Long Run with a little tempo thrown in

Last week Megan said that she and Mike were doing an 18 miler with 8 miles of tempo thrown in, I immediately jumped on it. Certainly, running with somebody else makes those miles go by so much faster.

My training plan had 20 miles so I was down to PDS a little early. Better to get in the extra mileage before the workout than afterwards. It is always a drag to keep putting the miles when everyone else is finishing.

A big group of us started out together and then we split into smaller groups with Jay, Steve and their group doing some speedy stuff. Chris and Billy were doing still different workouts.

Oh, by the way, Stan and Jenny if you are reading this post, nice work with the animal sounds this morning, but you guys know pay backs are coming. LOL

So after 10 miles for me, 8 miles for Mike and Megan, we were off on the 8 mile tempo from the Old Bell entrance. We headed down the greenway through McAlpine entrance. Then, we made a left and headed up the Harris Blvd section of the greenway. A mile and ½ later, we made the turn and headed back to the Old Bell entrance.

I reached down and push my Garmin from pace view to heart rate view. My heart rate was slowly climbing into the 160s and then 170s. With a mile left, my heart rage was pushing 175 which I think is kind of high for me considering that I was only running about 6:20 miles.

Overall, I was not feeling bad, but pushing any harder would only have pushed me into the red zone and probably have tanked the rest of the workout.

So I don't know maybe it is just the heat, maybe I have not adjusted to the harder runs, or maybe I am just getting older and the slowing down process is starting. I hope it is one of the first two item and not the last one.

 

Thoughts from the Cool Down Runner