I was set to do my long run for the week on Thursday. So I was watching the weather. We started getting snow Wednesday night, but "they" said it would turn to rain quick as it heated up (from 25 degrees to the upper 30s), and then the rain would melt everything by morning. Well, morning came, and we had 3 inches of slushy crap blanketing St. Paul. So I hit the gym.
I did a similar run to the long treadmill run I did about a month ago at Hamline University, but I didn't push it quite as hard. (That one was before my current knee pain flared up.) I ran a 2 mile warm up, then descended every half mile for 6 miles, then did a 1.5 mile cool down. And wherever I didn't speed up, I raised the incline for that half mile split (hard miles 1-1.5 and 2.5-3):
WU: 3:43, 3:44, 3:39, 3:38
Faster miles: 3:29, 3:26, 3:27, 3:23, 3:22, 3:22, 3:19, 3:15, 3:13, 3:11, 3:07, 3:05
(So mile splits of 6:55, 6:50, 6:44, 6:34, 6:24, and 6:12.)
CD: 3:44, 3:45, 3:45
1:05:46 total time for 9.5 miles (6:55 pace), with the middle 6 at 6:37 pace.
The last half of the faster miles were from 9.0 - 9.6 mph speeding up 0.1 every half mile. After walking on the track and stretching a bit, I snapped a sweaty selfie:
Here's what it looked like as I was out after my run:
I met a trail of snowplows clearing the road.
Why I ran inside. This looks all like slush, but about half of it was slick ice. Yuck. No fun.
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