Warning: Art Students Running!

Yesterday was the first group workout for the “College of Visual Arts Triathlon Club!” We met at 8 (yes, 8 am - they actually got out of bed that early!) for a 2 mile run. We met at CVA’s main building, and then we started with a 0.7 mile warm-up run. Here’s the gang hitting the turn-around of the warm-up near the Cathedral of St. Paul:

We got back to CVA, sat in the yard and stretched. I mapped out a 2 mile route for everyone to run. Here’s everyone starting the run:

And yes, that’s Pharmie on the far right.
She joined us for the workout too!

At the 0.5 mile mark, I snapped photos of everyone heading out. Here’s 4 of them, and I don’t know what Rudy is doing (I don’t condone his form):

Here, I don’t know what Brice is doing:

Joe had JUST quit smoking the day before this workout, so his “salute” and his “Mr. Yuk” shirt both sum up his mood at this point:

And here’s Pharmie running with Rachel, and their pony-bounces match nicely:

I stopped at the turn-around point to encourage everyone. Then we all headed back towards school. Rudy (the one running sideways the second photo in this post) was faster than he thought he was! He kept getting faster, and he negative split his 2 miler and finished under 16 minutes! AND he was just wearing generic Sketchers knock-offs from Target. (I don’t condone that, but they’re all broke art students, so what can I do?...)

Here’s part of the group done running, as we’re waiting for a few more to come in:

Everyone did SO GOOD! Seriously, I was impressed!! After the run, we stat down in the yard again, and talked about our training program. Pharmie and I looked at a bunch of training plans, and we settled on a pretty cut-and-dry training plan from Triathlon Training: Race Programs for Sprint Distance Through Ironman, by Michael Finch. We used Finch’s sprint distance program, but it’s written for a triathlon that has a much shorter bike than the one we’re doing. So we replaced the bike workouts with the workouts from Finch’s olympic distance program. I think it will work!

Now, I’m trying to set up a group swim lesson at our local Y for everyone. If that comes through, I’ll be pumped!!

And remember to check back Sunday or Monday to see if Matt and I (Team Happy Pants) can take the gold at the Gear West Duathlon! Wish us luck!