A Lean and Hungry Look

Easy 6 around 21st East loop.  Left Garmin at home and focused on loosening up the legs after Saturday's Grandeur Peak hike and a few days off from running.

12x2-minute repeats at 5k pace (goal of around 5:20/mi).  I did these at Sugarhouse Park, and the wide swings in pace are due primarily to the hills at the park--the very fast ones included downhill and the very slow ones included uphill.  Even so, I was pretty inconsistent today.

1-mile warmup

1. 5:03/mi (165 bpm)

2. 5:12/mi (171)

3. 5:45/mi (174 bpm) (started at the bottom of the long hill on the southwest side)

4. 5:38/mi (171) (hill on northeast side)

5. 5:06/mi (170)

6. 5:17/mi (172)

7. 5:30/mi (177)

8. 5:33/mi (173)

9. 5:07/mi (170)

10. 5:37/mi (171)

11. 5:02/mi (171)

12. 5:41/mi (177)

Roughly 1-mile cooldown.

Average pace for intervals: 5:22/mi

I was surprised that my HR stayed as low as it did.  That's a good sign.  My legs were pretty tired, though, particularly on the intervals that included climbing.  On my last few runs I've felt something a little weird in my right knee, mainly in the tendon on the outside but also just inside the patella.  It's hard to explain but it's as though I feel the tendon moving around.  No pain at all, but probably something to watch.

Scheduled rest day.

Drove 2 miles up Emigration, then ran up 4 miles at a comfortable pace (HR stayed below 160 most of the way).  Stopped and stretched for a few minutes, then turned around and came down.  Target pace was 5:50/mile.  Splits were:

Mile 5: 5:45 (162 bpm)

Mile 6: 5:48 (171)

Mile 7: 5:42 (174)

Mile 8: 5:54 (175)

Mile 9: 5:44 (177)

Mile 10: 5:23 (181)

Although the split for Mile 8 was a little slow, I was able to maintain a pretty consistent pace below target with a reasonable effort.  In past Emigration workouts, I think I've put more on the line and, as a result, have had difficulty recovering in time to run my Saturday workouts on target.  Instead of keeping the pedal to the floor today, I tried using cruise control until the last mile, and it felt better.  Hopefully that will translate into a better Saturday run this week.

Everything felt good today.  I didn't feel anything in my right knee, so I'm thinking that whatever it was may have been left over from the Grandeur Peak hike.  I'll keep an eye out for it, though.

Tonight we levae for Sheep Valley (near Fish Lake) for a quick camping trip/family reunion, so I'm hopeful that I can find some decent terrain for my tempo run on Saturday.  In any event, it should be fun, especially for the kids.

I ran on the trails around the Sheep Valley property.  We didn't arrive until 2:00 a.m.--due to some bad directions, an attempt to take the minivan on terrain that would challenge a 4x4 and resulted in hitting a tree and getting stuck for a while at midnight, but I digress--and I didn't get more than about 2 hours of sleep.  The run felt hot and exhausting.  I realized, after completing the run, that the elevation was about 9500 feet.  That, coupled with a lack of sleep, may have led to the overall crappy feeling.  It was spectacular country, though, and the drive home only took 3.5 hours instead of the 7.5 it took us to get there.  Call me Clark Griswold.

AHR 157

We didn't actually make it home from our camping trip and July 4th festivities until midnight on Saturday, so I broke my rule and, for only the second time in my memory, did my long run early Sunday morning (I had meetings starting at 7:30).  I'm counting it as Saturday mileage, though.  To help me justify transgressing a personal boundary, I did the run sans-iPod (I can't remember exactly where that exemption is found in Exodus).  Drove to Mountain Dell Golf Course, then ran past Little Dell and up the back side of Little Mountain, down Emigration to Crestview, up Crestview to Wasatch, around Wasatch to 13th, down to Foothill and back home.  Plan was to do the first 4 easy and the remaining 10 at a target of 6:00/mile.  Splits were as follows:

Mile 5: 6:28 (included last part of Little Mountain ascent) (157 bpm)

Mile 6: 6:01 (156)

Mile 7: 5:55 (159)

Mile 8: 5:58 (163)

Mile 9: 5:57 (166)

Mile 10: 5:55 (171)

Mile 11: 5:52 (172)

Mile 12: 5:55 (173)

Mile 13: 5:54 (included Crestview hill) (175)

Mile 14: 6:02 (177)

Although the first mile was surprisingly slow, I settled in to my pace and felt strong (strong enough to bark at a couple of cyclists who were leisurely riding two abreast and almost pushed me off the road during Mile 12) until the last half mile along Foothill, which is slightly uphill.  With about a quarter mile to go and needing to cross the road to get home, I was anaerobic and stopped for a minute to wait for a gap in traffic.  Otherwise, the AHR for the final mile would probably have been closer to 180.

I was late for my meeting, but the run went better than expected.  I don't know that I'm strong enough yet to hold 6:00 pace over terrain that isn't downhill, but I feel like I'm getting stronger each week.

Due to the shift in my long run, I'll plan to rest tomorrow and move my scheduled 6-miler to Wednesday (my scheduled rest day) instead.