Dead Legs

Mo Farah has a new coach - Alberto Salazar! Speaking of which, his group has somewhat separated from the Oregon Track Club and will now be called the Oregon Project. Alan Webb needs to learn patience in his racing, and Hicham El Guerrouj is enjoying anonymity in Portland. And finally, Denna gives birth to a baby girl!

Monday, Feb 21 - 0! Legs were tired, and just needed the rest day.

Tuesday, Feb 22 - 8.5 miles total: 1/2 mile warmup, 2 mile (11:59 - 5:59, 6:00), 1 mile (5:52), 3 X 1 mile at marathon pace (7:14, 7:13, 7:14), 2 mile cooldown (8:18, 8:02). Went to the track on a cold evening, but otherwise perfect night to run. Pat and Crystal ended up joining me for some track work. Felt a bit refreshed from the day off, and did a quick warmup before starting. Had scheduled workout of 2 mile tempo, 1 mile 10-15 seconds faster, 2 mile tempo but given my current state of conditioning, I knew this would be difficult to hit. Felt decent starting out and pretty controlled, but was struggling on the 2nd mile big time. Form was a mess, and barely hit my pace before finishing out. 5 minute rest (oops!), then hit the mile which started out ok, but was struggling big time at the end (2:52, 3:00 half mile splits). I knew the 2 mile wasn't going to happen - would have resulted in me quitting or hitting god-awful splits, and decided to have an extended cooldown instead. Well, Crystal ended up finishing her workout right at the time I started my cooldown, so jumped in for a mile which turned into 3 total with her, one minute rest in between. Felt more controlled on her workout, 2 mile cooldown to finish. I was proud of Crystal for not surging ahead and hitting a consistent pace. Used the watch as reference, but was pretty much dead on the entire time. She is ready for Sunday...

I feel a bit demoralized with another crappy track workout, but need to be patient and realize it's early in the game and I still have a lot of work to do to get to a decent level. Time was ok, but effort was almost too much, as my legs were just finishedI found myself really relaxed on the mile repeats with Crystal, and realized I have been running very tense which may be some of the problem.

So, I signed up for the 5K at Columbus, OH this weekend as part of the DBA Running Trip. This will be used primarily as a workout, and am looking to hit 6:00-6:05 even splits on all the miles. AOH Toolen 5K is the weekend after, then St. Pat's. An all-out assault on St. Pat's is looking very unlikely at this point, and may just use as a tempo run and try to hit around 32 minutes. But maybe the speed work will have kicked in at that point, so we shall see.