TexasLindsey

8.2 miles at 4:45am.  Weather=66F, 48% humidity, 49 dew point, 3 mph wind, dark.  Average pace=8:52/m.

mile 1- 10:21

mile 2- 8:49

mile 3- 8:27

mile 4- 8:15

mile 5- 8:36

mile 6- 8:39

mile 7- 9:00

mile 8- 8:55

final .2 pace- 8:00

First mile to corner to meet Ashley and Tim.  My body did not want to run faster than 10:00 miles at first.  After a couple miles I started feeling better with the pace.  Mile 6 was uphill and we saw a skunk on the sidewalk right next to us.  Ashley and I screamed and jumped into the street.  It was kinda funny.  Tim was like, "Don't scream!"

Ashley and Tim left after mile 6.  I ran the rest on my own. 

4.8 miles at 10:30 am.  Weather=85F, 43% humidity, 7mph wind, sunny. 

Ran a 2.4 mile loop twice at the park by my sister's house. Took a brief water break in between each loop.  It was HOT!  There was zero shade.  I was also miserable because I ate too much breakfast before running.  I was going to do another loop but I kinda sick.  Note to self: Don't eat a bunch of eggs before running!!

Loop 1 - 20:25 (mile 1- 8:39, mile 2- 8:21, final .4 pace- 8:16)

Loop 2- 20:12 (mile 1- 8:56, mile 2- 8:27, final .4 pace- 6:45)

Tomorrow morning I'm meeting Tim for 12 miles.   

12.3 miles at 4:45 am.  Weather=71F, 49% humidity, 51 dew point, 5 mph wind, dark.  Average pace=8:42/m.

mile 1- 10:56

mile 2- 8:42

mile 3- 8:32

mile 4- 8:15

mile 5- 8:54

mile 6- 8:34

mile 7- 8:15

mile 8- 8:47

mile 9- 8:19

mile 10- 8:15

mile 11- 8:29

mile 12- 8:35

final .3 pace- 9:23

Ran first mile to corner to meet Tim and Ashley.  Ashley ran with us mile 2-6 miles.  The first couple miles running with them I did not feel like going that fast.  The effort felt like sub-8's even though it wasn't even close! I started feeling more ok with the pace after mile 3.   I took 3 gu's: one before the run, one after mile 4 and one after mile 7.  There were many hills which is why the paces were all over the place.  I think we actually were going fastest on the uphills and taking the downhills easier. 

I'm feeling pretty good right now.  I have run 12 miles, watered the yard, made myself a protein shake, took a shower and did my running log.... and my kids still haven't woken up yet!  Very productive morning!   I wish I had time for a nap now but I bet they'll be waking up soon.

Track workout with my running group at 6:30pm. Weather= 98F

I tried out my new track spikes today. Made it two laps in the warm up before they aggrevated my plantar faciatis so I took them off. My left quad was also bothering me. I think wearing the spikes made me run the warm-up too fast too. I think it was like 7:45 or 8:00. Ashley and I were having fun though.

So then we talked to our coach, Gary Anderson. He's so knowledgeable! He's a sub-3:00 marathoner at 50 years old. He's always winning 1st place masters in all the races around here. He got into running about 10 years ago but before that he played soccer. He gave me alot of great advice and he said if I send him my training log and recent race stats, he'll give me some suggestions for workouts. He thinks varying your milage and pace everyday will make you faster. He runs everyday averaging 85 miles a week with 3-4 days being faster paced and the rest slow and easy. However, he says you can't run more than you have time to recover for. It will do you no good to run a bunch of miles if you can't get enough sleep. He really knows his stuff!

So Gary told Ashley and I since it was our first track workout in over a year that we should run laps and do the straight aways at 5K pace and easy run the corners. We were supposed to do it for 15 minutes.

I don't think I was doing it right. I think I was running too fast. I was doing the straight parts at 6:00 pace or faster. I only made it 11 minutes before I quit. Yeah, I quit. I was feeling so lazy. My quad was also bugging me. Then I ran a mile cool down at 8:30 pace.

Everyone else was doing Yasso-800's. I think I would have liked doing that instead. Oh well, next week maybe I'll be more motivated.

When I got home from track, I walked into chaos. I remember why I run in the mornings now. My husband seems to only be able to play with the kids when he babysits. He can't feed them, wash them, clothe them, brush their teeth and otherwise get them ready for bed unless I am here to tell him what to do. Why? It's the same every single night. So we didn't start all this stuff until I got home. We got them down about 9:15 am (about an hour late).

People always ask me when I'll go back to work. Frankly, I'm in no hurry because my husband wants to have the responsibilities of a teenager... aka, take the trash out -- when asked. He will only remember when asked!

5.5 miles at 5:30am. Weather=74F, 25% humidity, 17mph wind, dark.

mile 1- 11:00

mile 2- 8:59

mile 3- 8:36

mile 4- 8:39

mile 5- 8:21

mile 6- 10:04

So I ran to the corner 1 mile to meet Tim and Ash. Did not feel like running. I wanted to sleep so bad! Got to bed late because of track last night. I would have run the whole thing at 10:00 pace if it were up to me.

When I got home, I took a nap. My 4 year old rooster boy woke me up 45 minutes later, "Mommy, it's wake time".

Tomorrow I'm running 15 with the group. I'm going to try to go 8:00 miles until the half way point and then speed up and get down to 7:30's the second half. We will see though, sometimes the plan changes based on what other people want to do. If someone starts out 7:45's, I'll probably keep up cuz I can't help myself.

I did 7:45 average last weeks 14 miler and I did 7:34 average for the last 15 miler. My marathon goal pace is 7:50/m. I'm being told that it is not good strategy for me to run these long runs at marathon goal pace.

I know it seems backwards, but I run slower all week than I do on Saturday long runs. It's like my long runs are also my tempos. I enjoy it this way because I'm motivated to run fast when I'm around other people on the trails.

14.3 miles with my group at 6:30am.  Weather=AWESOME!!!  58F, 44% humidity, 6mph wind, sunny.  Average pace=7:40/m.

mile 1- 8:38

mile 2- 7:44

mile 3- 7:47

mile 4- 7:44

mile 5- 7:43

mile 6- 7:40

mile 7- 8:14 (I think I forgot to stop my watch when we stopped here cuz I know we weren't doing over 8:00)

mile 8- 7:41

mile 9- 7:19

mile 10- 6:57

mile 11- 7:04

mile 12- 7:31

mile 13- 7:51

mile 13.7 pace- 7:56

mile 14.3 pace - 7:12

This was the best run I've had in a long time.  I dedicate this run to 5-finger socks.  I didn't feel my feet at all the whole run.  ZERO BLISTERS!!  Normally, I have to endure the feeling of needles jabbing into my feet on long runs.  Not today and it was awesome!  

Also awesome was my new Nike Pegasus shoes which were light weight and felt great!  Oh and the weather today!!   Heaven!  Amazing.  Perfect. 

I talked to Jody before starting today and she and I agreed a good plan would be to run 8:00 pace until the turn around and then get faster.  Well, that was the plan.   We started running with Emily and somehow we ended up in front of everyone in the beginning.  Emily left after only 2 miles because she is just coming back from injury.  At this point Jody and I decided to slow down.  We didn't.  So much for our plan. 

At the water stop the rest of the girls caught up and started running with us.  Elise, Melissa, Jody and I continued the 7:45's.  I started feeling really, really great with the pace at mile 4-5.  I felt like I could do this all day.  Then at the turn around I put both my ipod headphones in and just started going fast.  Melissa kept up.  I ran miles 9 and 10 with Melissa.  We were really pushing each other faster and faster.  I didn't look at my watch but at the water stop she told me we were doing 7:00.  I felt great though.  I was amazed at how much energy I had.  I wish I knew what I did so right this week so I can repeat it every week!

At mile 9.5 water stop Jody and Elise caught up and we all decided we would run fast until the next water stop and then we'd do a cool down final 3 miles.  Sounded good to me.  So from 9.5 to 11.5 I ran about 7:00 pace.  At this point I was starting to get tired.  I forgot to gu at the last stop.  Good thing we're slowing down.

We ran slow from 11.5 until 13.5.  Amazing how 7:50 pace felt really easy now whereas at the beginning of the run it felt hard.  So at 13.5 mile I saw that I had about 1/2 mile left to the store and I decided to just let her rip for the remainder.  Lady GaGa came on my ipod at this exact moment so I figured it was meant to be.  I pushed my lap reset button at this point so I would know how fast I did it.  Ended up being 7:12 pace. 

Jody, Elise and Melissa didn't go fast at the end but they ran an additional .7 mile so they would have exactly 15 today.  

It was a great run!  I was so excited to have felt this great.  I really need to strategize my long runs better though.  I'm running these things without a plan.  I might be going too fast if my goal marathon time is 3:25 (7:50/m pace).  Or I might be underestimating what my goal marathon time should be... maybe I should aim for a faster time?   Maybe I'm getting too cocky.   Ha, ha!   I mentioned this to my friend, Greg, after the run today and he suggested that I run a 1/2 marathon race as fast as I can in a couple weeks to see where I'm at.  I think that's a good plan.