Archive for March 25th, 2009

Yesterday was a little goofy in that I had hill repeats scheduled, six 2-min ones, which meant I couldn’t do them on my closest hill, because it’s not long enough.

I don’t know if you remember the hill I used for marathon training, dubbed Smile Hill because I used it for mile repeats and kept calling it “that stupid mile hill” which eventually morphed into Smile Hill, but anyway, it’s 4.5 miles from my house – not a problem when you’re marathon training and your repeats are focused on downhill running at marathon pace.  But when the repeats are uphill at 5K effort, a 4.5-mile slog home seems like unnecessary torture.

So I drove to my run, which felt really silly since I parked in a spot I run by daily, but I was glad to have done it.  I ran 4 miles warmup, did the repeats which came out to 3 miles worth and then ran 2 miles back to my car, so 9 miles total.

It was funny because there was this lone crossing guard standing on the sidewalk whom I passed on the way up and down each time.  She was cute, made small talk on my trips down, “how many do you have to do?”  “did you make it to the top?” “tired yet?”  I think she knew not to chat on my way up though, my face one ugly determined grimace fighting against a constant wind.

Much improved pacing this time – when I did 8×1-min repeats @5K effort a couple weeks ago, I started with a 7:31 and by the 8th one could only eek out an 8:46, and if you recall I was so embarrassed by my shitty pacing I kept it from you.  This time I ran the ups in the low 8:00s so they didn’t veer much at all, but I got a solid workout and felt great afterwards.

Today I have 11 easy, or as easy as will be after having consumed vodka shots and wine last night.  We went with friends to a Russian restaurant, a BYOB, which makes getting drunk that much more convenient.  Feeling pretty good actually, considering I was on the verge of puking last night.

Looking ahead, the rest of the week looks downright luxurious with no races on the immediate schedule.  I’ve got 7 easy tomorrow, then Friday it’s 9 w/5 tempo at goal Half pace (ooh, time to decide on race pace), Saturday 7 easy, finishing with a 16-miler on Sunday that includes 15x(90sec.@10k pace w/90 sec recoveries).

Onward and outward, looks like a wonderful 55 degrees out there, just right for a fragile boozer such as myself.