Mile Repeats

I decided to run on the treadmill before work this morning, since today's heat index is in triple digits Fahrenheit, and I usually prefer to exercise in the morning anyway. My plan was to "get some running in," but it turned into mile repeats! This happened mostly because I had to go to the bathroom, but wanted to see how long I could last before I really had to stop and run to the ladies locker room! Maybe this is TMI, but it's how it happened to work out today. In retrospect, I'm glad I did it, and I can tell it was a good workout, more for endurance than speed this time, really. I did two mile repeats, which was plenty for my first time, especially since I ran without walk intervals for both! I've been feeling it for the rest of the day, in some overall tiredness. A good workout overall, though. In the near future, I think I'll try some shorter distance intervals (quarter and half miles) to change things around and work on my speed.

0.52 mile walk (warmup) in 10:05 (19:23 avg pace)
1 mile run in 17:24
1 mile run in 17:03

The second one was faster than last week's 17:22 Magic Mile outdoors, which reminds me how much easier it is for me to run on the treadmill in an air conditioned gym! Ah, well!

My upper body is sore from yesterday's strength training,

Negative Splits Today!

This morning, I ran on the American Tobacco Trail again, and decided to take it easy, since I had a couple of challenging runs over the weekend, and have an 18-miler coming up on Saturday. I changed my run/walk ratio back to 1/1, with the option of running longer if I felt like it.

I ended up running 3.26 miles in 55:01 minutes, with negative splits on the miles! I was hoping for that, and worked on it a bit without doing the math in my head. I did do some extra running, and also did 4 fartleks, using different things (signs, trees, benches) as marks along the trail.

Mile
1 17:09
2 16:50
3 16:38
.26 4:23

It was a good run overall, though I'm still a little tired from the weekend running, and my knee is still feeling tender from last Thursday's spill in the state park. While the pace could've been faster, I am encouraged by the negative splits. With a distance PR coming up this weekend, I'm kinda in endurance mode this week, so I plan to get some extra rest and take care of my knee.

Tackling the Hills of Umstead State Park

This morning's run was my first intentional mid-week hill workout, and it was an interesting one! I returned to Umstead State Park today, and instead of running the paved area this morning, I decided to shoot for the trails this morning. I missed the turnoff for the trails, but got a really good workout on the dirt and gravel roads instead.

I kept Tuesday's setting on the Gymboss pace timer to signal 2 minutes of running and 1 minute of walking. There were times when I was tempting to keep running after 2 minutes, but since this was my first mid-week hill workout, I decided to see how this worked out.

The temperature outside seemed a little bit cooler than earlier in the week. It was still plenty hot, but just a tad more pleasant. Of course, the area where I was running had plenty of trees, so I'm sure that helped. Umstead is such a pretty place to run! I saw a deer in the woods today--nice! There were a few other runners and bikers out this morning, and I enjoyed the company.

I tried out my new iPod armband this morning, and it worked pretty well! It was nice to have my hands free from carrying things. The only downside of my morning run was that once, while I was fiddling with the iPod on my upper arm, I tripped and fell! Ouch! My left knee got pretty scraped up, but otherwise I was okay. A park ranger happened to come into view just after I fell, so he stopped to check on me just as I got up. I was sooo close that I wanted to make it to my car, so I assured him I was fine. By the time I got back to my car (continuing my run/walk ratio), the blood had streamed all the way down to my sock! Charming. Thankfully, I had a clean towel in my trunk, so I was able to clean up a bit. I cleaned up the wound after I got home, and my knee doesn't seem to be too much worse for the wear, other than the scrapes. I'll probably ice it after work, though, just to be on the safe side.

My average pace per mile was 17:14, pretty slow, but faster than some of my other mid-week runs this summer. I was a little tentative, not knowing how my body was going to react, and then, of course, there was the fall. (I've learned how to make my Garmin Forerunner stop automatically when I do, so that feature came in handy!) As I write this, I'm feeling a little stiff (mostly in the knee that I fell on), but I feel like I could've given a little more out there. Now I know.

I ended up run/walking 3.48 miles in 60 minutes.

Mile Splits:
1) 17:25
2) 16:38 (Better pace there! Wonder why.)
3) 17:44 (the mile in which I fell)
Last 0.48 of a mile in 8:13 (On target to be my second best mile)

I think my overall training plan will include three runs--one speed workout, one hill workout, and then the weekend long run, and crosstraining on most other days, with a rest/easy day on the day before my long run (which usually falls on Saturday). I may do an easy run on a crosstraining day sometimes. I'll see how it all goes, and tweak things along the way. I'm so eager to improve my speed and endurance! (To do that, I need to stay healthy too!)