would be setting up at 8:30am, even though we’d already booked the track and was told there was nothing else going on.
*sigh*
So, it was back over to the W&OD Trail. Yeesh. Oh well, it was nice to at least run a warm-up on the springy surface of the track; I can see why people were a fan of running along it! Speed work itself went really well, though. We only had half-mile markers so it was a little harder to judge how well one was moving, but by the end I felt like I was hitting it, despite the way we were running meaning that odd-numbered miles were slightly uphill and even-numbered were slightly downhill. I was aiming for 9:30min/miles (or 4:45 for each half) and I ended up with:
| mile # | first half | second half | total |
| 1 | 4:53 | 4:36 | 9:30 |
| 2 | 4:25 | 4:34 | 9:00 |
| 3 | 4:42 | 4:41 | 9:24 |
| 4 | 4:29 | 4:40 | 9:09 |
| 5 | 4:43 | 4:48 | 9:31 |
| 6 | 4:30 | 4:51 | 9:22 |
So, not bad! I think I’m starting to get the hang of this thing.
Oh yeah, grand total of miles for July was 65.5, which was lower than the last two months… of course, I also went on vacation for a week, followed by missing one or two maintenance runs due to the heat. So, very understandable.
Start time: 07/27/05, 8:30pm
Location: Gold’s Gym
Distance: 3 miles
Average pace: 10:45min/mile
After skipping a day or two of running because of the extreme heat conditions (100+), I headed over to the gym this evening to knock out a few on the treadmill. Not a big treadmill fan, but I figured it was better than nothing. Gold’s was nothing short of an oven, so after three I decided that was good enough for government work and called it a night. Since my weekend run isn’t until Sunday, I might see if I can knock out a few on Friday morning, provided I can haul my lazy ass out of bed in time.