Two Laps at a Time

Wednesday's fun with Gazelles was 800m repeats. Weather was the now-usual high humidity, drizzle, rain, drizzle, humidity arc that we've grown to know and love over the last few weeks. The warmup was pleasant, though, and for a change, we could easily get through the low water crossing near Austin High. I guess the water levels have dropped over the last few days in Town Lake?

Drills and then the 50/50/50... strider lap and we were ready to go. Gilbert divided us up into big bunches, and my group was sent out to start at about 3:40/800m. We were to do between 6 and 8 repeats. I led the first repeat, and we nailed the pace. It was gratifying to get back to that level of pacing after struggling a little last week. I drifted back into the pack for numbers 2 and 3, but we nailed those repeats as well. On number 4, I was back up front, and went too fast on the first lap, but managed to dial it back enough that we finished more or less on time. I'm pretty sure it was repeat number 4 that had the heaviest rainfall. I did a better job on number 5. After that, Gilbert told us to stop at 6, and to "drop the bomb" a little on the last repeat. So, Brian took off with Amy, and I trailed along behind them. I almost caught Amy at the very end of the repeat, but I was pleased with my time nonetheless. It was a pretty good set of repeats, and a very consistent set on time.

Stats: 3:39, 3:39, 3:38, 3:38, 3:39, 3:19. Overall average about 3:35, or 7:13/mile. Most of the repeats were at 7:20/mile pace, though.

After the repeats, we were supposed to go over and do 10 pullups. Sadly, I still can't do that many. I'm getting better, and I actually did 4 in a row before giving out this time. Still, that's not great. I did another couple of pullups in another "set," but I was done after 6 total. At least I have something else to shoot for, right? :-)

Colleen and I ran back after that, and had a nice talk. Amazingly, the low water crossing was flooded out by the time we headed back. I guess they've opened up the floodgates upstream again. It's sort of scary how fast water finds a new level when it's unleashed from its barriers. A good stretching session with Colleen, Rachel and Lisa followed that as we recovered from the morning exertions. Another beautiful day with the Gazelles! For the day, about 6.8 total miles. This week looks like it will tip over 40 miles again before dropping a little bit next week. We'll see.