Monday, July 14, 2008

Tempo Run

Today called for a 25 minute tempo run.  I decided on my plan for the run by using heart rate instead of pace.  With the injury, I know I've lost a good deal of my training base so I'm not sure what speed my 5K/10K/half-marathon race paces are right now...but the HRM gives me an idea of how my body is responding to the pace I'm running.

Today's plan:  run on my 4 mile neighborhood loop - the first mile at a slow pace (HR <>
I do not do many tempo runs.  I'm normally either slogging away at a nice, slow pace or hitting the track to throw in faster intervals.  So this was definitely a nice, welcome addition to my training.  Unfortunately, on the training plan I only do Tempo Runs during the first three weeks - and I missed last week's - so again, I won't be doing these often during the next few months.

My first mile was awesome!  I kept my HR low (avg 143) and finished the first mile in 10:21.  I then pushed the pace up a bit and got my HR to 160 pretty quickly.  It was really great to be "running".  About 1/3 mile into my tempo pace, there is a really steep hill, so I had to slow my pace quite a bit in order to keep my HR in the 165 range.  After that, I think the high temperatures/humidity along with the hill got to me, and my pace started to slow while trying to keep my HR in the 165 range.  I ended up covering 2.5 miles in the 25 minutes of "tempo run" which is a 10:00/mile pace.  I slogged out the last .85 miles of the loop in 11:13 - in a desperate attempt to bring my HR back down to 150.  I couldn't do it - my avg HR during that last part of the run was 163.

My finishing time was 46:37 for the 4.4 mile loop - a 10:32/mile pace.  Looking in my training log, I found that in April I was running this loop as an "easy run" in under 44 minutes with an average heart rate in the low 150s.  Of course, the temperatures were in the 40s - not high 70s!

Tomorrow will be a rest day - and a scheduled massage!!!  I hope the massage therapist can work out the knot and other issues in the tendons behind my right knee.  I want to run without discomfort again!

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