TGIF!

Just a quick end-of-week update, since I haven't posted since my bad day on Monday. (Where has the time gone?)

Things definitely improved after Monday (though not without ups and downs!). Tuesday was a non-running day, with elliptical and yoga at the Y.

Wedneday morning I was back out on the road. Unfortunately I had horrible GI issues and had to cut my run a little short and stop after five miles, without doing my scheduled hill work. Believe me, there was no way I could stay out and try to run hard uphill. I needed to be inside, FAST.

I considered calling it good with five miles for the day (which is not a terribly short run). But the weather Wednesday was quite nice, even sunny, so I hustled home after work to squeeze in a few more miles and my planned hills.

It was dusk before I left, of course, and dark when I finished, but still pleasant enough. After four miles at an easy pace I started my four quarter-mile hill sprints. This involved running up a quarter-mile hill at a hard pace, and jogging down for recovery. Of course "hard pace" uphill is slower than on a track. Additionally, I was a little more cautious in the dark (only a few streetlights), and I think the glare of headlights and fear of tripping held me back a little.

That is a long way of saying that the first three laps were around 8:45 pace, give or take. The last one, though, I managed to give it an extra kick and did that one at 8:12 pace! With the remaining distance home, I totalled just over 6.5 miles for the evening.

After that, I was understandably apprehensive about my early morning run just 12 hours later Thursday morning! I don't typically run on Thursdays, but I switched Thursday and Friday to rest up today for a 10K tomorrow.

After the first three miles (10-minute pace), I met up with Arjin for the next four and a half. He must have been restless from the slow pace on Monday, because he was pushing it from the beginning. I didn't mind too much because I still felt the need for redemption. We were pushing an 8:30 pace, but had enough uphill sections to average about 8:45 in the first three miles.

I didn't mind the faster pace, but what I did mind was when Arjin sprinted effortlessly ahead in the uphill sections. What the heck was this? I am the experienced runner here! He has no business being faster than me!

As we moved into mile four I decided to make this worthwhile and picked up the pace to sub-8. Thanks to the hill at the very end, mile four was exactly 8:00.

We sailed through the finals blocks and finished 4.69 miles at an 8:33 average pace. I left Arjin at the office and ran the final 1.5 miles (to Starbucks) at a blessedly slower pace.

I took today as an "active rest" day, with just 50 minutes easy on the elliptical, a not-so-easy yoga class, and a massage.

Smelt Run tomorrow! Have a great weekend!
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