Maria's Running Blog

Fartlek 5x(3'on + 3' off). The pace was supposed to be ~10K in the beginning and ~5K at the end. I ran 7:29, 7:21, 7:15, 7:09 and 7:11 pace. The 5th repeat was very hard, I started really slow, but then managed to pick up the pace and bring the average down to 7:11. I realized that 3' fartlek is a lot harder than 1'. Then ran about 4mi. cooldown. Very tired, but it was a good workout. Total time 1:24:09.

easy run today. It looked like it was going to rain any second, and sure enough, it did, about half way through my run. It started drizzling, but soon it was coming down steady. I got soaked, but at least it's still very warm - it hasn't dipped below 50F during day time yet. I'm still running in shorts, so I'll take that over freezing my butt in NJ (which I did last year at this time!).

Remembered to wear my HRM today and tried to make sure it wasn't going over 150. Managed average of 141, but I ran slow. Total time 1:01:17 (9:00 pace).

Today was a tough run. My legs were tired and the effort felt hard, even though the pace was the usual. I started at 8:07 pace and then moved down to 7:58 average over the next 4 miles. Then I timed the last mile separately, and it was 7:45. That brought the overall average to 7:55 pace. HR was 162-165, which seems a bit high, but I never wore HRM on this tempo before so I can't compare. Was supposed to do strides after the tempo, but ran out of time and had to just jog home. Total time 1:07:50.

Did tempo intervals today for the first time since last spring. It was very, very hard. I did 4x2000m with 3' recovery jog. I was aiming to start at 9:20 and then try to speed up as I went along.

I started with 9:18 (HR 164), the second one was 9:17 (HR 171) and it was already very hard. I thought maybe I should just do 3 instead of 4. Third one was 9:24 (HR 170), and it was a bit easier, but of course I was slowing down already. There was strong headwind on one of the straightaways which wasn't helping. I was debating if I should do the last one, and eventually decided I'll start and see how it goes. Well, I started and it was going badly, I had no energy, my legs were shot and I was hurting big time. But for some reason, I didn't want to stop, probably because then I would have an incomplete workout. I guess that kept me going, although I was running very slow, 7:41 pace. I finished in 9:35 (HR 168). It was well off the intended pace, but because HR was still pretty high (about 90% of my max), I hope I still got the benefit. I think my threshold is pretty weak, but it's the first such workout in a long time, so maybe it's okay.

I went back to my logs of 7 months ago, and saw that I did similar workout (3x2000m with only 2' rec. jog) in 9:12, 9:18, 9:14. I'm obviously not at that level now.

Started off feeling so-so. The grass loop was very muddy after 2 days of rain, and I was sliding all over the place. I was spending a lot of energy avoiding water filled holes and trying to keep my balance. Couldn't get into a rhythm, so after one loop I decided it's enough. I stayed on paved loop from then on, but I had to run more loops, since it's shorter than the grass one. About 5 miles in, I started feeling better and realized that I felt better if I went a bit faster. Got into a good rhythm and went steady until 9 miles. Then I stopped for water and gel, and continued feeling strong to the end. My average pace dropped to 8:47 (from 8:54) and I ran the last mile at a good clip, I'd say around 8:35 - 8:40. Definitely better run than last week. Total time 2:03:41 (8:47 pace).