AM - 12.1 miles total this morning at the very dark hour of 4:30am with Sasha. I really do not like running this early but sometimes it is necessary. It is very hard to get going in the dark at this time of the morning and to do a fast workout makes it even tougher. The plan was to do 6x800 on the trail all in 2:40 with a 400 jog. This sounds easy enough but at 4:30am it becomes a bit more of a challenge. This morning was interesting as it was dark enough in places on the trail that we could not see the actual trail very well and at faster paces it makes you a little nervous trying to make sure you stay on the path. We warmed up 4 miles and then started the 800's. Splits for 800s were 2:35, 2:36, 2:37, 2:37, 2:39, 2:37. Sasha let me control the pace for most of them. The first 800 I felt smooth and in control and was a bit surprised with the time as we hit it in 2:35. After that one I wanted to make sure I stayed like at this effort and remained at a controlled pace. I did not want to feel like I was pushing all out on any of the repeats. All of them felt pretty good and were at what felt like 5K effort overall never pushing to what would feel like top speed. Afterwards we did about 4 more miles back to Sasha's house. Overall I am pretty pleased as I was well under my 2:40 goal but the effort was what I wanted it to be. I am also happy as running at this time and in the pitch black makes it much harder and I'm pretty sure slows one down a bit. A few more miles tonight with the boys. PM - Added 4.3 miles, 1 with Jared, 2 with James and rest on my own. Easy miles and only 16.4 total today.
Interesting read below continued from a previous article. Link to Part two of a series on running economy! | 