Zilker 2000's, The Longest Repeats [Edited 9:45 pm]

This morning featured the usual weather, with very minor misting/drizzle a couple of times. It was mostly warm and muggy, of course. A pretty good-sized crowd left RunTex early (5:45am) for Zilker Park and the 2000m repeats around the soccer fields. I hung out with some of the newer Gazelles on the way over, chatting about various training questions. For a change, we actually did the warmup run at a sane pace today, which was nice. (1.35 miles, 9:44 pace). Drills drilled, it was time to see what Gilbert had in mind. He called for 4 x 2000m for the marathoners, with the last one faster than the others. He warned us that he would be looking for improvement in a month when we do this workout next. I decided to do 3 x 2000, just because I don't have a fall marathon in the picture. We were split into a couple of groups, and we were off!

The City is doing construction projects all over Zilker, and one of the issues with that is that they dump water from somewhere on the site into the street and drains, right in the path of our run. It made me a little nervous about footing for a while after going through all that water, but I suppose it didn't do any real harm. I followed along for the first half of the first repeat, and then slowly found myself moving up on those folks leading the way. By the end of the first repeat, I was among the first few folks to finish. On the second repeat, I again drafted off of Brad and Dennis, and then pulled ahead on the short climb and finished a little ahead. And, after a quick cup of powerade, the third repeat was my fast lap, and I led almost the whole repeat except for Dennis passing me in the last quarter mile. After that, I was used up, and called it a day. Turns out, Gilbert also decided that 3 was enough for most folks anyway, so I didn't even have to cheat and sneak away. I forgot to mention the best thing about the repeats. On the first repeat, as we turned a corner near the new trail construction, we ran by a large snake lying in the road. It was maybe a 5 footer, and was very still. We all ran by with an extra burst of adrenaline, but I forgot about it soon enough. What I should have realized is that it was alive, because it was gone by the time we came around on lap 2. Exciting!

I clocked the distance all three times at 1.19 miles, so it's a tiny bit short of true 2000m, but since we run the same course for this workout every time, all that matters is a direct comparison to historical data. My splits were: 8:53, 8:43, 8:26, an average of 8:40 per lap or 7:14/mile. My record for 3 x 2000 was 8:36 avg laps, so I was slightly off my best. Not bad, though.

My HR recovery was pretty good on the 2:00 rest periods between repeats, so that was a good sign. After a cup or two of powerade and water, I started the cooldown run back with Brian. The group had scattered, due to differing paces, so we were the only peeps in our pace tribe left. Again, the cooldown run was actually fairly restrained. (1.4 miles, 8:55 pace).

For the day, 6.85 miles, with 6000m of repeats at high speed in the middle. I had a good stretching session this morning, and really enjoyed my Endurox and Powerade afterwards. Turned out to be a pretty good running day, despite my weirdly intermittent night of sleep last night.

And the gym visit?

Gymmin'

I felt much better before the gym workout, and ended up having a good workout, too. Core exercises included the floor exercises, the back raises and oblique raises (with weights) on the "rack," and Alex's medicine ball twists. I moved up to the 3 kg medicine ball today, about 6.6 pounds(?), and still did 2 x 45 seconds, but it was harder today. This was upper body day, and I can feel myself getting a little stronger each visit. I increased repetitions on bicep curls, and handled the other exercises pretty well. This is the hardest workout day, with a speedwork session and then the gym, but I feel pretty good right now.

Tomorrow, I plan on running around 10:00am to simulate the conditions I expect at the Silicon Labs Relay (I've got the anchor 5K leg), a nice and easy 5-7 miles. And, of course, a gym visit.