dedication, perseverance, self-discipline

4 miles in 33:53.  Still feeling under the weather, so I ran super slow in order to get the miles in but not make myself feel worse.  I did have two brief pick-ups during the run.  One because an unaccompanied dog was running towards me, and another to get across the street before the light turned red.

4 miles in 29:40.  I have been feeling sick for the last few days, so I was happy to feel a little better today, although I am still not completely over it.  I ran a little faster as a result.

5.4 miles in 41:56.  Watch measured the course I ran at 5.31, and the course tool on the blog measured it at 5.42.  I trust the accuracy of the course tool more than I trust the accuracy of the watch.  This makes a difference of about 10 seconds per mile for the average running pace during the run.

5 miles in 38:15.  I ran easy for most of the run, but added a couple pickups during the second half of the run, with the first just being a mild acceleration for about 10 seconds, and the second being a full sprint up a fairly steep hill, lasting 20-30 seconds.

4 miles in 29:23.  My runs the last couple days have been a little faster since I am no longer feeling the effects of being sick last week.

4 miles in 30:20.  I have only been running fast when I feel like it, no planned speedwork since I have just been working on building a base and gaining aerobic fitness again, but I may actually plan a speed session for tomorrow... if I feel like it :).

5.1 miles in 35:06.

During the run I ran 2 x 1 mile hard (0.5 mile recovery between) in 5:55, and 5:49 (recovery in 3:57).  My watch consistently measures distance short, leading me to think that the mile repeats were actually between 1.01 and 1.02 miles.  This would mean that the first repeat would have been between 4:48-4:51, and the second between 5:42-5:45.

It was kind of windy outside, and I had more noticable headwind during the second repeat, so I was surprised when this repeat ended up being faster than the first.  I could also tell during the second repeat that I had not done a workout like this in at least 3.5 years, as my legs felt weak, so I was happy that I was able to speed up, rather than slow down.

On a side note, temperatures were in the low to mid 80's during the run, despite running in the early evening, and I felt dehydrated by the end of the run.

4 miles in 32:35.  I took things pretty easy since I ran harder yesterday.  I didn't feel any soreness, nor did I feel excessively fatigued due to the workout yesterday, so I was happy with that.

5.1 miles in 37:06.  I threw in 4 surges between about 3.5 miles and the finish just to help my legs remember what it is like to run fast, so no more than 5-10 seconds for each stride.  It was pretty windy out today (23 mph when I got home), and I had mostly a tailwind during miles 1-2, and more headwind than tailwind for the last three miles, so I slowed down some as the run progressed (plus I have to run up a hill with an 8% grade in order to get back home!).

5.1 miles in 39:20.  I felt lethargic so I just took thinks easy, and didn't get going much faster than 8:00 pace until that last mile, which I ran in the low 7:00 range.

4 miles in 32:10.  I started to feel some abdominal cramping shortly before 1.5 miles, and I steadily slowed down for the remainder of the run thereafter.  I was a little surprised as I have not dealt with cramps like this in a long time.

On a side note, I emailed my shoe company contact about the problems I have noted regarding the watch I have been using.  We ended up emailing back and forth for a while on Monday.  They are already working on fixes to some of the problems that I have noticed, so I am hopeful that eventually this watch will become much more accurate out of the box than it is currently.

5.1 miles in 36:09.  

I made it to about 4.1 miles in 30:07, then sped up the last bit, running 6:09 pace the rest of the way to the house (6:02 for .98 miles).  My goal was to try and run close to a 6:00 effort, however there is a large hill that averages an 8% grade (assuming that the internet is correct) that lasts for about 0.1 mile which slowed the pace down.  Total elevation gain for the last mile was approximately 50 ft.

4 miles in 30:10.

4 miles in 29:57.

Starting at about 2.25 miles and ending just before the finish of my run, I ran 5 short pick-ups that I am estimating were about .05 each.  I just wanted to get my legs moving fast without putting a lot of stress on my body.  As I get back into shape, I feel like I first need to learn how to sprint again, and after that I can focus on learning how to run fast for an extended period of time.

As things are right now, because my aerobic fitness is still not great I will go anaerobic at moderate speeds, so I feel like I need to increase my general aerobic fitness first before I start running longer tempos, or longer intervals.  This isn't to say that I won't run longer intervals (see last Saturday), but I feel generally like I need to focus more on the short stuff at present.

5.1 miles in about 46:27.

My parents are in town for Enloe's baby blessing (born on Mother's day), so I ran with my dad and my running pace was slower than normal.

5.1 miles in 44:30.

Running with my Dad again before he goes back to AZ this afternoon.

5.1 miles in 37:46.

The kids were doing "mileage club" at school where they would run during recess once or twice a week, and then get prizes (like a rubber wristband, etc.) for each 5 miles that they ran.  My first grader ended up running 15 miles over the course of a couple months, while my kindergartener ran 13 miles.  Because the kids enjoyed it so much I decided to do something similar at home.  The kids will run a designated route that I set up, and they can run (or walk) as fast or as slow as they want to and they can stop whenever they want to.  Once they fill up their mileage club card I will get them a prize.  I hope that my kids will learn to love running just like I do.

5 miles in approximately 38:50 (not 100% sure on total time because I was messing around with the pause button at the end of my run and it added some time).

I ran 1.5 miles to the track to try and get an idea of where my fitness is at currently.  It was somewhat windy, and I was worried that the wind would adversely affect my workout.  At the track I ran 2 laps with a few strides thrown in to finish my warm-up and then ran an all out 400 (running start, probably running 7:xx pace prior to the start line).  Thankfully, the wind died off just before I got to the track, so I don't think it affected the 400 at all.  I neglected to use the lap button to time the 400, and I didn't catch my exact split, but I think it was somewhere between a high 61 and a 62.  I was really happy about this as it was faster than I thought I could run.  I was worried that I wouldn't even be able to break 70.  In the future I would like to get my 400 down into the 57 second range if possible.

After finishing the 400 I ran 3 laps in about 6:26 as recovery before running an 800.  I wasn't sure how hard I would push this because of how hard the 400 was, plus the wind picked back up again during this repeat (I first noticed it had picked up at around the 150m mark).  I ran the 800 in 2:37 (1:19, 1:18).  My legs still felt dead at the beginning of the repeat, so I just tried to get moving as fast as I could without pushing myself excessively.  During the second lap I started to push myself a little harder, and while I was still not going all out the effort was definitely harder, so I was a little disappointed that I only ran 1:18 for that lap.  I would guess that the wind during the 800 probably cost me 1-1.5 seconds.

Overall, I was pretty happy with how things went.  I would have liked to run the 800 a little faster, but I will take the time I got considering the 400 went much better than expected (and my legs were already fatigued for the 800).

On a side note, my watch did a horrible job of measuring distance for this run.  For a 5 mile run (maybe a little more), the watch measured 4.79 miles, with the online service connected to the watch claiming that I ran 400m in 69, with a half mile in 2:56.  The 2 miles I ran on the track (I added a little to make it at least 2 miles and not 3200m) were measured at 1.89 miles, which is unacceptable in my mind.

4 miles in 32:00.

I kept the run pretty slow throughout since I ran part of my run hard yesterday.

5.1 miles in 37:39

5.1 miles in 36:51.

I was planning on running a little slower than this, but I got excited because there were a lot of people out this morning due to a bike "race" and a 5k run that were both being held on the same trail that I was running on.  I ended up running the 3.13 mile segment around the lake in 21:55 (7:00 mile pace)

5.1 miles in 39:31.

I felt super slow and stiff this morning and I was content to run slow, so I did, running my first mile (downhill) in about 8:30.  My body finally started to wake up about three miles into the run, and I ran the final mile (uphill) in about 7:26.

5.1 miles in 35:42.

I ran 3 x 1/2 mile hard during the run with 1/2 mile recovery between each one.  I used my watch to measure the distance for each repeat, which meant that each repeat was actually longer than 1/2 mile (the watch did an exceptionally poor job of measuring distance today measuring 4.90 miles for the run which then showed up as 4.8 miles in the online service).  Based on the actual distance I ran during my loop around the lake, I estimate that the repeats were actually about 0.52 miles.

I started out a little easier on the first repeat to try and work into the repeats slowly, total time 2:54 (recovery 3:58).  The second repeat felt like I was running into more of a headwind than the first (less tree cover), while I increased the effort a little, total time 2:51 (recovery 4:03).  I pushed myself a lot harder on the final repeat, which had similar wind to the second.  My legs felt dead near the end of this repeat, total time 2:43.

I think this workout highlighted my current lack of true fitness (the fatigue during the third repeat was excessive considering the moderate effort on the first two repeats), but I was happy with how things went, and my legs recovered quickly after the final repeat was finished.  Based on my estimations for distance I would subtract about 7 seconds from each repeat to actually get a half mile time, so 2:47, 2:44, and 2:36.

5.1 miles in 39:09.

I am finding that my achilles is taking longer to warm up at the beginning of my runs than it used to, especially when I run hard the day before.  I don't feel any soreness, and I don't feel particularly fatigued, but the achilles feels tight, and tends to take about a mile or two to get stretched out.  As a result my run started out pretty slow again today and I went through the first quarter mile in close to 9:00 pace, and only ran the first mile in 8:10, even though I was running downhill for most of the second half mile.  During the last quarter mile of the run I did a short pick-up just to get my legs moving a little faster.

5.1 miles in 37:40.

Near the beginning of my run I saw another runner pass in front of me running fairly quickly, so I sped up (it felt awkward as I was not completely warmed up yet) and shadowed him for about a quarter mile just to see how fast he was going.  I timed an approximate quarter mile in 1:29 (probably slightly shorter than a quarter).  My best guess is that he was running between 6:00-6:20 mile pace.  I remember when I used to do all of my easy runs at 6:40 pace or faster.  Oh, to be young and not know the meaning of a recovery run.  I ran the rest of my run at a fairly moderate pace until the last quarter mile when I sped up briefly just to remind my legs what it feels like to run faster.

5.1 miles in 37:34.

I ran 4 x .25 hard during the run, at approximately 2.0, 2.75, 3.75, and 4.85 miles.  I didn't want to run too many repeats since I am still getting in shape, and I also wanted more of a sprinting non-aerobic stimulus from the repeats, thus the long rest.  Since my watch does such a poor job of measuring distance I just ran 1:20 hard and called it a quarter for the first three repeats even though I knew it was a little farther.  For the last repeat I actually ran a quarter as I had previously measured on the course tool where 0.25 miles from my house is.  I ran the final quarter in 1:14 (slowed some by a 90 degree turn near the end as I turn onto the street I live on).  My best guess is that the other quarters were at a similar speed/effort as the last one.  My achilles on my short leg was sore the rest of the evening, making me think that despite my efforts to not overdo things, this workout may have been a little too intense.