Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Tempo Time

First real post injury tempo run this morning. All I've done so far had been some progressively faster running vs any real steady pace tempo runs. Today I was feeling good so decided I'd go try to do 2x2miles at about 7:15 pace. Picked a long straight road that climbs about 100' over 2 miles. It's not steep, but it's enough to effect pace so I planned on 7:20-7:25 up and 7:05-7:10 back down, with a 1/2 mile recovery in between.

Warmed up for 1/2 mile and then eased into the first half mile and quickly found 7:15 pace. Went a little quicker than planned going up and did the 2 miles at 7:11 (halves at 7:17, 7:08, 7:11, and 7:09 pace). Decided my goal had been too easy so planned to come back down at under 7:00 pace.

First half was fast at 6:42 but then I steadied down and ran a 6:56 pace half. Kept the pressure on for the last mile and ran it at 6:47. Overall pace for the downhill 2 was 6:49. Average for the 4 miles was spot on 7:00. Very happy with that and it was the first fast run I've done where there was absolutely zero pain in my achilles.

This all tells me that a 7:15 pace 10k in 10 days should be well within my grasp. Including warmups, recovery and cooldown the average pace today was 7:21 for about 10k. I'll probably aim for 7:00 pace and see how far I get before the wheels fall off.

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