Training for 7/17/12

We’ve got another couple of days of really hot, humid weather coming up. This morning, when I stepped outside just after 6 a.m. to go to the track to do today’s scheduled speed workout, I knew it wasn’t going to be a good day for running fast. The air was already warm and thick.

But, I completely killed it anyway!

I was supposed to do six 400-meter repeats at 5K pace. The last 5K I ran, I ran at a 6:53/mile pace, which would work out to repeats of about 1:43 each. But I want to run a 5K much faster than that, so I decided to just run my 400s as fast as I could.

I did a mile easy to warm up, and was already pretty sweaty when I started my first repeat. I clicked off the first repeat in 1:38. Not my fastest ever, but pretty good. I hoped I could keep that up for the next five.

I did a recovery lap and then ran the second one in 1:36, which was only a second off my fastest-ever 400 repeat. The heat was bearing down on me, but I tried to ignore it as I jogged my recovery lap and got ready for the third repeat.

As boring as it is to run 24 laps around a track like I did today, I’ve found the monotonous scenery gives me a chance to concentrate harder on my form. I noticed I was leaning back a bit, and sometimes I would find my shoulders tensed too much. I made a conscious effort to correct both of those on the third repeat, and equaled my fastest-ever 400 — 1:35.

So far this was going pretty well!

I jogged the third recovery lap and then ran No. 4 in 1:33, a new fastest-ever for me. I jogged the recovery and then repeated that on the fifth with another 1:33. Just one more to go.

I was pouring sweat, and had to walk a few yards after that fifth repeat, but after jogging the rest of the recovery lap, I ran the sixth one as hard as the rest, and even cranked it up closer to a sprint at the very end.

I hit the button on my watch as I crossed the line and looked down to see 1:31!

I was very pleased with the whole thing. Checking my notes, the last time I ran 400s, I only did four, as I was tapering for the Steamtown Marathon. So that was a shorter workout during a taper on a nice cool October day, and my fastest that time was 1:35. I ran the same or faster four out of six times today.

I put on my iPod and did two more miles easy to cool down, for a total of six miles. At home, I did some stretching.