Track Workout (and a PR!)

In Thursday's post, I noted running a lot recently with the stroller. I mentioned that on a stroller TEMPO run and a stroller LONG run I had the EXACT SAME PACE for my "hard" miles (when my "hard" miles should be a lot harder/faster during a tempo run vs. a long run). So I knew that was my wake-up call to start working on my speed.

I hit the indoor track at my gym on Thursday to work on that. It's a 6-laps-to-a-mile track, so I did my "normal" ladder workout: efforts of 2, 4, 6, 4, and 2 laps. Then I'd run an easy lap between each effort. That's 3 miles of HARD running in the end.

I had NO goals and I did NOT look back to workouts like this before I hit the track. I just wanted to run hard. I wondered if I could keep the effort under 6:00/mile (or 1:00/lap, or 2:00/2-lap splits that I was going to take). My first lap was around 0:55 even though I expected it to be more like 1:00. And then I actually held on pretty well for the 2nd lap of that interval. AND ACTUALLY FOR THE REST OF THE WORKOUT TOO! Here were my 2-lap splits (again, with 2:00/2-laps = 6:00/mile pace):

- 1:51
- 1:19 easy
- 1:59, 1:52 = 3:51
- 1:24 easy
- 1:59, 1:55, 1:51 = 5:46
- 1:24 easy
- 1:56, 1:49 = 3:46
- 1:27 easy
- 1:48

EACH SPLIT (every 1/3 of a mile split) WAS UNDER 6:00 PACE!! THAT SHOCKED ME! When I started my 2nd-to-last interval, I thought that split could be 2:00 or over (because I was pooped), but I kept it at 1:56.

Looking back, I found that this was my FASTEST TIME EVER for this workout!! My "hard running" for those 3 miles was done in 17:02. I looked back over the 5 times doing this same workout (2 times in 2016, then Feb of 2017, then later in 2017, and finally at the start of 2018) and I usually averaged just over 18 if I was "slow," and my previous fastest 2 times for the "hard 3 miles" were 17:15 and 17:27.

So hopefully within the next 2-4 weeks, I'll try this workout again. Only I won't try to be so consistent (and with that perfect descend within each interval) - I'll just try to go HARD on each interval. This time, I felt like I was going around 96% when intervals are usually like 99.5% for me (just short of ALL OUT RACE PACE). Next time, I'll shoot for more pain... like around 98.5%. ;)