Pushing the End

This week was our first intense week towards our Richmond goal. So far training has been both challenging and encouraging.

Here's how it is suppose to work. Long runs are run about 2 minutes slower than your desired race pace. In order to run the half in 2 hours, we need to pace about 9:10/mile. My best half marathon time was a 2:15 which calculates a pace of 10:18. Math majors, that is over a minute per mile cut. This is no easy goal, to say the least, but we are going to try. The speedwork we are doing is an effort to eliminate that minute from our pace.

This weekend "coach" suggested we run the first 7 miles at about 11:00/mile pace but run the final mile at race pace. We weren't certain we could pull off the final push for speed. Tim says this sort of thing trains your legs that they can push even when they are tired. That's what we need. So, half heartedly we agreed to at least try it. I have to admit it was sort of fun. Our final mile was a nice trail that had a few small inclines and some winding parts. It sort of felt like we were on a roller coaster. We were breathing pretty hard and anxious about hitting the end but we did it. Final mile pace: 9:07.