NEW STRATEGY

During my Grandma’s marathon training, Thursday’s usually meant getting up before 5 AM for a solo 10-12 mile run with up to 9 miles at marathon pace. Today’s run was my first hard workout on a Thursday since before Grandma’s, which meant a 4:40 wake up call. Believe it or not, getting up wasn’t as hard as I thought it’d be.

My coach mixed things up a little this time. Instead of a straight run at marathon pace he wanted me to run 3 x 2 miles at half marathon pace with a half mile jog in between. I decided to run this on the dirt track near my office. Being my first such workout in awhile, I gave myself a little wiggle room and planned to run somewhere between 6:20 and 6:40 pace. When I saw my first 200 meters took 51 seconds or about 6:50 pace, I decided to try a new strategy. I decided I wasn’t going to look at my splits at all – I’d just run how ever I felt. I didn’t even look at my splits after finishing each rep (pat on the back). I waited until I was at my desk before I checked and I saw 13:07, 12:53 and 12:57 (for 3200 meters). So I basically averaged 6:30 pace or so. Not great, but for a solo effort at 5:30 AM, I’ll take it.

I’m not sure if Debbie runs without a watch or not, but this weekend she talked about focusing on just having fun and training however she wants – rather than focusing on speed, miles, time, etc. Even talking about her 10 mile race she said she doesn’t take her splits at all. Instead, she just focuses on her effort and how she’s feeling. She said even taking her splits, but not looking at them throws her off. For awhile I was at the point where I’d take my splits, but not look at them. Maybe I need to get back into that habit during races again.