Zilker 1000m Repeats (Through the Fog and Mist...)

It was sort of surreal driving down to RunTex this morning, through the fog and mist. It was the conditions that movie makers want when they're filming their moody masterpieces. A good sized crew (numbers of people, not their actual size :-) ) set out for Zilker Park for our 1000m repeat workout. For many in the group, the new Freescale people in particular, this was their first exposure to this workout. I ran over in the dark with Bryan, and it was pretty casual running over there. It was truly dark while we did our drills, and in fact, it didn't really get all that light during the workout, either. That's not a big problem except that it eliminates the easy glance at your watch to determine how your pacing is going on each repeat.

We're still not organized into pace groups for these workouts, since most folks are pretty new, so Gilbert sent us out on the first one in a big mob. He suggested a minimum of 2 and a maximum of 5, especially if we were racing Pervasive on Sunday. His stated goal was to get a "baseline" speed for the new folks, and he expects us to run more of these, faster, as the training goes along. This 1000m course is a road course, with a gentle downhill at first, and then really flat after that initial decline. Last time I did this one, I did 5 repeats at about 4:25 per repeat. Today I would run by feel, and see where I am.

On the first repeat, I soon passed up most of the folks, and settled in a spot behind two women about 20 yards ahead of me, but ahead of anyone else. I was surprised that I started out with a personal best for this course. We did a walk/jog recovery across the soccer fields between each repeat. I hooked up with those two women, Sharlene and ?, for the next two repeats, which we slowed just slightly on. I was feeling good, and after a cup of Powerade, I found myself alone at the top of the course for repeat number four, except for the two fast guys in the group, Mason and another guy who I didn't get his name. It was scary, but even in the dark, I could tell that it was Blue flavor Powerade. That must be a bad sign, that I can discern the flavor of Powerade in a sort of blind taste test. I trailed the two fast guys for repeats number 4 and 5, returning to my initial repeat pace and then kicking it up a notch on my last one.

The splits: 4:18, 4:23, 4:23, 4:19, 4:12. Average split 4:19, average pace 6:57/mile! Frankly, I was stunned at that average pace, because it really didn't feel like I was blasting away at these this morning. That's faster than I ran 800m repeats on the track last time out.

I ran back to RunTex with Mason and Sharlene, which was fun as well. I did a quick bit of stretching once I got a dry shirt on, and even got a chat in with Gilbert about Saturday and Sunday's plans. Gilbert told me, after we talked about the Chicago people all having big PR's, that at Freescale it was my time to have a big PR. I hope I perform there as my training seems to be showing.

Rest of this week is easy until Sunday. Thursday another easy one hour recovery run, Friday is cycle + gym, Saturday is easy 30 minutes and stretching. I'll go drive the Pervasive course today or tomorrow, just to remember all the twists and turns of the hilly portion of the race, and then it's just time to focus and run a good race there for the first time.

For the day, 6.7 miles, with 5K of intervals in the middle at 6:57 average pace.