Category Archives: pacers alexandria

“Don’t you forget about me.”

Start time: 2/27/07, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.42 miles
Average pace: 9:19min/mile

Went running with the Pacers Alexandria group tonight and it was a good run; the first two miles have a bit of uphill—especially mile 2—but it was a good start (9:32, 9:51). And from there? Very good progress indeed. (9:10, 9:13, 8:58, and an 8:53average for the final portion.) So, a good sign.

One of the women I was running with asked what my last marathon was and I’d mentioned it was Florence. “Oh,” she said, “a friend of mine just did that for his first marathon.” Turns out said friend was John. *sigh* It’s a small, small world indeed, isn’t it?

Vroom

Start time: 1/4/07, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.1 miles
Average pace: 9:13min/mile

The regulars were all back on Thursday—and then some. The managers at Pacers said that this was the largest turn-out in the run’s history, and I’d believe it; there were at least 30 people there, probably more. With a lot of new people and a confusing course, it meant that we got a slow start with a bunch of people at our pace tagging along. Without about a mile and a half to go I started picking up speed which felt good, averaging for the last bit around an 8:20 without breathing hard or feeling like I was racing. Hopefully next week we’ll be able to start earlier at a faster clip; I like the people I run with but at the same time I also need to look out for my own running needs. I’d like to be able to go a little faster on these runs.

One final Pacers run for 2006

Start time: 12/28/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.5 miles
Average pace: 8:48min/mile

Well, the plan was to get one last run in with Chris, Darryl, Sonia, and company down at Pacers tonight. The reality? None of them showed up! It was a tiny turn-out, less than ten people, the smallest I’ve ever seen in Alexandria. I ran with Guy, who I’m pretty sure is a faster runner than I am for this sort of thing. The way out down Eisenhower Avenue we did good, a 23:32 time for the 2.75 mile course. On the way back I had a nasty stitch in my side that simply wouldn’t go away (ugh) and we slowed down a tiny bit with a 24:53 time. Still, an 8:48min/mile average, which isn’t too bad. Considering how much bad-for-Greg food that was eaten over the last week, I’ll take it!

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=606386

Yet another Pacers Alexandria Route

Start time: 12/21/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.16 miles
Average pace: 9:03min/mile

I am starting to lose track of how many Old Town Alexandria routes I have, now. This one was pretty scenic, though; a lot of running down on Union Street, which is the last cross street in Old Town before the water, and where things like the Torpedo Factory are located. Lots of holiday lights up too; wish I’d had a camera. It was nice to run with Darryl and Sonia again; Darryl really pushes me a bit and I’m always feeling great by the end of the run and at a really good clip, too. Not out of breath or anything, but I feel like I had a good workout that gets me pretty jazzed up.

(No knee strap, no problems. Yay! No GPS either. Oops! It doesn’t help me much sitting on my desk. I think I mapped the route out correctly, and the distance matches up with what I was told: “Five and change.”)

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=597970

Watch out for that… never mind.

Start time: 11/21/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.4 miles
Average pace: 9:29min/mile

This is the second time I’ve run the Pacers Alexandria Tuesday route, and we actually ended up a tiny bit faster (40 seconds), which considering that I’d changed my GPS so that it no longer pauses when I stop moving (as happens when running up and down King Street waiting for cars to go by) is impressive. My last hill work pre-marathon, and it felt effortless. (Really consistant, too.) Amusement for the evening was watching Darryl deliberately leap and roll in a massive pile of leaves along the course… and then later on finding bits of branch trapped in his shoe. Hmmm, wonder how that got in there?

If I’ve got everything else ready I might try and do a slow 3-miler Thursday morning, we’ll see.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=510272

Oops!

Start time: 11/09/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.25 miles
Average pace: 9:05min/mile

Oopsie… I forgot to turn on my GPS when I went running with the Pacers group tonight. Fortunately Darryl turned on his stopwatch, though. A good run, all in all.

Somewhere different

Start time: 10/24/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.4 miles
Average pace: 9:38min/mile

I decided to give the Pacers Alexandria Tuesday run a whirl—it was an interesting route, through a lot of neighborhoods, and this was a lot of learning the route and following other people. One slow big hill, so not quite as tough as the normal Tuesday route I hit. Still, it was nice to see a change of pace.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=510272

Quickie

Start time: 10/12/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 3.5 miles
Average pace: 9:29min/mile

When I make the Thursday runs, I normally run with Chris, Darryl, and Sonia. Except Chris and Sonia weren’t there, and there weren’t other runners interested in our pace, so just the two of us headed out together… Except Darryl’s coming down with a cold and is also running the Baltimore Marathon on Saturday. “I’m going to take it a little slow,” he said, “and do just a little bit. So don’t be afraid to leave me behind.” We stuck together because I like the company and wasn’t feeling up for a huge run anyway (those gale force winds were a little daunting) so we just did 3.5 miles. What amuses me is our mile splits: 10:03, 9:36, 9:06, and an 8:56avg for the last half mile. So much for us trying to take it slower than normal. Somehow I suspected it wasn’t going to last…

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=489997

“Um… where are we?”

Start time: 10/05/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria
Distance: 5.5 miles
Average pace: 8:54min/mile

Tonight was another new course; now that it’s getting darker out, it’s not safe to run the other course on Thursdays so this new one sent us through Old Town Alexandria, as well as some industrial sort of wasteland along Eisenhower Avenue. Only the the thing is… we weren’t sure where we were supposed to turn around. We were told the course was five miles, and given a landmark… but where was it?

When we finally did hit it, we turned around and decided to come back on the other side of Eisenhower Ave. Only there wasn’t sidewalk for a stretch of the highway. And oh yeah, a big metal fence along the edge of the road. And an 18-wheeler heading right for us. Whoops! (Don’t worry, we survived thanks to hugging the fence.) Turns out it was actually 5.5 miles, not too shabby.

Afterwards I pitied any future boyfriends I may have; I was humming as I put dinner in the oven, and outright singing by the time I got into the shower. After a good run? Top of the world, no doubt about that.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=477958

One last Thursday hurrah

Start time: 09/21/06, 7:00pm
Location: Old Town Alexandria and the Mount Vernon Trail
Distance: 5.1 miles
Average pace: 8:36min/mile

Tonight was the last run on the Pacers Alexandria course we’ve been running on Thursdays—with it getting dark earlier it’s dangerous to use the trail much later. So it was a fond, but fast, farewell to the course. I’ll miss next Thursday’s run (book club!) but I guess on October 5th I’ll see what the new course is like. Here’s hoping for flat, flat, flat!

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=389088