First Workout Back

After receiving my running plan for the next three months from Coach Mark Hadley, I was ready to finally test the legs after the marathon with a workout. My goal for the next few weeks is to run workouts for fun, without wearing my Garmin or worrying about pace splits, and just running on feel. If that means even just jumping in random workouts, then so be it. Going on that mentality, and wanting to make things as casual and fun as possible, I decided to invite myself to Bill Shire's workout and even invited Mike Beigay for more company.

We met at 8am Saturday at McAlpine for some miles together. Being the Illinoisan that I am, I jumped out of the redmobile in shorts and my favorite yellow Craft t-shirt, and immediately Mike made fun of me for my lack of warm clothing. At that moment, I felt great and wasn't that cold, so I scoffed at Mike while Bill noted that they were Southerners and I was technically a crazy Northerner. Once we started running, the cold immediately hit me as a light breeze made the cool air even colder on my dry skin. My wrists immediately felt numb and I instantly regretted not at least wearing gloves. In the end, we ran a solid 5 miles of warmup and then I ran back to my car so I could find something in the bag of clothes I had stashed in my trunk, ready to go to Goodwill. I found an 80s style long sleeve that worked just fine.

Mike and Bill were planning on a 5 mile tempo, and after my long schedule of 10 hours standing and barely eating enough, I had decided on the warmup I would only do 4 miles. We started out, with Mike and I as the fearless leaders, and Bill sitting comfortably on my shoulder. We went out at a solid clip, and I felt pretty good. Towards the end of the tempo, I could feel soreness in my hip flexors, which I figured was a remnant from the marathon.

In the end, our splits were:

6:18
6:29
6:06
6:01

While my legs were tired, I was pleased with this workout. With Costa Rica in less than three weeks, I'm trying to build up my strength before I take over a week of some downtime as I enjoy time with my family and Garrett in the rainforest of Manuel Antonio. Upon my return from tropical paradise, training will become more regimented as I begin to build up for the USATF Club XC Champs and then the USATF Half Marathon Championships in Houston on January, 30th 2011.