.: CIM WEEK 3 of 18: A discount code to share, back on Strava, & threshold run #1

Tuesday, August 23, 2016

CIM WEEK 3 of 18: A discount code to share, back on Strava, & threshold run #1

This week's big news is no, I have not completely lost the ability to move my body at a sub-7:00 pace. #smallvictories

FIRST: So when I started counting weeks for CIM, I updated my defunct Strava profile & started posting runs again. I don't know why, or what I hope to get out of it. I don't know why I signed up for Strava in the first place. I don't even read other people's workouts because who has time for that ~~once you finish reading blogs, facebook, twitter, & instagram~~. But there it is, so if seeing my weekly miles unfold in real time before your very eyes will somehow improve your life, by all means click over.

SECOND: I think I've mentioned the awesome folks over at RaceRaves a few times. (See the badge in the right side bar.) They've been kind enough to give me some shirts to race in which, honestly, is pretty flattering because it means they seem to have a reasonable amount of confidence that I won't do something horrifically embarrassing while wearing it in public.

So far I have managed to avoid vandalizing any gas stations and/or public urination, so the way I see it we are both winning.

I wanted to mention them again because if you are angling to run the Golden Gate Half in San Francisco on Saturday, November 5, you can get 10% with discount RACERAVES10. I'll be out of town but you should totally do it!!!

THIRD: Actual running stuff.

This week marked my first speed & threshold workouts since last April, and I would be lying if I said I hadn't been just a tad nervous about how hard they would feel after so many weeks of nothing but super easy runs. As I wrote last week, though, the speed work went just swimmingly and the pace actually felt a little easier than I thought it should (especially as I got further along in the reps).

The threshold run on Friday, though....oh my. I'd thought hard about whether I wanted to add both workouts in all at once vs. just adding speed for a couple of weeks to give myself sometime to adjust and THEN adding then tempo/threshold, but ultimately just decided I'd give the whole thing a shot & see how it went.

For all that I felt great after my Tuesday speed workout, it was pretty clear in my easy runs on Wednesday & Thursday that my legs had worked a lot harder than they were used to. I ran four super easy miles on Wednesday & was very thankful I wasn't going further, and eight on Thursday felt *slightly* easier, but still tougher than usual.

Friday's threshold workout was supposed to be 2 x 2mi @ half marathon pace (~7:40, though let's be honest, I haven't run a half at that pace in years). During my Eugene training, I found that tempo/threshold paces were the ones that seemed to vary the most in terms of how hard they felt, depending on heat, wind, terrain, how tired I was, etc. On some days 7:40 felt like no big deal while on other days even just 1-2 miles felt impossible. (I still remember doing a threshold workout on a treadmill while traveling & honestly worrying that I was one false step away from flying off the back of it at all times.) So before I started doing these runs again, I checked in with Coach Ashley about whether there were heart rate guidelines for different paces. Behold:

Short intervals (200-400m) - 100% of max HR
Speed work @5k pace - 94% of max HR
Speed work @10K/threshold/tempo pace - 85-92% of max HR
Marathon pace - 78-85% of max HR

Interpolating, it looked like ~85% max was about right for HM pace.

I'd hoped by Friday I'd be feeling back to normal, but as soon as I started my warm up the answer was obviously no. I wasn't even worrying about the pace during the first tempo mile because it was uphill and into the wind, but even just going by heart rate, I had to laugh; no matter how hard I pushed, my HR just flat-out refused to rise very much, but even so, the thought of running more than a mile at that level of effort was horrifying. I don't know if it was a smart decision considering how worn out my legs were or if I just wussed out, but I ended up doing 4 x 1mi @ HMP instead of 2 x 2mi, and even that felt WAY harder than it should have.

I was shooting for about 180 in terms of HR, so you can see that it took some time to actually get there. The interesting thing about base training is that although the engine is not yet very big (it's hard to generate much power for very long), there is a decent amount of efficiency (even at heart rates a bit below the target, I was hitting the pace or slightly faster with no problem).

So yeah. It was not easy, but this was only week 3 so I'm optimistic.

Grand Total:

45.9 miles + 3:00:00 strength

Monday 8/15:

Tuesday 8/16: 2 warm up, 10 x 600m @ 5K pace / 200m jog, 2 cool down

Wednesday 8/17: a.m. strength/p.m 4 easy.

Thursday 8/18: 8 easy.

Friday 8/19: 2 warm up, ~~2 x 2mi~~ 4 x 1mi @ HM pace / 2:00 jog, 2 cool down, get on plane.

Saturday 8/20: Obscene brunch followed by epic dinner at N/Naka