I Hate Tempos Less

I figured I’d keep the “I Heart”, “I Hate” theme going for a little longer. I nearly entitled this post “I Respect Tempos,” but that’s not really news … I wouldn’t run them if I didn’t believe they drive improved performance.

Last night we were scheduled to run 2×4 mile loops around Central Park with no recovery (aka an 8-mile tempo). However, one of the lead members called an audible at the last-minute and switched up the program to 2×3 mile tempos. The reason for the change was that he was uncertain if a portion of the route was sufficiently plowed. The park was in great shape given all the snow over the last couple of days, but he had a point. At some level, it didn’t matter to me. My goal last night was to run my own race so to speak. I let the Assassins go and focused on TRYING to run a balanced tempo without killing myself but also showing evidence of improvement. We were instructed to run at marathon pace for the first 3 miles and HM pace for the second 3 miles. For more experienced runners, that prescription probably means something. For me, I wanted to negative split and run sub-48:00 for the entire tempo. How did it go?

I felt relaxed for the 1^st 3 miles. I didn’t care if I was alone … I wasn’t. I wanted to avoid blowing up on the back half, which required running more controlled from the jump. I didn’t look at my watch until we hit the 3-mile marker … 22:47 or 7:36 pace. Those numbers didn’t mean a lot until I considered the 2^nd 3 miles, but looking back on it, I came out too fast again. I never felt I “blew up” like on my previous tempo runs with the team. In fact, with a couple of exceptions, I felt pretty strong. However, the pace significantly slowed on the back 3 miles to 25:08 or 8:23 pace. Before I beat myself up, a 7:57 (6.03 mile) overall pace is nearly 30 seconds faster than my 10k PR from last Spring and I definitely was not in race mode last night. Therefore, I’m making progress. Nonetheless, I can’t hide the disappointment of failing on the negative split again. In reality, my goal marathon pace is 8:00 while my actual HM pace is 8:17 (new goal HM pace ~ 7:45). I could have done that for 6 miles, but breaking barriers will require much, much more and probably a lot more evenings like last night.

Also, I’m not training for a marathon or HM right now. I’m getting ready for a 5k on March 7^th and a couple of 10k’s in April and May. I have two choices on tempos – (1) slow down to a more realistic pace in the beginning to ensure a negative split or (2) keep hammering away like I’ve been but dig deeper on the back half to pull thru. You know I’m going with (2). I need to jack up VO2 threshold. I’m much more disciplined about easing my recovery runs to 9:15+ and LR’s even slower. Logical or not, I feel like that gives me license to try to hammer it on intervals and tempos. I’m not sprinting or doing anything crazy, but I feel as if I need to keep the pedal firmly on the metal. While the numbers don’t reflect it, I definitely felt stronger during last night’s tempo than previous evenings.

I’m in the midst of battle and I love it!