Friday, January 22, 2010

If anything could ever be this good again

I'll start with shoes. As I said in my last post I had a shoe problem. The lovely folks at Jackrabbit let me exchange my shoes. So now, I have a new (and pinkish...hhmmm....) pair of Asics 2150s. I've been wearing this line of Asics for years and years, always an 8.5. This time the 8.5 felt big, so I went down a size. I also went down to a narrow. The felt so good when I tried them on and so far, they feel really good to run in.

As for running this week, I did 5ish on Monday, when I discovered the shoe issue. Tues, with new shoes, I ran 3 easy with Bea. I've also had a bit of a head cold that I'm trying to blow out with little success. Running makes me feel better for a little while anyway. Today, I wanted to try adding some speed. I think it's time if for nothing else to see how much fitness I've lost over the last few months. Ok, that's a negative spin, let's put it this way: to see where I am fitness-wise right now.
I met Ishii in the park and was decided what to do, tempo, hills...tempoish hills is what we decided on. 2 clockwise loops of the Harlem Hills. It's a nice 1.4 mile loop that has a bit of everything, 2 nice uphills, a long downhill, and a fairly flat straightaway. I figured maybe I'd be able to do 8-8:10 pace with the shape I'm in.
lap 1: 10:51 which is about 7:50 pace. I was surprised by that. 2 minute rest and away we go.
Lp 2. 10:51. I was actually really surprised that we were that fast and that consistent. I certainly felt like I was working but not dying and could have gone again (thankfully wasn't going to). 6 miles for the day. So, even with that time recovering, better shape than I expected! This makes me feel a little better about Boston which I feel way behind in training for.
This weekend is the Manhattan Half marathon. When I started running again, I made this a goal in terms of long run distance, so I'll be doing that on Sunday.
I'm still being cautious, but things are going pretty well on the recovery.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

It's nice when you meet expectations nicely. Good job!

Girl In Motion said...

Fantastic to hear! And you're sick too. Looks like everything's on the up...must be those pink shoes.

L.A. Runner said...

Hhaaa, GIM, I was thinking that, too. Lucky pink! I'm so glad everything is looking up for you and your running, A! Have doing the half this weekend, and I can't wait to read about it!