One very hard workout

This morning in the freezing temperatures I may have done one of my hardest workouts ever.

I know you are dying to know what the workout was just look at the next section.

 

• 4 mi. tempo with a 4 min. recovery
  
• 2 x ¼ mi. with 1 min. recovery
  
• 2 mi. tempo with 2 min. recovery
  
• 1 x ¼ mi. with 1 min. recovery
  
• 2 x 1 mi. with 1 min recovery
  
• 1 x ¼ mi. with 1 min recovery
  

 

To be totally honest, I didn't come up with this workout myself. I actually found it on Tim Budic's Blog when he posted some of his old marathon workouts. The first time that I read it, I knew it was one that I wanted to try.

For this workout, I headed out to the Huntersville Business Park. With a 4 and 2 mile tempos, I could not bare the idea of running that many laps on track. Pretty much it would have been like being in the spin cycle.

For the 4 mile and 2 mile tempos, I did the big outer loop. This loop includes several up hills and down hills but the run essentially starts and finish in the same location. The quarter mile repeats were run against a hill so I was either charging up the hill for 1 and 3 quarters. 2 and 4 quarters were downhill.

If you totally up the mileage, you get 9 miles of hard running. That's definitely a lot. What I really struggled with during the workout was the cold temp. I was bundled up like the Michelin Man which caused me to struggle a little. With the extra clothing, I just couldn't get my arms working normally.

 

Workout Item	Time	Avg. Heart Rate	Max Heart Rate
4 mi. tempo	25:39	173	202
¼ mi.	1:26	144	166
¼ mi.	1:21	154	175
2 mi. tempo	12:15	162	173
¼ mi.	1:30	153	172
1 mi. tempo	6:05	163	171
1 mi. tempo	6:07	158	166
¼ mi.	1:29	153	163

 

Looking at the splits, I also suspect that I was starting to get a little lactic acid build up. I really started to tail off during the last couple of intervals.

As I am setting here, I am really glad this is the only time that I have to do this workout during this training cycle.

 

 

Tales from the Cool Down Runner.