Track Blech

Tonight was a quick coached track workout with only about 15 people. Temps were in the 40s and it had been raining before we began, so I think a lot of people bailed.

The workout was very casual - warmup for me was 1.25 miles, the first timed mile I ran at 10:44 - for me, that is fast for a warmup mile! After that, we jumped into the main set - a short but sweet ladder as follows:

200, 400, 600, 400, 200 (total just over 1 mile), with core work in between. Sounds easy, right? Ha ha ha.

We were supposed to try and keep our pace constant, but apparently I am totally incapable of that, so my splits looked like this:

53.54 (200 meters), 2:02.89 (400 meters), 3:48.35 (600 meters and really?! That is SLOW - I must have screwed something up here.), 2:32.29 (400 meters, notice how much slower this is that the first 400?! So bad at pacing), 52.50 (WOO faster on the last 200!).

I thought we were finished after that, but oops - there was more! The last part was a 3/4 mile (3 lap) run, sprinting the sections in front of the bleachers (so about 60 meters) and recovering for the rest of the lap. This worked out to 6 full-on sprints with recovery, and I forgot to get splits for this, but I got the total time, which was 8:26.53. This is a really slow mile time, but I don't care because I busted my ass on the sprints. On the third one I was hurting so badly I actually closed my eyes and pictured my little legs spinning faster and faster. Thankfully, there were no obstacles or I would have ended up face down on the track! I also found that on the recovery I was able to jog instead of walk, whereas the last workout like this we did I almost had to lie down after the sprints. Progress! Good.

After we finished the running, we all hung around to stretch and chat for a few minutes. When it's cold like that, our hot sweaty heads give off steam. Actually, even my legs were steaming tonight! Together we looked like a sauna. A bendy sauna.

Tomorrow I have to go into the city to meet one of the UK contingent from the job (still waiting on the official offer letter, although I have been assured it's on its way...), so I'd better go figure out what to wear, bring, and where to park!