2 miles Easy in 15:59 (7:59/mi, avg HR 159) warmup.
6.5 miles Steady
State (2.5 up, 2.5 down, 1.25 up, 1.25 down) in 45:28 (6:59/mi, avg HR 178) with
splits: 6:54, 7:34, 7:11, 6:28, 6:37, 7:17, 3:21 Decided
to take yesterday completely off in order to rest after Tuesday's race
and to celebrate my (step) daughter's 20th birthday, which we did by
going to the Point Defiance Aquarium and Zoo. I guess it wasn't
completely off, since we did quite a bit of walking, which I normally
don't do having a desk (computer) job. As it turned out, I was
completely wiped out and wound up taking a 1.5 hr nap once we got home
(passed out is more like it), in time to get up, eat, watch a bit of
football, and go back to bed. All in all, a good day. Unfortunately,
that didn't presage a good workout today. Supposed to be a 10 mile
Steady State workout today, but things went south quickly. I went out a
bit fast in my warmup, trying out my new pace ranges and overdoing it a
bit. Today's temps hit 50 today, quite a bit warmer than normal. Once I
started the Steady State portion, I could immediately tell the effort
was substantially harder than it should've been. I'd decided on a
2-loop out and back course, in order to break up the uphill and
downhill portions a bit more than my usual 5 uphill out, 5 downhill
back. Some uphill headwinds during mile 2 made it especially hard to
stay anywhere near my pace and I struggled mightily while my HR soared
to near my max. I could also feel my leg muscles start the familiar
burn and knew this wasn't going to be sustainable. I tried to focus and
eliminate the bad thoughts, and decided to mentally focus on getting to
the 2.5 mile mark, where I knew the turn-around and downhill section
would be a mental boost. I managed to make it there, and quickly
discovered the downhill stretch wasn't all that much easier, confirming
my suspicion that today's run was not going well. To make this long
story shorter, I did make the halfway point, and continued onto the
second loop, only to be reduced to a short walk at around 5.5 miles, so
I decided to turn around and pack it in shortly after that point to
finish off a total of 6.5 SS miles, slightly slower than my new SS
range (but still within the tolerance of my previous range). I'm
going to speculate that this is simply a case of too much too soon.
With the race, walking around yesterday, winds, warmer temps, etc. I
obviously wasn't recovered enough to properly execute this workout.
Instead of giving into the "end of the world" feeling I've got right
now, I'm going to chalk it up to learning, try to avoid as much of the
inevitable muscle soreness I *know* I'm going to have following today,
and to try to get back on track for Saturday's Progression Run.
Brooks Adrenaline (Blue) - 401.5 miles.
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