Back up to the Armory last night for intervals. I was pleasantly surprised at the emptiness of the track. Apparently, the high school indoor season is over and our track team (the laughably quick folks) moved to an outdoor track to get ready for their season. As a result, the road racing team (me) enjoyed the roominess.
Despite running after the race and again the next day, I was still slightly sore. I thought I shook out the acid, but apparently not all of it. For the first time, I was not in a rush when I arrived at the track (hit the subway at the right time) and was able to leisurely get into running mode. On tap for last night was a challenging downward ladder workout: 1200, 1000, 800, 600, 400 all at 5k pace with 400 recovery; followed by 300 and 200 at mile pace with 300 recovery. The results:
| Type | Distance | Time | Per Mile Pace |
| Warm Up | 2.6 Mi | 22:09 | 8:32 |
| Interval | 1200 m | 4:51 | 6:31 |
| Interval | 1000 m | 3:56 | 6:20 |
| Interval | 800 m | 3:03 | 6:09 |
| Interval | 600 m | 2:14 | 6:00 |
| Interval | 400 m | 1:23 | 5:34 |
| Interval | 300 m | 0:57 | 5:06 |
| Interval | 200 m | 0:32 | 4:18 |
| Cool Down | 1.25 Mi | 10:00 | 8:00 |
I had no real goals for the evening … just enjoy the run and have fun with the team. Those two were certainly accomplished. Fun group. I never pay much attention to the pace while running on the track, other than wanting to push myself, and accept that it will be much faster than announced. Looking at the chart, it is amazing how this group negative splits like clockwork. The 1200-600 stepped down rationally at approximately 10-second increments per interval. My memory gets foggy after running in so many circles, but think I jumped in and led the 600m interval. I tried to keep the pace consistent and reasonable because at that point we still had work to do. However, when we get near the short stuff (sub 400m), these folks get ridiculously itchy for speed (myself included). You’ll notice the massive drop from 600, 400, 300 … 6:09 pace to 5:34 to 5:06 is no joke. Then for the final 200 it just got downright silly. I had the nerve (stupidity?) to challenge one of the really quick Assassins in our sub-group. Aside from crazy talent, this one is 25-26 years old and literally 50% my height and weight. We both got into Alpha-dog mode and jumped out for the lead together. I hung with her for … no lie … 5 strides and she was gone. I started cracking up. Honestly, it was funny as hell. I laid down a 0:32 200m or 4:18 pace (completely irrational) and she had to hit 0:28 and was visibly slowing down on the final 50m. She said in a very unassuming way, “See why Coach wants me to run the mile? I don’t want to do it though. I like marathons.” BTW – I don’t want to give the impression that we are reckless in any way. Other than me, these are very experienced runners. Also, Coach mentioned to me at the conclusion of the workout that he almost gave us a 100m interval as the finale, but thought better against it as he said, “you guys would be like rabid dogs attacking meat with a 100.” I laughed and agreed.