Everything Counts

10.44 miles at a moderate pace.  I ran an out and back on the base perimeter road.  The legs actually felt pretty decent considering the downhill 20-miler we did on Saturday.  Hopefully that means I've trained my quads well in preparation for the pounding at St. George in two weeks.

9.18 miles easy.  I ran out the North Base Loop and added on a bit at the top.  I ran a bit faster than normal for an easy run, but I think that has to do with running in the evening as opposed to the morning.

INTERVALS

Intervals around the base pond loop.  This loop is just over a mile long and one half is very hilly and the other half is very flat.  I started with mile repeats, doing the hillly half as the first half of the repeat.  The first half was consistently 5 seconds slower than the second half.  After four mile repeats I finished up with 4 half mile repeats on the flat side of the pond. 

Mile repeats (1:15 rest in between): 5:00, 5:03, 5:04, 5:06

3 minutes rest

Half-mile repeats (1:15 rest in between): 2:24, 2:25, 2:24, 2:21

The toughest part of the workout was the low rest in between repeats.  I wanted to run at 5:08 pace with 1:00 rest, but after I started quickly I changed it to 1:15 rest and shot for 5:04-ish.

PROGRESSIVE TEMPO

I ran a 4-mile progressive tempo.  I didn't plan it this way, but it ended up being one mile at tinman pace, one mile at goal marathon, one mile at half marathon, and one mile at goal 5k.  So, although I didn't plan that I thought it was cool it turned out that way.  Here were the splits: 5:55 5:31 5:09 4:53

6.14 miles easy out and back on the base perimeter road. 

I'm doing a 5k run tomorrow with Ben up in Pleasant View at 7:30 in the first annual St. George tune-up 5k (so far a race consisting of just Ben and me).  If anyone wants to make the trek up this way to join us, let me know.

The first annual St George Tune-up 5k in Pleasant View.  Ben and I set up a race environment this morning to get a tune up in for St. George.  Bryant Jensen and Jon Heslop both joined us in the race as well.  Ben even made race tee shirts!  Nice. 

We ran the Pleasant View Days 5k course and though not in an official race setting, we simulated a race as best as possible.  We met up at the finish line and ran the course backwards to ensure we knew exactly where 3.1 miles was and where to start.  The course is aided, though almost all the aid comes from 1.1 to 1.6 miles. 

My goal for the race this morning was to attempt an assault on sub-15 minutes.  With an aided course I thought that should be obtainable, even if it would take a solid effort.  Yesterday when trying to talk Scott Keate into running with us I told him I was shooting for sub-15 and he said, "Bless you my son".  Well Scott thanks for that blessing it worked!

I got out very quickly and ran solo the whole way.  First mile is very slight uphill with a couple of dips (quick, steep down and then right back up) on a canal dirt road.  I came through mile on in 4:51.

Now I knew I needed to bank some time on the downhill section in mile two so I kept pushing it. Mile 2 was 4:39.

I wanted to know my time at 2.1, because I knew I needed 10:00 or under so I could run 5:00 on the last mile and still get under 15:00.  I was about 9:58 or so I think at 2.1 so I was right on track and feeling pretty good.

Then I hit the uphill in mile 3 (it's about 200 meters long) and started breathing a bit harder, but I knew that I had a good .6 of flat after the hill and then the last quarter mile was downhill for a finish.  Mile 3 was 4:56 and 27 seconds for last .1

14:55!  I was very pleased with the result and feel like I'm ready for next week!  Bryant was second in 15:38, Ben 15:48, and Jon 16:08.  I laughed at the start when I realized that this was likely the most competitive race in the state today.  It was good times.  Great race, great organization, and great shirts.  And it was free!  We'll have to get more of you out for this next year!