Killing It on My Final Tempo Run

It's been either easy running or no running for me over the last 4 days, but now it was time to go back to work.  I considered running yesterday, but took the day off after having my calf cramp up in the morning.  I knew it would be sore all day.  Instead, I went on about a mile or so hike each way up Mt. Tammany at the Delaware Water Gap. 

I was fine after the half marathon on Sunday, but this made for a nice recovery day.  It was challenging, with a lot of climbing (about 1200 feet of it) and rocks.  With all of the leaves changing colors, the view of Mt. Minsi on the other side of the river was spectacular.

I rested two days before the half marathon and then ran that at an easy pace and had another day off after the half marathon.  I'm 12 days out from my goal half marathon, the D&L Half Marathon on November 4th.  I figured that today would be the last day to get some hard running in.  I will be running semi hard with Flo for 12 miles on Saturday, but I won't be pushing it quite like I was today.

I've been doing a lot of mile repeats lately.  Those are certainly challenging, but at least I get some recovery breaks.  I was thinking that I really haven't incorporated tempo runs into my training very much.  I ran a lot of the 10K the other week alone, so it kind of became a tempo run.  I've done another tempo run here or there earlier in the summer, but that was about the extent of it.

I was going to run in the morning, but it was raining.  I love running in the rain, but I didn't want to try to do a key workout in those conditions.  If it rains on race day, I'll just have to readjust my goals.  For now, I wanted to try to run 5 or 6 miles straight near my goal pace of 7:00 per mile.  Hitting mile repeats at that pace was tough enough, so I knew stringing together mile after mile at that pace could be tricky.

It was still cloudy when I started out in the early afternoon.  Since my race is on the D&L Trail, I decided that I had to do this run on the course.  I've actually done most of my speedwork on the course.  The only thing is that I've done it on the early part of the course, not the final few miles.  That's not too big of a deal though.  I started off at the Cementon Trailhead and ran north.

I just bought a LVRR singlet over the weekend at the half marathon expo.  I'm excited because I want to represent the club in a race.  I've been waiting quite awhile for the singlets to be available.  I will wear it at the D&L Half Marathon, but wanted to test it out today first.  It worked great and passed the test with flying colors on this comfortable day.  Come race day, I might need to add arm sleeves into the mix.  We have LVRR ones of those too, but I didn't purchase any of them.

The extra rest lately has been huge for my aching quads.  I've felt so good the last few days.  Usually I can tell how well I'll do in hard workouts just based on how I feel during the warmup.  Although there was still some slight stiffness, I felt much more fluid early on than I have lately.  I wasn't going hard, but I was feeling fast and light for a change.  The warmup mile came in at 8:09.  I didn't push much until the end of it.

After warming up, it was on to the tough part of the run.  I was hoping that I could hit all my miles under 7 minute pace, but the big thing was to just run 5 or 6 miles hard.  Even if that meant they were only 7:10 or 7:15 miles, so be it.  This workout would give me a fairly good idea of what I can do in the race.

The first mile wasn't hard, but a little uncomfortable.  I got into a groove and cruised along.  I wish it would've been a little easier, but I was right around a 7 minute pace and didn't want to back off.  I felt good after that mile, but it was hard to believe that I still had 4 or 5 miles to go at or near that pace.  Hard mile 1 was run at a 6:57.

Things didn't get any easier in the second mile.  I tried not to think about how difficult it would be to sustain the pace for the duration of the run.  Instead, I just focused on getting through the next mile.  That wasn't easy in this mile, but I did it.  The mile got faster by the end and finished up at 6:51.

My legs were certainly feeling it at this point.  I kind of felt like this was a little fast.  Ideally a 7:05 pace would've probably been a little better.  I might've had more left for the end.  Regardless, I kept on pushing.  It's hard to slow by just that little bit. 

I planned on turning around after the third mile, so I knew I just had to focus on getting to that point.  It is more uphill going out than it is going back.  It might not get any easier on the way back, but I could run with slightly less effort and still hit my time goals.  My GPS was definitely a little off in the first tenth of this mile.  It said I was going at a 5:30 pace.  That certainly wasn't happening.  In the end, I think this mile was pretty accurate.  I came through that third mile at 6:56. 

These first three hard miles were right on target with my 5K pace for the race in early September.  That's definitely fairly impressive.  They did take a lot out of me.  The end of the third mile had a little more uphill that earlier on.  That was tough.

Turning around was a huge relief.  It was still crazy to think I had 2 or 3 more hard miles to go though.  I tried to sort of relax just a little and recover some on this mile.  Early on, it was around 7:30 pace, but for most of the mile, it dropped to around 7:10-7:15 pace.  I pushed more and more towards the end, but wasn't willing to kill myself to get that mile under 7 minutes.  I finished at 7:09 and that was good enough.

That mile and my final mile was what impressed me most.  Too often in these speedwork sessions, I've got to what I felt was my limit and just backed off.  If I hit a mile repeat that was around 7:10, I'd often just quit.  I don't push through enough whenever I don't hit my goals.  I knew I didn't have much left, but I kept battling through it.

The fifth hard mile was my final one at a fast pace.  I just kept telling myself to really give it my all and get through this mile.  Now wasn't the time to quit.  I was slipping, but I wasn't falling off that much.  I only had a few minutes of hard running left, so what was the big deal?  I need to be mentally tougher and today I definitely was.  I knew that if I tried for a sixth hard mile that I probably would fall off, but I just had to get through this fifth one.

The pep talk to myself worked.  I'm sure I had some help from the downhill slope of the trail too.  Regardless, I kept battling and battling.  I was happy to be almost done when I hit the slight uphill.  I was able to relax a little at the end and still hit my goal pace with a 6:53.  I guess the recovery I gave myself on the previous mile helped too.

One thing that is tough is that there isn't much time to relax in tempo runs.  Often times when I run mile repeats, I can back off a bit in the final tenth of the mile or so.  I do that if I am under goal pace.  I couldn't do that on a tempo run because then I'd start off the next mile too slow.  I had to be fairly consistent.  Overall, I felt that I was.

I was 2 miles out when the hard running was over.  I wanted to do a mile cooldown.  I decided that a mile was good enough and another mile of walking would be a fine way to finish up.  That worked well and I didn't feel all that sore when I got back to my car.  The only issue I encountered was some soreness on my foot during the cooldown mile.  I had to readjust how I planted my foot.  It is at the bone below the big toe.  I'll have to watch for that and be cautious.  I don't want it to turn into something big.  I may need to consider racing in my regular shoes rather than the minimalist shoes that I was wearing today.

I might not have got every hard mile under 7 minutes, but overall I was under my goal pace.  It would've been great to get another mile in under 7 minutes, but 5 miles will do.  It was a good workout and a good bounce back after some tough speed sessions lately.

Running on my own, I think this workout is a fairly good indication of where I am at for the race.  I would've liked if I could've hit these times with a little more ease.  It is what it is though.  I'd love to break a 7:00 pace for the race, but my PR pace of 7:06 is likely more realistic.  I will shoot for 7:00 and then if I don't get it, I should still be able to PR.

At least I now know that I can push through a tough 5 miles.  As long as I save something, I should be able to finish strong in the final 5K to 5 miles.  The key will be getting to that point without overtaxing myself.  I just need some decent competition to pull me through those early miles.  If I can hit those near goal pace and not beat myself up, I should achieve my goals.  This is a small race and I don't know what to expect on race day.  Either way, the fact that I can consider a PR after just 6 months back into training is impressive.

Tomorrow, I will start doing mostly easy running.  I have no idea where I'll go.  It will be 5 or 6 miles somewhere.  I have to run in the morning since the District XI cross country meet is in the afternoon.  I'm feeling good heading into the home stretch before my half marathon.  I can't wait for it to get here.  I'm so ready to see what I can do.

7 miles - 51:26 (7:21 pace)