Ran with Eric and George in the morning. George had already run some, so we dropped him off early. Did a "bio break" acceleration at marathon pace. Then took Eric on his tempo run. He set a record for the Slate Canyon Loop (2.11) (14:28). Dropped him off, put on ankle weights, did 45s slow/15s fast for a mile in 6:57. Cheated and started the fast part early (with 100 to go) to be sub-7:00. Last 100 in 18 seconds. Took off ankle weights, and ran a tempo Slate Canyon loop in 12:25. The pace felt abnormally good even on the uphill section until I hit some headwind. Afterwards, even after I turned and there was no noticable headwind, the pace stopped feeling abnormally good. This led me to some thinking. I've had two races this year in which I underperformed relative to competition - Moab half-marathon, and the BYU Robison Invitational 5000 meters. Both had signficant headwind. Of course, you should expect to run slower with headwind, but I slowed down more than the peer group of consistent runners I am tracking. There is clearly a weakness. I do not have any reliable historical data of running into a headwind for myself, so I cannot tell at this point if this problem has been around for a while, or if it something new. My current working theory is that the weakness is in my ability to regain rhythm after a break when fatigue sets in - I have noticed it could take me as long as half a mile to get back to normal speed when I am fatigued after a 180 turn. Sometimes it happens when I am even not that fatigued. This could have something to do with my threshold being very close to my VO2 Max. One thing I know is that takes a lot of mental focus for me to run even a quarter at my threshold pace. I remember feeling very confused about how to run in both of those high wind races. Later in the morning ran 2 miles with Benjamin and Jennifer. They both are going to race in the Harrington Memorial 5 K in American Fork on the Memorial Day (May 29). This will be Jennifer's first 5 K. Initially, I did not want her to run it, but she has my genes - a persistent red head. With Sarah being pregnant and Jennifer's "monster" speed, Jennifer's participation gave us a challenge to find her a pacer since I'll be tied up with Bejamin. Fortunately, George agreed. Since Jennifer had never run more than 1.5 miles at once before, I was a little concerned about her ability to run a 5 K, and decided to give her a practice 2 mile run today. She did a lot better than I expected. Her assignment was to run the first mile in 10:00, and then try to accelerate on the second mile if she felt good. She ran the first one in 9:33, and the second in 8:49, with the last 400 in 2:00, and last 200 in 56. With the ankle weights, and pushing Julia in the stroller, I started feeling something during her kick myself. Wore the ankle weights the whole day, and did always on the run. Total of 13.2 miles for the day. | 