It's all relative

Race season begins again! This was a local 5k with 440 people total doing it, so pretty small, but a pretty great after-party. This was my third year in a row doing it, so I knew the course quite well- an out and back with fifteen or so 90-degree turns. I didn't see any runners I knew and then all of a sudden Nick Miehe pops out of nowhere, possibly the last person I'd expect at a 5k road race. I knew I wasn't in his class if he was in shape, but I was excited to hang on for fun as long as I could. I took the first mile in 5:09, and wondered why he was not about 5-10 seconds ahead of me, so I looked back and saw him about 30 seconds back with 2 other guys. I was utterly shocked. Mile 1.5 clicked through at the same exact pace, and turned around and fortunately saw them about 45 seconds back. I was grateful for this as my legs were slowly cramping. I didn't realize it at the time, but he was apparently running with his dog, so that explains the 17:41 finish. The rest of the race was taxing in the sun and (un)fortunately at the end- as I wasn't close enough to break 16 to worry about breaking it- I didn't have to do any sprinting or speed up at all. I was very thankful for that as I had some terrible leg cramps by that point. It ended up being a weeny PR, slicing a couple extra seconds off, so that's always nice.

I really don't understand this cramping issue I continue to battle in races, and seemingly races only. During the cooldown I was literally limping for the first mile until my heart rate dropped. This cramping happened last year and the year before that in this exact same race, and likely will happen in the 10k race in a month- as it has happened the last two years there, too. I'm guessing it's overheating related at this point, but I don't know for sure, just that it tends to be the most severe in summer races.

Rough Splits (poor gps)

Mile 1- 5:09

Mile 2- 5:20

Mile 3- 5:24

Finish- 0:22

PM: 12 miles

PM: track workout in St. Pete. Workout called for 600 repeats. I joined in with Drew, Quint, and Cory for the last half of their bridge/hill repeats. Workout called for: 2 sets of 5x600s with 200m in between items and 400m between the two sets. The "hills" after were approximately 0.1mi with the downhill being the recovery. All active recoveries.

Splits

Set 1- 1:55, 1:51, 1:54, 1:52, 1:45

Set 2- 2:00, 2:03, 1:57, ------, ------

Bridge inclines:31, :26, :25, :24, :22

Went way too fast in the first set. Wanted to keep them around 1:55, but the high schoolers kept challenging those paces at different times, and I just couldn't help being competitive. The 1:45 really did me in. Bailed on the final two and join the hills to get some form and quad work in,

I FINALLY got my friend Cory to make it out to track. Ideally he will come every Tuesday. Now if only I can convince Tyler to join we'd have something going... Drew is understandbly focused on doing marathon specific stuff, so I am trying to stop being lazy with my workouts as they're mostly solo. We'll see.

PM: 11 miles in the sun. Gotta work that tan...

AM: track workout in Safety Harbor with RunVie. Workout was intended to be something Dan called a "flush out." No idea what the hell that means, but he's been doing track forever...

1200, 2x400, 800, 3x200, 600, 4x200, with 400 active recovery between long items, 200 between short items, descending speed starting at 10k pace, then 5k, then 3k, then mile pace.

My paces started at 5:30 per mile and then dropped eventually to 4:20 or so. Just not useful speeds overall, as my fitness can't match those in a correct workout. Still entirely too much rest in between items, so I just kept jogging extra which is just giving too much recovery... Enough to turn an 8.25 mile intended workout into 9 miles... Next week I plan on just keeping the correct speed for a longer time and then returning to the group to get the same "time-spent-working-hard" benefit I'm clearly cheating myself out of. I'm disappointed I wasted this workout, but hopefully, finally, learned something from it.

No running today.  Helped a friend move.  

AM: solo run. Need new shoes.