In a recent post the guy I will be running Boston with, Keith, referred to my use of the word partners, in terms of our running, as squishy. With that in mind, I will refer to the guy I run with, Gary, as a colleague as opposed to a partner.
Gary, my running colleague, took me on a long run Saturday on a route he has found/created. It was my first good strong long run (17 miles) as I train for Boston and I kind of just followed Gary's lead and let him take me where he saw fit. The route was sadistic in nature with a couple of extremely large hills. Tough enough that one would think it was Gary and not myself who is training for Boston. For this I am eternally grateful. While I was cursing him during the run - in particular the last 4 miles or so, I know that such a run will pay great dividends come race day.
The rest of my week wasn't bad either:
I ran a nice easy 9 miles on Monday.
I ran 8 miles on Wednesday and in anticipation of increasing the speed in my workouts in coming weeks, threw in a half dozen accelerations of 30 each in which I got up to a 5:55 per mile pace. The rest of the run was completed at an easy pace.
On Friday, I ran 7 miles and, as I am gradually increasing my pace, threw in 4 miles at about a 7:30 min / mile pace. Slower than I want to be, however, I feel that it is prudent to gradually ramp up my tempo to the 6:30 to 6:50 range. That said, seeing that my virtual colleague is already sticking in some 6:30 stuff is a little disconcerting. I just have to remember to stick to the plan... my plan.
Finally, yesterday I ran a nice recovery run of 5 miles at about 8:40 min / mile pace - nice and slow to work out any kinks Gary may have created on his sadistic route. Feel great today, so hopefully it is all working its way into shape.
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2 comments:
Dude, you definitely want this badly! We're in different leagues altogether. I hope to do a 6:50 pace for (gasp!) 2 miles this summer! But you have a great plan, so knock 'em out!
Impressive numbers, comrade. (I like "comrade" in this context. I guess we'll see in April who's the Putin and who's the Medvedev. IOW, who's the top and who's the, ahem, finisher.)
Keep up the good work!
BTW, do you have Gary's address? I may want to send him a package in early April.
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