Week 6, Part 1

As I mentioned, this was the REAL start of marathon training, the first week that involves tempos and intervals.

Day 1 - 12x400 (8 miles, total)
On Monday night, I ran 12 x 400m with 400m rest intervals. With warm-up and cool-down, that's 8 miles. The goal for the 400s was 2:08. I never hit that, but I enjoyed trying. It's a good pace - I didn't feel like I had to go insane, but that the pace was well within my reach, I just had to work hard. I kept chanting in my head: "stay within yourself." I don't know why, but it seemed to work. It felt like a little game, trying to hit the right pace, which really helped me mentally, because that was a friggin' long workout! SO long that I got to the track before my running group, did my warm-up, headed to the lake path to do my intervals just as they were arriving, and they were all gone by the time I got back! (I'm doing the lake, because my adductors don't like the repetitive tight turns on the track. Also...32 laps of the track? Ugh.) Oh! And I did it with just my Garmin - no music or podcasts to distract me!

My intervals: 1:59 (oops...I had no idea how easy or hard my pace was supposed to be), 2:10, 2:05, 2:05, 2:07, 2:09, 2:00 (oops again), 2:05, 2:06, 2:05, 2:03, 2:05. Apparently 2:05 is my sweet spot.

And, can I just note that setting up my workouts on the Garmin is awesome? I did those intervals manually, but have already done the rest in the Garmin software. I have a magically thingee that sends workouts to my watch wirelessly and so BOOM, five minutes later, I have everything ready. I loved that it kept track of .25 mile repeats for me, although I think I did this by setting the autolap to .25 miles. The new ones that I did in Garmin land on the computer will be a bit more sophisticated. I also used a workout for my tempo run - I had it set for a 1 mile warm-up at between 11-11:20 pace (so it yelled at me to slow down), 5 miles at 10:10-10:20 pace, then 1 mile with no target pace. I LOVED that it counted down how much longer you had in the interval and your average pace for that interval. Oh, 610. Now, if I could just get that last pin in from the fabric strap, you'd be perfect. Leaving it hanging halfway out is bound to cause problems at some point.

Day 2 - REST
Except that I went to the gym for a training session. Tabata workouts were designed as instruments of torture, weren't they? Surprisingly, I was super sore afterwards. Perhaps my devotion to epsom salt baths is a contributing factor?

Day 3 - 5 mile tempo (7 total)
This one definitely felt hard. I finally figured out how to set up a workout so my watch could yell at me when I was going to fast during the warm-up and too slow or too fast during the tempo. Had to stop for tummy issues again, but it wasn't as bad as other runs have been. I'm wondering if cutting out my morning coffee on days when I have to run right after work is a good idea? That seems to be helping.

According to my Garmin, I did the warm-up and cool-down at 11:01 and 11:15, respectively and the tempo at 10:09 (goal was 10:18). I'll take that. I also learned a great deal about Japanese running, courtesy of Marathon Talk, and raced a train. I won! But only because the train stopped. But, this was definitely a hard run. It's supposed to be. That's ok.

Day 4 - 4 miles easy
My Garmin's downstairs. I don't want to get it. I ran 4 miles, wiped down with a baby wipe, took the Light Rail to the airport, then flew to Los Angeles to see my dear, dear friend Juliet. No one looked at me like I smelled funny, so I'm counting that as a win.

I'll write up the rest of the week separately, because they were super fun! LA running!