Category Archives: 07mi

Out and About

0, 07mi

Start Time: 6/15/08, 8:00am
Location: Arlington, Washington DC
Distance: 7.5 miles
Average Pace: 10:08min/mile
Total Miles For June: 34 miles

Laura and I met up with Emma, Donna, Susannah, and someonewhosenameIcan’tremember for a planned 8-miler (or so) on Sunday. It was a group of varying speeds, so we decided we’d just take it easy. We had a walk break request, so on each mile we took a minute walk break and then trucked on. It was nice—we started at Iwo Jima, ran past Memorial Bridge down the 14th Street Bridge, then around a slice of the Tidal Basin and by the Lincoln Memorial before heading up into Georgetown, onto part of the Capital Crescent Trail, then over Key Bridge and through Rosslyn. Donna, Susannah, and the other person (sorry!) slowed down after a bit, but Laura, Emma, and I trucked through to the end. It all went really well…

…well, until we hit Rosslyn and Laura tripped on the curb and wiped out pretty spectacularly. From the sound of the thud, Emma and I were convinced she’d broken something, but thankfully it was just a scrape. Still, that was the end of the run for that day! Otherwise, though, it was a nice run with good company.

Backdated Florida thrillsville

0, 07mi, travel

Start Time: 2/9/08, 2:00pm
Location: Yulee, Florida
Distance: 7 miles
Average Pace: 8:50min/mile
Total Miles For February: 15

Running through my parents’s neighborhood—which was quite nice—and then the next neighborhood over… which was not quite nice. In fact, rather terrifying. And lots of snarling dogs. Eeeeek.

Hello, 2008

0, 07mi, indoor track

Start Time: 1/2/08, 6:30pm
Location: Thomas Jefferson Community Center
Distance: 7 miles
Average Pace: 8:28min/mile

Well, the plan was to hit my cycling class tonight. Even getting there almost half an hour early, though? Toooo late, already full thanks to the New Year’s Resolutioners. But, that worked out well because I needed to run my 7-miler either tonight or tomorrow morning. So while the others pedaled, I ran. The indoor track wasn’t too crowded—mostly regulars that I recognized, like the guy who runs in the same polo shirt and sweatpants every time, or the guy with the t-shirt from Iran, or the super-tight-and-trim guy who wears a spandex shirt underneath his running shirt. Good times, good times. (8:44, 8:25, 8:24, 8:30, 8:25, 8:32, 8:19)

Melting in the City

0, 07mi, tempo

Start time: 7/29/07, 8:00am
Location: National Mall
Distance: 7 miles
Average pace: 8:45min/mile

Well, the good news about Sunday’s run is that despite some pretty warm temperatures we stayed slightly above pace for our tempo run. The bad news is that it was supposed to be 8 miles. Erica and Cassie zoomed off (per usual) and did all eight. But of the rest of us…

Aaron: Stopped after two miles, turned around and walked back
Dave: Walked one mile and skipped one in the middle while we headed out and back.
Paul & Devora & Me: Toughed it through seven miles and called it quits.
Laura: Toughed it through seven miles a tiny bit behind us, then after walking for about two minutes or so decided she was good and ran the rest of the eighth mile.

A tough day! It was hot, it was super humid (the bigger problem), and we all decided we had nothing to prove.

What Goes Up…

0, 07mi, tempo

Start time: 7/12/07, 8:00am
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 7 miles
Average pace: 8:45min/mile

I was a little tired this morning, and having had little success with my last two mid-week tempo runs, I was determined to do a little better this time. Since I was giving the W&OD Trail another shot, I decided it was time to reverse my path; the entire section I use has a slight incline, so rather than my bad run two weeks ago where I ran down-up-up-down (and then pooped out at the end of the last “up”) I would reverse things and tackle it as up-down-down-up. That way there wasn’t such a long, steady uphill climb and breaking it up would do better.

Sure enough, my first two miles (up) were off-pace (9:07, 9:01) but I also don’t have a problem with taking those slower and then ramping up. The next stretch—aside from an incident that I will explain momentarily—the two stretches of “down” went pretty good (8:35, 8:26, 8:38). Even the final stretch of up wasn’t so bad; a little off-pace but nothing that I was going to worry about (8:46, 8:42). So, overall, an 8:45 average, which I’m pleased with. I’d have liked an 8:30 but I will take what I can get.

Oh yes, and the “incident”? Well, about two and a half miles in… a bird pooped on my face. This, by far, beats the infamous “Greg finds a cicada clinging to his neck” incident of 2004. GAH. SO GROSS. (Yes, I stopped and wiped it off.)

Miami

0, 06mi, 07mi, 13mi

Start time: 1/6/07, 8:00am
Location: Downtown Washington DC
Distance: 7 miles & 6.4 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1 & 7:1
Average pace: 11:33min/mile & 9:37min/mile

Today I decided to run with mai_neh in his final training run for the Miami Half Marathon, a 14-miler. The first half of our run was with his two pace group members, who were training the full marathon so they were at a slower training pace. They were supposed to be running an 11:30min/mile, so we hit that really well. On the way back, with about mile and a quarter left to go I was starting to feel beat and I could tell that mai_neh was raring to go. Since I’m not training for a race and he was, when we hit 4th Street I told him to keep going, and hooked a right-hand turn to go directly back to home base. It lopped off just six-tenths of a mile, but it was nice to get back a little quicker and to be done. Since he finished up his last two miles at an 8:30min/mile average, I’d say I made the right decision to cut him free of my anchorness! 🙂 We saw Chris S. on the trail heading out as we were zooming back, which was fun, and it was nice to see all the other staff members as well. Good times, good times.

Back in the saddle

0, 07mi, aidsmarathon

Start time: 09/03/06, 7:00am
Location: Downtown Washington DC
Distance: 7 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 6:1
Average pace: 9:20min/mile

Well, after Tuesday’s “maybe I’ll skip this weekend’s recovery run” comment, did I? Well, obviously, no. It was just me again (booo) but it also wasn’t raining (yay!) like the Saturday runners got. I headed out by myself at a nice clip, though; after the first warm-up mile we’re talking about miles 2-4 being 9:08, 9:07, and 9:09. Part of the return trip was a little slower when I picked up Coach Karen at two different spots; we ran together for part of mile 5 (9:56) before she took care of another runner, then she cut across the mall and we did part of mile 7 together as well. (Meanwhile, mile 6? 9:11. It seems that I am very consistent once more.)

It was interesting contrasting the streets in Southwest DC versus up by the monuments and museums. There, you could tell that there had been the remnants of a tropical storm coming through; lots of branches and leaves carpeting the sidewalks as far as the eye could see. The water in the Washington Channel was just as high as the humidity, but the temperature was still low (mid-60s!) and it was a nice way to center and focus once more after last week’s not so great 14-miler.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=299537

Getting back up to speed

0, 07mi, aidsmarathon

Start time: 07/09/06, 7:00am
Location: Downtown Washington DC
Distance: 7 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 11:00min/mile

Rick Carter: “Sounds like you’ve been doing everything right to get back from your injury.”
Me: “Yeah, but it’s still hard to accept slowing down for a bit.”
Rick: “So true!”

This morning actually went really well. Once I’d accepted on Friday morning that I couldn’t run in my 9:30 group (more on that shortly) and needed to slow down, my return to the training program was a breeze. I ran with the 11:00 group this morning; a little quiet but very nice. No alumni in the group, so I got questioned a bit on what it’s like to run a marathon (things like packet-pick-up, starting corrals, and sports gels). Really good people, and I wouldn’t mind running with them another week. I still haven’t figured out exactly what group I’m going to run in for the 8-miler…

…and therein lies the problem. When I ran the 4-miler, the fastest group was me and Stephanie as the 9:30 pace group. There were five or six people in the 10:00 group below us, and I was hoping that perhaps they’d merge with ours. Instead? I got there today and the fastest group I could definitively recognize as being one was the 10:30 group. No sign of Stephanie (who’d said she might be running on some Saturdays, but I wonder if me being out two weeks made her decide to shift there entirely) or anyone from the 10:00 group at all. Hmph. The 10:30 group had a whopping 3 people in it; while I’ve run in a small group (2002 in particular) I must admit that I’m happier with higher numbers.

Hopefully some of the 10:00 people will come back. Or perhaps once grok is back up to speed we could run together on Sundays? (I have no idea what his training pace will be, although I know he’s still a bit faster than I.) If not, I guess 10:30 will be it, which is a bit disappointing, but doable. Still, we’ll see. There’s a long training season ahead, who knows?

Hmph

07mi, aidsmarathon

Start time: 05/28/05, 8:00am
Location: W&OD Trail
Distance: 7 miles
Run:Walk ratio: 5:1
Average pace: 12:03min/mile

AIDS Marathon has what’s called a “designated driver” system; each week, someone in the group offers to be the “DD” and if a runner is having problems, the DD hangs back with them so no one’s out by themselves. (On really long runs, you assign two DDs and then the DDs can drop off the ailing runner at a water stop and then keep running their old pace.) I was DD this week, and alas, my services were needed. One runner was running out of steam before the fourth mile was even over, so for three-and-a-quarter miles I got to go at a slower-than-normal pace. It wasn’t until after I got back that I discovered she’d had the same problem last week. *sigh* Let’s hope this isn’t a trend.

Ah well. Being DD means that sooner or later you’re going to be taken up on it, and in five years this is the first time that’s happened for me. At least it was on a week with short milage!