The Fool(s) On The Hill

Happy Birthday, Sir Paul! Mr. McCartney is 65 today. Hard to believe, isn't it? I am an unapologetic Beatles fan, and I have long celebrated Paul and John's birthdays by playing Beatles tunes on my various entertainment platforms on those days. While we may not have been "fools" this morning for running the Secret Hill workout, we were indeed on the Hill, so that Beatles tune is most appropriate today. Now, I've got to go and select a new Beatles tune to commit to memory on guitar and voice. Maybe "I've Just Seen A Face."

With apologies to Jan's work with "The Secret" DVD/Multi-platform inspirational/motivational megalith, I finally learned about the Secret...Hill workout this morning. I had either ducked it or missed it the few times it's happened this spring, and as a rule, one is not allowed to know of the specific location of said Secret Hill until and unless you participate in said workout.

My Garmin is officially toast (sigh...), so I ran with "just" a watch this morning. A goodly number of fall marathoners and others took off on time from RunTex for the hilly adventures ahead. Weather was as usual. But, I might becoming accustomed to the heat a little bit. 79 degrees didn't feel as bad today as it did a week ago. Maybe I was just sleepy, instead. :-) We cruised gently over to the parking lots off of Robert E. Lee and did our drills and strides, and Gilbert met us at that point and sent us further on up the road. Since I had no firm idea where we were headed, I trailed along midpack, and was kicked around a little bit by the long hill that climbs up from Rbt. E. Lee to the Secret Street. It was yet another occasion that the newbie might say, "Wow! Great hill workout!" essentially before the workout officially began. I know that's how I was after my first Wilke workout 3 years ago. :-)

Gilbert had parked at the end of the shallower portion of the long hill climb, but before the slight turn onto the steeper climb that finishes the repetition. We grabbed a cup of water/Accelerade, and then G asked us to knock out 4 repeats, no timing involved, with a concentration on form (lifting the knees, strong push off, drive the arms, etc.). After the 4 full repeats, there would be more fun stuff to follow. Okey dokey.

We all jogged down to the start of the repeat, and we were off. I hung out in the middle of the pack, but usually closed on whoever had started ahead of me, so I was happy with my performance. This workout is similar in design to Wilke, with an eye to building leg strength, but the road is kinder for longer. It's a longer hill, nearly twice as long, but I sort of enjoyed the work this morning. The fact that it slants off sort of slaunchwise keeps you from seeing the whole path at once, and that helps you to compartmentalize the repetitions into manageable bite-sized chunks. Sooner than I expected, I was done with my 4 repeats, and launched into the extra stuff. Even though it wasn't about time today, I was happy to note that I actually slightly improved my time up each repeat throughout the morning. I made some "Wilke noises" at the end of number 4, but I did not slow down. Victory!

As at Wilke, we did 3 repeats running backwards up the steeper final bit of the course, with the first backwards running going the full distance (about 50-100 yards, I estimate), and then 2 final backwards running repeats going just up to halfway (which was most of the really steep part of the course). That backwards running absolutely burns your quads! We finished off with 3 shorter uphill striders, which actually helped my legs to rejuvenate a bit. G tortured a few folks by making them run up the hill while he held them back with a harness and elastic band device. I'm thankful that I was not chosen for such special treatment. Rich and Frank had that fun, though, and did good jobs of running against serious resistance.

Some more fluids later, and it was time to head back. I paired up with Amy, and we had a nice chat on the way back, at a reasonable cooldown pace. It was around 2.2 miles each way for warmup/cooldown. My legs felt pretty burnt on the way back, especially my quads, but that's the way they're supposed to feel, so I'll score this as a successful outing.

Endurox and full stretching later, my day was done. I'll guess that we covered around 7.4 miles total today (Frank had a slightly higher number, but I usually just give myself a standard 800 meters for all the drills, and that, along with not counting the weird distance that accumulates while at the water cooler, accounts for most of the difference). Tomorrow is a recovery run, 40-50 minutes, nice and easy, and a gym visit (core/legs). Wednesday is apparently 1000's on the track, which are entirely different than doing them on the Zilker road course. Should be a party!