Newburyport Half

This morning I headed out to do the Newburyport river run - a half marathon distance around the town of Newburyport.  The race started promptly at 9:15.  Good thing I arrived early - as I thought it was suppose to go off at 9:30.  I've had a spell of poor showings recently, so I was hoping for a decent time.  The race started off swift - about 7:20s for the first two miles, but the weather was very muggy and I knew I would never keep that up.  I moderated the pace and tried to hit the 7:30s since it's easy to keep track off.  After an hour, I was still pretty close to that.  I know I hit the ten mile mark at 1:16:30 a so I was about 740s overall.   The last 3 were harder than I would've hoped, but I finished at 1:40 on the nose, good for a 7:38 pace overall.  This places it as my second fastest of 5 attempts at this distance, my best being 7:20s, my third best over 8 min/mile.  Given the muggy morning, I'm pretty happy with that.

Race week!

Taper week.  Some hate it, I love it.  Did 6x400s yesterday at the track.  Did 1:30s the first two and 1:32s the lat four.  It was pretty hot out, so I'm happy with that.  Today I biked to and from work for my workout.  It was mys first biking all the way in since last fall.

Last Hurrah.

I did my final 'long run' today - a good 8 miler around the Charles River.  I went out with a grad student from Spain who I was thinking I'd have to ditch (at an 8 min/mile pace).  I was surprised when the 7:30 pace we were running appeared to be an easy lap around the river for her - shows you what you get for making assumptions about people.  In the end, it was good she ran with me as it ended up being a perfect way to cap the training plan.  A few more 'easy' runs next week to keep the legs fresh - and then i'll hit the race circuit for the first time since March.

Last Tempo Run

I did my last tempo today.  I ran it without the iphone/gps - but I think it was ~3 miles in about 21-22 minutes.  Which is about right.  It felt hard - but doable the whole way.  Nice rain to run in also.  Home front is rough.  Way too much going on - wife on crutches really ramps up the do everything to about 1000.  I'm not sure what that means - but that's what I feel.  Seems frusteratingly consistent with the difficulty the last 3 years of getting a good training/life rhythm.

2x3200s

Not sure if I ever did this workout before: 2x3200.  I went out with Larry and Travis and did the first 2 miles slow - about 9 each.  At Longfellow, Larry and I took off - did 7:10 and 7:11 for the first 3200 - a little fast, but Larry was pushing.  The middle mile I took easy: 8:38 - this brought me back across to the Boston side and then I hung a right toward BU.  The second set I did 7:25 and 7:14.  It felt hard, but good - not too much.  7.4 miles total.  Good Intensity.  Freaking perfect day for running.

Final long run...

Today I ran home from work, including the fresh pond loop, for 12.3 miles.  The first 11 miles I averaged roughly an 8 min/mile pace.  Hill into Arlington sucked.  Nevertheless, a solid run, and I felt better throughout compared to last week.

5x1000s

I've been itching to hit the track for a while now, and I finally made it this morning for 5x1000s.  I manged ~4:10s throughout - which is about 6:45 pace.  Back calculating - that would estimate my 10K pace to be about 7:30 (imo, a little slow) - and my planned half-marathon pace at 7:50 - which may be about right.  In any case - it felt good and hard.  I managed to do them all about the same pace as well - which is always good.

Tempo-ing

Did the tempo run today.  I didn't have enough time to do the intervals, so I headed out thinking it would be too hot to run very fast.  Turning onto the esplanade, I caught a very nice cool breeze, and thus started my first mile of three.  It clicked by in 7:28.  The second was about the same (7:30) and the final one was 7:09.  Must have been pushing.  I was trying to go hard, but not too hard that I was dreaming of stopping.  Overall, a very nice workout.  Will aim for intervals on Wednesday morning and a long run in again Friday.

14 miler

yesterday I ran into work, incuding two loops of fresh pond.  My goal was about 8:10s.  I managed about 8s down and through fresh pond, and then started slowing down through miles 8 and 9 toward the arsenal bridge.  The last four miles I was seriously hurting.  Total mileage was about 14.5 and time was around 2 hours.  The gods cutout for about 1/2 mile, so those are estimates.  I'm not sure exactly what was wrong.  It was a little hot to start, and my pacing wasn't great.  The race is three weeks out.  I think I'll aim for another 12 miler next week.  Hopefully it'll feel a little better.

2x2000s

I did my first interval session of this round.  Never did 2000s before.  Pushed the first one too hard and finished in under 8:30.  Second one was back on the Cambridge side and took just under 9 minutes.  That's a good hard workout - but relatively short and fits well along the river loop.

Zoning In

Last week was spring break week which we spent at Disney Land and San Diego - a great trip - one of the best of my life - but completely devoid of meaningful exercise.  It was by design - a decision made in advance - but I knew I needed to have a good week this week.  Mission accomplished.

Did a very nice tempo run on Monday - the normal 4.7 loop - but the middle 3 was run at a sub-7:30.  Legs were very sore from 1 hour strength on Sunday (probably the most important of the 5 workouts).  I took Tuesday off because of the leg pain - but it was a good pain.

Wednesday they were feeling better - and I did the last hill work with Lar.  2x(45x90x120) - which felt pretty easy - since the hill flattens out at the top and the trip down gives you a nice blow.  We ended up running a little extra - 7 miles total.

Thursday was the topper - 9.9 miles home - much of it around 7:40 pace - probably the middle 6 miles.  Lar was really pushing it hard - and i was pretty much holding on.  The hill at arlington killed the overall pacing - but is probably really good training so i'm good with it.

Finally - another hour of strength this week.  Likely my best week in many years.  The only thing I need to hit harder next week is stretching.  I'll dial back the strength into more often shorter strength/stretch sessions - and concentrate on my 14-15 miler - probably on Thursday.  Week kinda stinks because i have Groton on wed - so i'll need to do mon,thr,friday runs....