TexasLindsey

Today's run was awesome!!  It's runs like today that make me LOVE running!  I ran 12 miles all between 8:00 and 8:45 pace (which is really fast for me).   The route included a very steep hill.  I plugged it into www.mapmyrun.com to see what the elevation was.  It was about 1/2 mile long hill that went up 250 feet.  The grade was 8%.   It was a tough hill...   But last year, I thought it was alot tougher.  Today I did the mile that included that hill in 9:45.  My legs felt strong the whole run.  Even the hill didn't wear them out.  I must say I am really impressed with myself.  My best race before I got prego last year was a 20K (12.4 miles), in which I ran 8:34 per mile... today, I did almost as good as that and I felt great!  I can't wait to see how I do at the half marathon in a couple weeks. 

I did all this while running all by myself and without an ipod (it broke today)!  There was no one running my pace in the group today.  There were a couple girls doing 7:45 miles and a group of 4 guys who were running 7:00 or 7:30 miles... and then the next fastest was the 10 minute group.  I was in between.  I kept doing a slinky thing with the guys.  They were taking longer at the water stops because there were 4 of them so I'd catch up with them there... then we'd start out again and I'd fall behind and catch up with them 2 miles later at the next water.  

The advice I got from Sasha's article about increasing my daily miles and frequency has made a tremendous difference!  I can't believe how much faster I am now.  During the week I just run easy 6-8 milers everyday.  Then I show up on Saturday long runs with my group and run faster and faster. 

Splits:

8:41

8:52

8:50

8:40

8:29

8:45

9:45 (included the HUGE hill)

8:23

8:10

8:44

8:40

8:13