Speed Work…it’s hard, but it works!

So in years past I have not focused on speed. I was always worried about distance, just surviving the 26.2. Well, this year I have a new lease on life (and training) it’s about speed…pushing my body. What can I sustain? In the fall I did a half marathon at what I thought was the top of my game. Finished in 1:46:01, a PR by approx. 5mins. I was on cloud nine!! A week later I pulled my hamstring and took some time off. After that injury I built back to where I thought I was and set my sights on the Boston Marathon (in April.)

In January, I began to do some indoor track workouts with Team Envision on Wednesdays at MIT. Despite the tight radius (8 laps=1 mile) I did a few workouts there and saw good results at 1 mile repeats. I was averaging 7:41min/mile pace. That pace was comfortably hard and I would go home and sleep like a baby!!

In February, I did quite a bit of fartlek running. I method of speed+recovery where you are running hard constantly and then a short rest period between efforts. I was doing these LT (Lactate Threshold) efforts at approx. 7:35 pace (note, improvement from 7:41 in January.)

In early March, I did a few weeks of Yasso 800s (an 800meter repeat where you build up to 10x and take the average pace and that number should *closely* equate to your marathon pace, eg. If you want to run a 3 hour marathon, you should be able to do 10x800 with an average pace of 3:00mins.) So I did these at the outdoor MIT track by myself yielding 3:36/800 one week, and 3:31/800 the next. Great results.

Now here we are at the end of March (one month out from the Boston Marathon) and I did another (outdoor) track workout last night. The workout was 1.5mi w/u, 6x1mi @LT pace (400m recovery), and 1mi c/d. I head off to the first Team Envision outdoor track session this spring in Watertown. I did the w/u with the group and then headed off to do my 6x1mi workout (w/ 400m recovery) My splits were as follows:
7:26
7:23
7:23
7:23
7:22
7:14
AVG: 7:21:50
I am excited about TWO things here…
1.) my consistency. To hit 7:23s for three straight and then 7:22 for the next one. I thrive on consistency.
2.) The speed of my last mile. WOW…I *hoped* for a 7:20 effort…and mostly just wanted to prove to myself that I would not fade at the end. To do the last effort at :08 faster than the first 5 has me speechless!

Speed Works.
Still not sure what to expect at Boston next month, but I still believe that I have a lot of work to do before then. Mostly, I need to decide on a race day game plan and stick to it.