4 Mile Tempo with Laurie

Goal:
4 mile tempo at 6:10 pace (should not be physically or mentally taxing)

Actual:
3 mile warmup
4 mile tempo in 23:50 (5:57 average) in 5:56, 6:10, 5:47, 5:57
3.1 mile cool down for 10 miles total

A four mile tempo at 6:10 pace was slated as my secondary workout of the week, so I treated it as such mentally.  I didn't really think too much about it except when I texted Laurie the night before to see if she'd be interested in joining me.  Fortunately she was, and we met up the following morning at 5:45AM in Dilworth to start the workout.  To switch things up, we decided against doing two loops of the Dilworth 2 Mile Speed Loop. Instead, we started on East Blvd's nice downhill and turned onto the flat terrain of the Sugar Creek Greenway.  We chatted it up on all the miles except for the fourth one, where the workout finally started to feel a little difficult.  I was supposed to go a little bit slower overall, but the legs felt good so I just followed the signs of my body.  I figured if Laurie and I could still talk that this meant it was a good pace for both of us.

Laurie and I both joked afterwards that we need to approach all workouts like this one--relaxed and not over-thinking it--because we ended up running faster than we expected.  Even though this was only a four mile tempo, I've really struggled with the 4-5 mile tempo ranges in the past because I come in with such high expectation and leave them feeling depleted and defeated.  Sure, the pace wasn't blazing fast, but I came out feeling confident which is the exact outcome I want/need to have.