I realized after writing yesterday’s post that I hadn’t actually written about yesterday’s run.  It was six miles on the treadmill, at my new “easy” pace.  And it felt tough! It was fine for the first couple of miles, and it was so nice to chat to Liv, as we hadn’t caught up for a few days.  We didn’t chat too much once I hit the four mile mark, I was struggling, and I think for the first time ever we just ran side by side, without saying anything.  Certainly NOT my definition of easy!

Yesterday’s easy pace had translated to 5.7-6.1mph on the treadmill for speed, so I approached today’s tempo run with a healthy dose of hesitation.

Those first three miles FLEW by, I couldn’t believe how easy they felt, and I felt some of my nervousness fading as my distance increased. The real test came once I hit 4.5 miles, I was just outside of my comfort zone, but still had another 1.5 miles before I could start slowing down.  I figured I would get to 6.7mph on the treadmill (my previous highest speed for a tempo run) and see how I felt.  My B plan was to bring it back down to an easy pace after a couple of minutes at 6.7mph if needed, and just run a bigger portion of my 7 miles at an easy pace. My mantra for the run was “trust the training” over and over again.  I just needed to have some faith that my new training paces were actually appropriate for my current fitness level, even if my head was telling me otherwise.  That mantra must have worked because I did it, I finished that scary 7 mile tempo run! Woohoo! I even felt, at mile 6, that I could perhaps have run another minute or two before slowing down.  I decided instead I would slow down to 6.0mph (10:00 min/mile pace) instead of my planned 5.7mph speed. So my final stats for my run were:

Distance: 7 miles

Time: 1:09:24

Pace: 9:55

My plan for my next tempo run will be to have a shorter warm up, and .3 miles at each speed, rather than .2

My favorite song on my play list  today was “Push It’ from Salt-n-Pepa, it felt very appropriate for today’s temp run!

Liv and I are running the Super Sunday 4 Miler this Sunday, it sort of snuck up on me, I’d totally forgotten about it! We definitely are not going for the polar bear prize (least amount of clothing), but thought we might try to find some superhero shirts for the run.  I headed to Old Navy with the kids, and found these choices:

You’ll have to excuse the boy’s face in the photo above, he was rocking out to the song that was playing over the speakers, and I caught him at a bad moment! I loved the Wonder Woman shirt, but they didn’t have it in my size, so I went for the blue & red Superman shirt instead. Liv chose the Wonder Woman shirt, I can’t wait for Sunday, we’ll have to see what accessories we can find between now & then! I would love a cape, but don’t think I have time to whip out the sewing machine in the next few days.

I’m really looking forward to the weekend’s running, I have 9 miles planned on Saturday, and I think the race will be fun on Sunday, I’ll have to see if I can get some photos of the runners trying to win that polar bear prize. Brrrrrr!!!!

Have you ever dressed up for a race? Do you like any old-school songs for running?