I ran on my own this morning because Sasha had to run earlier in the morning, and Mary Ann was running a race. I needed to do a hard long tempo run anyway, so I was probably going to end up running alone regardless. So, I drove to the start of our 5 mile tempo run, and after a 1 mile warm-up in 7:48 I jumped into the tempo. My splits were as follows: 1 - 5:52 - right on goal pace, but the pace throughout the mile was very uneven. 2 - 5:55 - my shins are starting to tighten up and hurt a bit 3 - 5:59 - the shins are hurting pretty bad now and are slowing me down. Hit my first turn-around during this mile
4 - 5:57 - I started focusing on pushing off more from my toes and it helped stretch out my shins 5 - 5:53 - 29:36 for 5 miles. In the pace range I wanted, but slightly slower than expected. Second turn-around at the end of this mile
6 - 5:55 - the shins are finally starting to feel normal and I can run without pain 7 - 5:52 - now that I am feeling better the quarter splits are starting to yo-yo as my body is telling me it wants to go faster, and I accidentally would run too fast for one quarter, and then overcompensate and run too slow on the next. This went on for a few miles 8 - 5:50 - I hit the third turn-around during this mile 9 - 5:55 10 - 5:53 - 29:25 for the second 5 miles, 59:01 for 10 miles. fourth turn-around at the 10 mile mark 11 - 5:47 - After 10 miles I was sick and tired of trying to force myself to stay at 5:52 pace, so I just decided to run and not worry about pace anymore 12 - 5:52 13 - 5:47 - 5th turn-around during this mile 14 - 5:51 15 - 5:47 - 6th turn-around at the 15 mile mark. 29:04 for 5 miles, 1:28:05 for 15 miles 16 - 5:47 17 - 5:51 - I purposefully slowed a bit this mile since I knew that at the 17 mile mark I was going to be running all out to the finish. 18 - 5:12 - As soon as I started this mile I took off, and I pushed it hard to the finish. Quarter splits for this mile were 76, 80, 79, 77 with my last turn-around coming half-way through. The 80 second quarter was slowed by some wind, and the turn, while the 77 was probably slightly wind-aided 19 - 5:12 - quarter splits of 79, 77, 79, 77. I was working pretty hard by the time I finished this mile 20 - 5:17 - quarter splits of 81, 79, 79, 78. I lost concentration a bit during the first quarter, otherwise I probably would have run a 5:15 for this mile. I was really hurting by the end of this mile. 15:41 for the last 3 miles, 27:19 for the last 5 miles, 56:23 for the last 10 miles, 1:55:24 for 20 miles So, the results of this tempo were very encouraging. First, it lets me know that I am getting over the fuel issues that I have had in the past, as I did not feel like I was running low on fuel at the end of the tempo. Second, it lets me know that I can run close to my all out 5k pace after running 17 miles averaging 5:52 per mile. I still feel that I have some work to do, as I was hoping to hold 5:12 pace through the finish, but overall I think that the results of this are very positive.
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