It's all relative

AM: 2.5 slow miles showing the group the route around the park.  Then followed that up with a LOT of walking with some of the walkers who were straggling behind.  

"Run Week" begins tomorrow!  

AM: 20.5 miles with Anthony, Charles, Drew, Lee, and Sydney.  Very spry: ~7:00-7:10 for the majority of it.

This is going to be one heck of a running week, I can already tell- I am feeling great.  I will call it "Runspringa" (trademark pending).  And it will.  Be.  Awesome.

PM: 10 more miles solo... because... RUNSPRINGA!  Felt great!

AM: 2.5 miles and the gym- chest, tris, shoulders, abs.

PM: 12 miles @ ~7:00/mile.

AM: 10 miles, 3 at marathon pace. Why, you ask? Runspringaaaaaaaaa.

PM: Track in East Lake with Anthony- kind of. He didn't want to do the workout at all, so I went solo. 10x400, 4x200 with equal recoveries.

Splits- 68.5, 68, 67, 66, 67, 67.5, 68.5, 68, 67.5, 66.5, 34, 35, 34, 34.

PM: 11.5, 7 with Anthony.  ~7:30avg.

AM: Thunderstorms = rained out.

PM: 12 miles ~7:30 avg

Planned day off. 

This race was meant to help my friend Anthony break 16, but it was just not meant to be for him on this day.  Hopefully, he'll give it a shot in June.

5k Splits-      mile 1- 4:58, mile 2- 5:06, mile 3- 5:16, finish 0:31.

Then we did a long run on the clay loop in Clermont.  Wow, if you ever get a chance to run there, that is a pretty cool long run loop.

AM: 18 miles very early (4:30 start) with Steve watching the Irongirl half/5k and cheering them all on.

PM: 10 miles after a long day.  Glad I didn't give myself an excuse not to run.  Had really no run stuff in my car but threw on an old pair of basketball shorts, my backup-backup-backup-backup 3 year old sneakers, no watch, work socks, and no workout shirt but it didn't matter- still got out there.

AM: Track in Safety Harbor.  10x400 with 400 recoveries.  I was running people mostly trying to hit their times.  Fast group today- they worked real hard. 

PM: Track in East Lake. 4x1600 with 400 recoveries with Chad.

PM: 10 miles, 7 with Anthony.

AM: 9 miles with Matt, Alan, and Brian.

PM: 11 miles.

AM: 8 miles solo.

PM: 5 miles with Anthony.

AM: Ryan's Run Relays, 4 x 1miles team event in Ybor city.

This is a road race event where you have 4 members to a team and you hand off a baton to the next member when finished.  Today I ran with Alan (leg 2), Brian (leg 3), and Celia (leg 4 anchor).  I ran leg 1, as I am not the type to enjoy being way behind and having to catch up.  It was a tougher leg than I expected- brick for the first quarter, two 90-degree turns and then an annoying 180 turn to hand off at the 1 to 2 mile marker- whoever decided on that part of the course being included at the finish of a leg absolutely sucks.  I went out at 4:32 pace and felt pretty gassed immediately to be honest which was a bad sign.  I somehow held on to the pace although the entire way, which was surprising.  I'm happy with the mile time, but definitely can do better.  I can't really count it as a PR, since it wasn't certified, but still nice to run that type of time psychologically.

Our team finished with a 21:58 (or thereabouts, not sure the actual finish time), but I tried my best to run the rest of my teammates to PRs, but only one was able to PR.  Oh well, still top co-ed team for the 4x1! 

AM: 21 miles+ mostly with Steve, Charles, Lee. Paces: ~7:30 pace for the first half and 7:15 for the second half.

Hoppy Easter everyone!

PM: 10+ miles.  Felt great, ~7:02 average.

Also watched the Boston Marathon!  Jordan Hasay ran incredibly well.  Her last 5k was right around 16 minutes and negative split the race finishing in 2:23- she certainly has a 2:20 in her.  On the men's side, it was nice to see SIX Americans in the top 10 spots... although 3 of those are non-American born products... so let's not get too excited.  Still cool.  Rupp looked strong finishing in second- 22 seconds back- but he had no real chance against Kirui.  Kirui was straight up racing the whole way and could just follow game plan from mile 22 onward- creating a gap and holding it.  

Fun race to watch, however, I wish Mutai, Korir, (and even Tsegay) had actually bothered racing after 25k.  I know they get paid to come (as well as often win money for placing), but it's like watching Lebron James dog it in a regular season game- it's cool, but let's just move to the NBA finals to see the real deal.

AM: Track in Safety Harbor.  3 fast miles running the guys running 3 sets of alternating 1000s and 600s, but the real work is planned for the afternoon.  

PM: 10+ miles at the track in East Lake- unbearable hot and humid.  Tried to do 3 miles of alternating 1000s and 600s, but just couldn't get my pacing down.  Not a good workout at all.

PM: 12+ miles solo in Safety Harbor.

AM: 9+ miles at track in Safety Harbor helping Alan run some 300s with 100 recoveries.  The splits were around 60-62 seconds per 300, although I was using the outer lanes to get more of a workout in.

PM: 7+ Solo late (after 8pm) in East Lake.  I'm impressed with myself, since I had every excuse not to run today.

PM: 11+ solo in East Lake, ~7:10/mile avg..

AM: 3.5 miles solo

PM: 3 miles then gym, chest, tris, shoulders.

20 total miles solo in East Lake with a 2x3mile at effort in the middle of the run.

PM: 11 miles, 3 of them fast- I don't know why.  I tried on some new shoes, so that might be it.  Overall, ~6:50/mile average.

AM: Track, ran 10.75 miles total.  We did 12x400,408,416.  Our goal was to keep the same time for each interval, even though we would be switching to lanes two (interval 2,5,8) and three (3,6,9) and then rotating back.  I've done this workout once before and find it really useful for keeping things fresh and focused.  I ran everyone else's' pace alternating between runners, but they were, fortunately, quick today.  

PM: Track again, this time solo and fast.  Ran 10.25 miles total.  I chose to do 24x200 with 200 jog recoveries.  Anthony tried persuading me out of it and telling me to do it next week- a common refrain lately.  Chad did not want to join as he has a triathlon on Sunday, which I understand.  So I did it solo.  24 intervals in a row are just, plain daunting.  Afterwards, I was proud I hit my goals.

Splits- 32, 31, 32, 33, 33, 32, 32.5, 30.5, 32, 29.5, 33, 33, 33, 32, 33, 33, 32, 34, 32.5, 33, 32, 33, 32, 31

There is no real reason I'm running these workouts, I just think they are fun.  I enjoy running relatively fast.  It's fun to persevere and try to succeed, particularly after a string of failures.  Especially solo.  

PM: 6 miles with Anthony at a (thankfully) ungodly slow pace, ~8:50/mile and then the gym: arms, back, plyos, squats, abs.

I really killed it in my workout yesterday. I am wicked sore, but in a good way.

AM: 8.5 miles with Alan.

PM: 8.5 miles with Anthony.

PM: 13 miles solo, ~7:15/mile pace.

AM: 12 miles solo in Safety Harbor.  It is sweltering here in Florida even super early.

AM: 21 very slow miles.  ~8:35/mile pace

Unintentionally slow miles, actually.  I got roped in with a slow group, and they were talkers and I just let it go from there.  It took me 3 hours of running to finish 21 miles, but 3:30 hours total since they took so many breaks/walked/took forever to start running again which is entirely frustrating.  Very thankful I did the first 5 miles solo, or else I think I'd still be running...  

Later, I volunteered at the St. Anthony's Triathlon at one of their water stops- I don't give back to the community nearly enough.  Happy I chose to join the volunteering corps.  :)