Sleeping in is a double edged sword...I had a wonderful rest and enjoyed being lazy, but then the day was slipping away and I wanted less and less to get out and run. Fine...lets just buckle down and do it. Kids home from school and I have an extra kid as well (watching one for my neighbor who is out of town), so I waited until after lunch when I could put baby down for a nap and my daughter could supervise the others while I ran on the outside TM :) Decided to do speed work today and Wednesday, I was scared...I don't like the outdoor TM for speed work. I was going to fail, too much wind and the street I run up and down is relatively flat, but is like a V - I live at the top and the end is at the top. So, it is downhill into the wind then uphill into the wind turn and you get downhill with the wind at your back and uphill with the wind at your back. Because I did a 1/2 mile recovery it would switch if I got to finish into the wind or not. Either way, it was harder than the track at the rec center! I just had to remind myself - what doesn't kill me makes me stronger and you can't control the weather on race day. Just do it and stop whining! 1 warm up mile: 8:58 5 X 1 mile repeats: 7:07; 7:14; 7:30; 7:25; 7:25. all the repeats had a 1/2 mile recovery in between that I ran about 8:30-9:00. AP: 8:02 I was running late to pick up the brother of the extra kid I had from the airport (he was visiting his dad in Vegas), so I kept trying to talk myself into doing just 3 or 4 repeats. No one would know, you have a good excuse. But, then I thought "you're only cheating yourself!" The people on the blog don't care if you even DO your speed work. They'd be just as supportive if you went out for a 2 mile shake out run. No one is going to judge you - if you want this then YOU DO IT! No one can do the work for you and you can't cheat it. Your performance doesn't lie. Plus, I heard a quote that said something to the effect that quitting is the easy part - anyone can do that; it is sticking with it and getting through the hard part that makes you resilient. Okay. I CAN and WILL do this. Didn't have time for my last cool down mile, but I got all 5 speed work miles in!
After the first two repeats coming in low again, I debated...I was tired and felt like I was sprinting. It was NOT comfortably hard, it was hard and my breathing showed it (or maybe it's that I'm carrying around 20 extra pounds from Easter weekend!). I wanted to do a mile comfortably hard and keep my breathing under control and see how the numbers came in. Well, that was my 7:30. Right on the money. THAT gave me confidence as well. I can do my speed work comfortably hard and hit the pace I'm aiming for. This is probably better in the long run anyway. I can go faster, but shouldn't I be aiming for the pace I'm shooting for and keeping things more comfortable? Or do you go faster if you can and hope your speed work translates to a faster race? Hmmm, maybe a question for someone with more knowledge than I.
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