Tonight was the first tempo work for the season. I took my running to the track at Cal Poly since the combination of the track and tempo has always been a mental block for me, what better way to face my trepidation than to face it head on? Seeing my running group, the San Luis Distance Club, at the same time, also motivates me.
I warmed up for a nice mile, running easy at a 9:58 min/mile pace. After the mile, I took some time to stretch. It's important to stretch after the body has had time to warm up thus, avoiding injury. I do this especially before speed work or any kind of fast running. I hit the quads, the hammies, calves, glutes, lower back, ankles and arms. After that I joined the rest of the running group where we ran a lap before doing some form drills, high knees, butt kicks, Carioca, grapevine, then finished off with 100 meters strides. Then the tempo was underway.
My goal tonight was to do a total of 10 minutes tempo. That equates to 2:00 minutes per lap x 5 laps. I concentrated on the pace without looking at my Garmin. I kept my focus. As I was running I was very aware of the feeling that my pace was manageable. I still felt that uncomfortable push--that threshold between "I-want-to-stop" feeling to "one-more-lap" feeling. For the first time, I felt I can finish the final lap strong. Not sure if I am making any sense. I felt good running in the moment and not thinking about "when is this uncomfortable push going to stop?" That's the best way I can describe it. The best part is, I finished the 5 laps in under 10 minutes. I finished in 9:35, which is a 7:42 min/mile pace. Very satisfied with that. This should have been the end of my workout. I went for another mile at 8:06 pace, ran a lap recovery, another 800 at 7:44 pace, and finally, cooled down 1/2 mile
at 9:59 pace.I felt that tonight was a good quality workout.
Tomorrow is an easy, recovery run. Looking forward to that.
Happy running!
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