First Outdoor Intervals of 2023

Well, technically, I ran 3x1 mile intervals during our family trip to Mexico in January... so I guess this is my first outdoor intervals IN MINNESOTA of 2023...

I hit the trail along River Road for a set of 2x2 mile intervals on Friday morning. I was ready to see what I could do, but I also wanted to go pretty hard. I ran to the river as a warm-up, and then ran out-and-back for a mile each way like I normally do:

Starting in the middle near the bottom, running NW to the
corner for a mile, and then back to the middle/bottom.


Where I started and finished my intervals.


Speedier "red" sections in the middle of my intervals.

I was happy to have kept the first mile under 6:00 (2:56.9 + 2:57.1 = 5:54.0), but then I turned back into the breeze. I think I over-compensated for my fear of the wind and ended up running my fastest half-mile split of that interval on the way back (in 2:52). I pushed decently for my first interval, and was happy with this:

2:56.9, 2:57.1, 2:52.3, 2:56.6 = 11:42.9

After 3:00 of walking rest, I was ready to go again. I was worried I wouldn't be able to live up to taht first interval, but (much like my over-compensation for the breeze in my first interval) I ended up going out harder with my fastest half mile split all day at 2:51.0. At this point, I just tried to hold on and make it fast. I was fried by the end and was (again) pretty happy with this:

2:51.0, 2:57.4, 2:54.0, 2:55.7 = 11:38.1

I thought that was a pretty good start to my outdoor speed work for 2023...

... but then I started looking back at past workouts: I did this workout on the treadmill 2 months ago in 11:36 and 11:25. That was faster as there are no hills and no wind resistance. I ran slower times a few weeks after the TC 10 Mile last fall in 11:43 and 11:49. But I ran kinda similar times to this recent workout as my first outdoor run of 2022 in 11:47 and 11:35 (with the goal "run the 2nd interval so you die!"). And that last link has lots of links to previous 2x2 mile workouts - of the 20 individual 2 mile intervals (10 workouts with 2 intervals each), only 3 of the 20 were down in the 11:30s.

So it was GOOD, but not CRAZY GOOD.

PACE of my entire run, clearly showing the 2 intervals in the middle.


ELEVATION showing that I started each interval with
a downhill at 0.25 miles and ended uphill with 0.25 miles left.


PACE and ELEVATION combined. Slow-downs near the end of each interval climbing that hill!