WTAC Clamdigger 5 Mile

Sunday morning I headed to Misquamicut beach in Westerly Rhode Island for the Clamdigger 5 mile road race. I was happy to see the rain stop at the Connecticut border, but not thrilled with the wind - which I heard one person estimate was gusting to 40 mph. The first leg of the race was right into it, and my split showed a 7:26 pace. The second leg I ran with a high school kid named John who helped me pull off a 7:01 pace over the final 2.5 miles. My GPS had our time at 36:45 and an average pace of 7:13, which I think is very good considering the conditions. Official times are poster here. The GPS tracked the distance to be 5.1 miles, while the race is listed as only 5, so there is a difference in the pace I'm reporting here (7:13) and the pace on the website listed (7:21) - since the GPS says I'm faster, I'll stick with it (and to keep consistency with all my training runs, etc...). Anyway, the time was good for 8th out of 18 male racers in the 30-39 age group and 30th out of 108 overall. Although the field was small, the times were pretty competitive, as the top 4 in that age group all clocked under 6:20 paces - a full 5 minutes faster than me over the entire course. I guess I have some improving to do before I get that fast.

Fourth set of hills yesterday. I went out again with the group from work and it felt pretty good: I had an average pace of 7:20 - but the workouts are gradually getting more difficult. I do think these helped during the race. I'll do another 6 miles either tomorrow or Friday, then do a 4M, hills, and 6M next week in preperation for the May 6th L&M run (3.5 miles). Hopefully the weather is such that I can do that Monday, Tuesday and Thursday to give me a day-off prior to the race.

April Run Home

I've recycled this image - since I still think it's pretty cool. Yesterday, after work, I did the run home again - a great way to get a long run in. I finished way ahead of my expectations - 7:51 pace for an even 10 miles. My 2.5 mile split paces were: 7:54, 7:54, 7:50 and 7:48 - so I got a little faster toward the end which is good. Two days of rest, and then I'm off to the Clamdigger Sunday.

Third Spring Hill Workout

Today was my first run with the regular Tuesday hill runners from the Pfizer running team. I made the rookie mistake of going off a little fast, so the 75 second intervals were a bit slow (8:03 and 7:41). Still had a nice average pace and I'm still improving everytime. The other people on the team are really very fast - I was toward the back for every interval.

Had a nice run with Larry yesterday - we did 4.36 miles at a 7:22 pace. Thursday I'll do my 10 mile run home (or run to work - depending on how much mulch I need to move Thursday night).

Running Calendar for SE-Connecticut

Today's 'long' run was a 6 miler that I polished off in 45:48 for a 7:37 pace. This is my best pace for a 6 mile run and well below the target of 7:50 - so I'm pretty happy with my improvement. The last 2 miles seemed pretty tough though. I took mile splits: 7:24, 7:25, 7:47, 7:47, 7:35, 7:44. I did a different 6 miles today also: I used Tyler road to cut across twice and make a figure eight - instead of jogging up toward the CB Sharp Highway. I would show the route - but it's really not that interesting...
...Instead, I'll paste in my running calendar - a lot of interesting runs coming up in late April and early May.

Second Hill Workout

Today was the second hill workout of the spring, which I finished at a better average pace than last weeks. I don't think I like these as much as the intervals - but I'm going to give it the 2 months. Next week I may try and go out on Tuesday with some other people from the running club. The 'ladder' is taken from the running club website - and appears to do a nice job of gradually adding on time.

Catching up: last Friday I did my 'long run' - a 6 miler at a 7:49 pace. On Monday I went out with Larry and Dave and did a 4 mile tempo at a 7:15 pace. I'll plan on doing another 6 this Friday. Next week I may skip the tempo and do my hills + a long run home - and then the Sunday after that would be the first race of the season, the Clamdigger over in Rhode Island. There are a number of runs coming up - I'll try and post an updated schedule at some point.

Spring Hill Workouts

With Spring getting underway, I'm going to put on hold my 'intervals' and do some hill repeats in their place. This will last for 8 weeks - or until the end of May (about when kid number 2 is due). Today was the beggining of the 'ladder', which consisted of 60 second repeats. My first one was at a 7:10 min/mile pace - and the next 5 got progressively slower. My average pace was 7:52, and the average distance for the 60 seconds was ~750 feet. I was the last to finish on all six - but I'm guessing I'll get better as the weeks go by.