Thursday, September 06, 2007

RFE TR #27

Total Miles Trained For Elijah: 195

Today was "Terry's Choice" on my marathon training schedule for 4 miles. Coach Terry decided that I needed to do some running at "marathon pace," which is to be +/- 11:30 per mile. I was to do a warm-up, then 2 miles at pace, then a cooldown mile no slower than 12:30.

I was not thrilled when I got the assignment yesterday. I thought "How on earth could I maintain that pace for 26.2 miles?" But Coach straightened me out with words of wisdom and encouragement.

So off I went this morning. It rained buckets last night, again, so it was nice and misty out there at 6 AM when I hit the start button on my Garmin. I ran mile 1 (the warmup) in 12:00 flat. Not bad! It didn't kill me, so I figured I could do 11:30 for mile 2. Well, I did mile 2 in 10:19 to my SHOCK. I thought "Whoa - slow down for mile 3." Mile 3 came in at 9:58. Hmm - surprised! I cooled down at 11:47.

Now why can't I be speedy any other day??? It is all in the mindset, as we all know. I guess I need to fine-tune mine on longrun days!

6 comments:

CewTwo said...

Great times! I am impressed.

I have to admit that I get really confused. I trained at an 11:00 pace for my last half. It worked, but I don't know that I was satisfied.

I can run with Tom, but it is always a push and I don't always want to push. I am kicking it at the end now, because I know that I can do that. However, I remember going into the stadium after the last half and having to sit down fairly quickly as things were getting dizzy for me (at least dizzier than normal). A couple minutes of sitting there and I had to find the food tent next!

Good run!

What are your after race food desires?

Unknown said...

Susan... you are right. I think you keyed in on something here. And this is something that I thought about today during the first run of the day.

"I've always felt that long, slow distance produces long, slow runners." -Sebastian Coe

Any training schedule has those long runs and the pace is by nature something that is slower than our goal pace. So when we get ready to start these runs, we are already mentally slow. Our body keys into these senses and hits that slower pace and it feels GOOD. How often do we run and think, man I must be flying, only to see that the pace is slower than what we thought. Or my race report from the Scholar's RUn when I thought that I had to be running something close to a 8:30 minute pace because it felt like that only to discover that no, I was running a 7:37 pace.

What I have discovered, or thought about is how in my past marathon training runs, my long runs, I just go out and run and whatever pace I hit I hit. Well, it starts out okay and I can maintain that pace for a while but then I start to slow down. These past few weeks, I have been really hitting that 9:20ish pace for my long runs, and been hitting it consistently. According to the training "plans" I should be running something slower for my goal time, but I have not been upset that my long runs have been faster, it's almost like I believe that my long runs should be at a 9:20 and not a 9:45 and thus they are slow.

So, I think you are on to a great mental technique there of making yourself believe that a long run is not a slow run. It's a fast run but at a slower pace.

peter said...

Words of wisdom from Coach Terry. Believe it. I tell my students, To run fast you gotta run fast.

Maddy said...

Those are awesome splits!

You are Speed!

G said...

Susan,
Hope all is well. One more week until I return from achilles hiatus.
Do you wear a fanny pack for gels/camera, cell phone? If so, what brand? Is it water resistant?

Keep it up. I am registering for the St Jude's half (the achilles pain killed my marathon plan) and will soon become a St Jude Hero!

Irish Blue said...

Those are really good times Susan. Way to go! I think it is a mindset.