Running Ruminations

Who doesn’t love Top Gun? 🙂

The quote seemed fitting to use since last night was my first night of speedwork with Fleet Feet’s Boston Bound program.  We got a temporary “heat wave” last night and had balmy temps in the 30s or so.  It was a nice change, though I was reluctant to shed any of my layers that I had become so accustomed to wearing over these past few weeks.  The workout was pretty straightforward: 2 mile warm up, 1 mile at marathon pace, 1 mile recovery, 1 mile marathon pace, 1 mile cool down, for a total of 6 miles.  Simple enough.

Admittedly, I was a bit geeked because my desired MP is 8:23 (for a 3:40 marathon), and I hadn’t really tried to run that anytime recently.  Adding further insult is that parts of the lakefront, where we run, are still snow- or ice-covered, so the footing is a bit precarious… making hitting a desired goal time a bit, well, lofty.

All turned out well, though, as my first timed MP was a 7:50 (WAY faster than I had wanted to shoot for!) and my second MP around 7:36.  Oops.  If nothing else, it was reassuring that I can still run relatively quickly after not doing hardly any speedwork since my Boston training last year or sometime this summer.  Rock on.

Saturday we’ll get back into double digits with a nice 10 miler along the lakefront.  Maybe the “heat wave” will hold out through Saturday.  We can only hope…