Running streak

Monday, April 30, 2012

Another streak extender...need to actually get a run in sometime as it has been about a week straight of streak extension runs only. Perhaps tomorrow, though it will require me to feel a bit better -- think the late nights/early mornings have caught up to me.

A streak extending effort that was perhaps as efficient as a single run can be. As I spent all day and night participating in wedding related activities with family and friends the only opportunity I could create to run was to leave the after party for a while, get in my run and return. It worked out rather well and basically gave me a day off. Wondering how often I will do this two for one type run...it seems like a good idea, except that I have to a) not run first thing in the morning as I prefer to do and b) be awake well past a time I would consider to be a preferred bed time for myself.

A streak extender and nothing else, though it was a nice enough short easy run...running after dinner as others are preparing for bed, when it is after your normal bedtime is just that.
First run in new pair of shoes -- logged 430 miles in previous pair, which fell apart during the last week. New shoes seem a bit loose, but they were on sale so I will run at least 350 miles in them before moving on.

A quick streak extender -- as is often the case when I travel within the U.S.A. I failed to look at any weather forecasts before beginning my trip. Running fastish helped me tolerate the chilly temperature and additionally finish my 2.8 miles faster than I most probably would have. Sure, I could've just run on the treadmill, but then, per previous promise to faithful reader and 2012 LMI Champion, JEC, I may have needed to run further or longer, neither of which I was eager to do this morning. Anyway, happy enough with this run, probably mostly because it is now done.

Suprisingly slow pace, felt quicker, though not quick...hmmm, maybe the especially early start had some effect...or should I say affect?

A very small volume of interval work today -- I call this work out the "Terrible 2's." I do slow warm up jogging for about 10 minutes and then go hard for 2 minutes followed by easy for two minutes and repeat etc. Today, as I am just starting to try to run with any speed to speak of, I decided I would do 5 terrible two's. They were hard as I expected, but not too horrible. I was probably too conservative with them, which I didn't feel bad about since it was my first time doing them in years. Here's how they played out from a distance covered perspective:

Adding the warm up and short cool down results in the overall mileage. The interval figures (or "Terrible 2's") equate to roughly 6 minute per mile pace during the hard two minutes and 9 minutes per mile during the easier two minutes -- per my Garmin 305 watch there was some fluctuation in pace, but at such short distance/duration those were not enough to have much affect on the distances covered as you can deduce from reviewing figures above. I will need to greatly increase my speed during the hard minutes and ideally also during the easy minutes I guess, but we'll have to see how that goes after monitoring perhaps monthly or so.
Yes, I should have run hills this morning instead, but I piddled around for too long after waking up and as a result only had time to do the above, which I've wanted to be able to convince myself to do for a while, so I guess it is better than nothing...and extended the streak, of course.

Tried to make up for the fact that I didn't run slow yesterday by concentrating on running slow today -- probably doesn't work that way, but whatever, I ran slow today, it was fine. A streak extender.