After at least salvaging Friday's run, the rest of the weekend was terrible. The plan for the trip was to run the Appalachian Trail for my 8 mile long run. Instead, I was sick in bed all Saturday with stomach cramps. Too bad, because the short part of the trail that we hiked on Sunday seemed pretty nice. It was a drop in elevation too.
I felt much better today, so I headed out for the scheduled interval session. I decided to use the flat Nor-Bath Trail. As it gets closer to the race, I might do speedwork with more hills to get used to it for the challenging race. I started at Bicentennial Park, so I wouldn't have to cross busy Airport Road and I also could run further west on the trail than I ever have before.
The plan was for one mile of warmup and cool down. The three miles in between consisted of intervals of 3 minutes at a 7:30 pace, followed by 3 minutes of active recovery. This certainly seemed reasonable.
I did have to work a little more than I would've liked to keep the first interval around 7:30. Even after a mile warmup, my legs weren't ready to run as fast as I needed them to be. I still just tried to concentrate on good form though, rather than pushing it. The second interval, I got into a better groove. It seemed quite easy actually. Things got tricky though as I hit a new section of the trail. It had some paved surfaces, rather than gravel, as well as some hills.
I turned around a little before I got to Northampton. The third interval started out easy. I was barely working at all and staying comfortably below pace. It seemed to easy, until I hit a hill. Then I had to push to stay under pace. Right after I started the fourth interval, I passed another run. He seemed startled. I guess I was going to fast. It seemed like he was catching up during my recovery portion. I didn't want to pass him again, so I picked it up a little more.
I could've finished with 4 intervals, but I had enough distance left yet to do a 5th interval. I don't know if my watch was right or not, but I was running under a 7 minute pace in the first 45 seconds and it just seemed too easy. The whole interval was well under pace and maybe harder than I should've run it. You want to work hard, but not overdo it. My legs were starting to tire at the end.
I've become good at running a consistent pace. That makes it go for tempo runs. It seems that I have to work on intervals though. My legs get stronger and I run them too fast as time goes on. I need to be more consistent. Adding hills will be great for these runs too. My goal is a 7 minute pace right now, I'm very confident that I could do that on a flat course, just not sure if it is realistic with Berwick's hills. We shall see.
Tomorrow, is an easy 5 miler. I'm definitely going to run at the Finish Line. I haven't been to their group run in a couple weeks. Hopefully, there will be someone there to push me, but not too hard. I don't want to be overly taxed. It will be good to get back with that group though. This will be my first week of 6 straight days of running during this training cycle. We'll see how well I adjust to it.
5 miles 40:46 (8:09 pace)
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