Despite being under 10 degrees this morning, it was actually quite nice out. Having on enough layers and nice mittens, the cold wasn't a bother at all.
Jason, George and I got out for some mile repeats on the creek path this morning at 6:30. The path was largely clear, or so snow packed that it was easy to run a good pace on. And, after most of my speed work sessions being around 5:20-5:30 pace for shorter interval stuff, it was kind of nice to be doing a pace that felt relatively easy, only getting my HR up between 160 to 165. After a couple miles of warm up, these were my 6 mile repeat splits:
6:07, 6:04, 6:04, 5:53, 5:54, 5:53
Totals for the morning: 11.75 miles - 1:24:53 (7:13 avg) - HR 151 avg - 390' vertical
I started a 7th mile repeat with Jason, but it was largely uphill and as my pace dropped to 6:30 I lost the motivation to keep pushing another half mile so I bailed and went back to cruise it in with George, who decided to not attempt a 7th repeat. I was good with 6 faster miles today, no need to push it too hard today, because I'm starting a taper for next week. Jason would've probably done 10 of them if we let him!
And now, I can't help but start to look forward to toeing the line with a bunch of fast trail runners in about a week from now. Here's a preliminary look at some of the faster dudes and folks that I know planning on doing the Red Hot 50K next week in no particular order: Dakota Jones, Dylan Bowman, Todd Gangelhoff, Sam Malmberg, Kevin Shilling, Cody Draper, Pete Stevensen, Woody Anderson, Jim Petterson, Bryce Warren, Stephen Young. I'm sure there are other fast runners I don't know of doing it, that's just a quick look at the list. Looking forward to that! Hoping the weather is nicer (warmer) there than it is in Boulder.
