Tag Archives: mile training

Racing the Mile & a Mountain Marathon this week.

Posted on August 9, 2011 by Aaron K

It is another gorgeous morning in Boulder.  Sunrise is getting later though, which is a bummer, but we still have a couple good months of awesome light mornings left.

I warmed up for 6 miles with Eric W. this morning, and then hit the track for a few short intervals at mile goal pace – 4:40.

I did 4 x 100 to get the turnover going, and surprisingly felt good starting out right on pace at 16 and 17 for each one.

Then I did an 800, a 400, and a 200.  My main goal was to run an 800 at race pace to get a feel for it.  And wow…I got a feel for it.  And the feeling wasn’t all that amazing.  Meaning after the first 400 meters at 69 seconds I started to feel a healthy burning sensation throughout my body and could tell I was taking myself to a place where I have not been before, or in a long long time.

That second lap of the 800 felt steady and controlled, but also, kind of scared me for the mile.  Because if it hurts like that in only the 2nd lap, what am I going to feel for laps 3 and 4?

Its kind of unsettling.  But oddly kind of exciting also.  I’m intrigued to find out what it feels like to try and hold that pace for the full mile.  And I’m certain its going to hurt.  And for some reason I don’t think I fully understand, I am looking forward to that.

I did the 800 in 2:21.  So pretty close to right on pace.

Then I rested for 3 or 4 minutes.

Then I ran a 400 in 65 seconds.  Huh…that was faster than planned, but felt easy relative to the 2:21 800.

Then after some rest I did a 28 second 200.

Still not sure why I feel compelled to run 200′s so fast, because I can’t even come close to holding that pace for any longer distances intervals.  But for some reason I gravitate toward that speed on the 200′s.

After that short session of pain in the chest, I’m not feeling all that confident in being able to hit a 4:40 mile.  But I’m going to give it my best shot, because I do believe its possible with the adrenaline of race day, and I’m curious to find out if it is.

I’m fairly certain I can run a 4:50 right now, and I could definitely run a 5:00.  But 4:40, based on the paces of my workouts, seems to be pushing the edge a bit for me.  Which I guess is why I’m motivated by it.  We’ll find out Thursday night on Pearl street!

I believe I could get my mile time down below 4:20 with another year or so of consistent training for it.  Not sure if I’m motivated enough to do that type of training or not.  But I do enjoy getting at least one flat speed session in each week, even when training for longer distances.  And I plan to continue that.

Speaking of longer distances, I’m also planning on running a marathon this weekend up Kings peak and back in Utah.  So I’ll be racing twice this week, and my pace for the 2nd should be close to double my pace for the first.  Hopefully an all out mile effort doesn’t zap me too much for the marathon two days later.  How bad could it be though right?  It’s less than 5 minutes of running after all.

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Mile training pains and gains

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Aaron K

Sometimes directly after a 28-30 second 200 meter repeat when my heart is pounding and the nausea approaches rapidly, I ask myself as I walk or sloooowly plod around the curve, “Why the heck do you want to try and run a faster mile?”  And for the next 30 seconds I am nearly convinced that mile training sucks and I’ll just go back to training only for 50K to 50 mile events.

But then 30 seconds later I’m running another 200 meter repeat and loving the speed…until about the last 15 meters when the cycle and questions start over again.

Other times, when I have some company on the repeats, none of those questions pop up, and 28 seconds feels great.

Its an odd thing.

This morning I was able to start out the first couple 200′s with Patrick Hunt over at Fairview.  That was motivating enough to get me started right out the gate at 28′s.

Then I was on my own for the next 10 of them.  Halfway through, 90 seconds was still not quite enough recovery, and mentally I was caving in a bit as well.

Then I was able to jump in with Kenyon Newman and Bob on the last few, and I was right back to running 28′s.  Granted, I had a little more recovery between the last few.  But it was odd that at that point I felt like I could have done a few more at 28 whereas earlier I was falling off pace hard.

Here were my splits for the day.

4 X 100 to get moving: 19, 19, 18, 15

14 X 200: 28, 29, 28, 29, 31, 30, 29, 32, 32, 32, 33, 31, 28, 28

Felt good to get a decent set of fast running in the legs.  Next up is a saturday session of 400′s with some 200′s to finish off.  I’m shooting for 69-70 second quarters and will see how many of those I can hold.  My last set of 400′s I was averaging 73′s a couple weeks ago, so its going to be a bit of a stretch I think.  But I’m going to give it a shot.  Because if I’m going to come anywhere close to a 4:40 at the pearl street mile in a couple weeks I’m going to need to be able to hold the pace for a set of 400′s.

So how is this all going to help me run a 50 miler in steamboat in september you ask?

I have no idea.  But I find myself drawn to speed work at this point.  At least I’m still getting in a 15-20+ mile run in each week.  I see the 50 miler as a fun day running through the mountains.   I guess I’m not all that ambitious about running hard and fast at that distance at this point.  I really just want to complete a 50 miler.

And after last saturday when I bailed on my planned 24 mile route after only 16.5 miles of running in the heat, it makes me wonder a bit about that.  But that was in 90 degrees so I guess I can’t beat myself up too bad.  The heat was getting brutal.

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