Everything You Didn't Want to Know About My Runs

2 mile warm up.  

Dynamic stretching:

• High knees
• Butt kicks 

7x10 sec hill sprints.  Still working on stride rate.  10 seconds should be 30 strides, so I tried to count 15 left foot strikes while I was sprinting.  It was awkward, but by the third set, I started getting it.  I was pretty close.

~2 mile cool down.  Still trying to do 180 strides per minute. 

Timex 

Ran with a metronome on my phone set to 180 to see how close I was to the ideal stride rate.  I struggled to keep it up for very long.  I was listening to music and the metronome at the same time and was not able to stay at 180.  I thought maybe the music at a different tempo was confusing me, so I turned it off and kept the metronome going.  I just couldn't physically maintain that cadence.

It is going to take some practice to get there.  This isn't surprising, but I am wondering what the best approach is.  Do I set the metronome to what I can do and do that for a while and gradually work my way up?  Do I keep it at 180 and just keep striving for the ideal?  Do I ditch the metronome and just check in with the pace every once in a while?  I don't know.  But now is the time to work on this while I'm not really training for anything specific. 

I've mainly been running loops then end with me coming down Newcastle.  Lately, most of my loops have been going out to the north.  Today I went out to the south like I used to do.  It was nice change. 

Timex 

Ditched the metronome and just tried running at what I think 180 is.  I've noticed that I'm running at a faster pace for the same amount of effort.  I've also noticed that it is difficult to maintain the high cadence after a few miles and on sustained uphills.  I have to focus to maintain a high cadence.  If my mind wanders, my turnover rate drops.  I wonder how long I have to run like this before this just feels natural.

It was cold this morning.  I should have worn gloves.  Almost cold enough for long sleeves.  It was cool to see the moon over the mountains and under Venus with just the faintest glimpse of sunlight.  Is that Venus? It's too bright to by anything else.

Timex 

Ran a little easier this morning.  Still had a faster turnover rate, but lower than what I've been doing the last couple of days.  It was just too hard to go that fast this morning.  It is going to take some time to build up to this.

Timex