Very encouraging tempo run tonight. If this holds up, I should be blastin' Saturday morning. Warmed up for a mile and a half, then set up at what I hoped would be slightly faster than HMP speed. Five laps around the park. First lap at 7:29 pace. Close to what I wanted, but felt pretty good, so picked it up a bit more. Second lap 7:18, although I didn't know that exactly. Decided to try to maintain that one. Slipped just a tad on lap 3, to 7:21, although didn't know that exactly either. Lap 4, picked it up to 7:18. It occurred to me that I might be threatening my 5K PR on a tempo run! Decided to let 'er rip on the last lap, and ran it at 7:11 pace, then added another tenth of a mile for good measure. Wound up with 29:52 for 4.09 miles at pace, a 7:17 average. And laps 2-5 combined, which were slightly more than a 5K, worked out to about 22:40 for the 5K, only 43 seconds over my PR. If I'd been running an all-out 5K tonight, I think I would have gotten the PR. Finished the entire 7 mile run, warmup and cooldown included, in 57 and change.
Noticed something weird last night, in looking at a VDOT chart, which I haven't done in a while. Every single one of my PR times, 5K through marathon, falls between 44 and 45 on the VDOT. I'd say I'm pretty consistent there. Now to find a way to get them all into the 46-47 range. That would be something like 21:20 for the 5K, 44:00 for the 10K, 1:37:30 for the half, and 3:22 for the marathon. | 