Good Day to Stay Inside with the A/C

Today: 17 miles

Week: 17 miles

Workout: 10.5 miles in Central Park on the bridle path and various pedestrian paths, 6.5 miles w/WSY up West Drive to track, 6x400s with 300 recovery.

I did the 10.5 miles with Bruno and Farbod. We were running just under 7:30/mile. If it wasn't for the shade along the run and the breeze, I probably would have skipped the WSY workout. The weather today was extremely uncomfortable. My 400s averaged in the high 70 second range.

The best part of the workout? The Gatorade that Bruno had waiting for us at the end!

1000 Meter Repeats

West Side YMCA Road Runner Club

(WSY)

Today: 10 miles

Week: 10 miles

Workout: 3.5 mile warm-up in Central Park, run from the West Side Y to West Side Hwy bike path & 59th St, head north, 5x run 3:45 hard (a little more than 1000 meters, under 6:00/mile), and run a 1:50 recovery at a nice slow pace.

I ran the workout with Joe, Farbod, and Bruno. I thought I wouldn't feel too good because of the 19 miles I ran on Saturday, but I felt fine. Before the workout, we received our new West Side Y running singlets. I must say we looked pretty damn cool wearing them.

Mile Repeats

Today: 12 miles

Week: 12 miles

Workout: 3.5 mile warm up on my own in Central Park, 1 mile warm up with WSY Running Club counterclockwise from the Y to the middle of 72nd St Transverse, 3x1 mile repeats (2 clockwise, 1 counterclockwise), 3 minutes of jogging between the miles, 3.5 mile cool down.

The 1st and 3rd mile repeats going clockwise were slightly downhill, which makes the time on the 2nd mile surprising since we were going the opposite direction, slightly uphill. My times were 5:44, 5:25, and 5:34. Bruno, Farbod, Joe, and I were tightly bunched on the first two mile repeats. We got a little spread out on the last one. I was hurting on the last one. I thought that I was going to be around 5:50, so I was pleasantly surprised when I looked at my watch. I could tell that everyone was working hard because there was very little talking going on.

I'm going to remember this workout when I start hurting in the Team Championship race in a couple of weeks. It will remind me to keep pushing through the pain, and good results will follow.

I did the cool down with Bruno and Farbod. I would not have gone by myself. I felt completely depleted of any kind of energy after the last mile repeat. Even now, as I sit here in front of my computer, I feel a little dizzy and nauseous. I wish I had a camera. Everybody looked like they had just run a muddy cross country race. The ground was wet, and there were a couple of muddy sections we had to run through.

Tempo Run

Today: 10 miles

Week: 25 miles

Workout: 4 miles from 63rd St on the west side of Central Park, around the lower loop to Engineer's Gate, across the bottom of the reservoir to West Drive and back to the YMCA, 1 mile warm up with WSY to 81st Street, 4-mile tempo run around the top of Central Park to 72nd Street Transverse and East Drive, 1 mile cool down around the lower loop.

I ran the first 4 miles at 7:30/mile. I did the 4-mile tempo in 26:42 (6:41/mile). But the first mile was probably close to 7:30-7:45, and the last 1.5 miles was probably close to 6:00/mile. I ran first mile of the tempo run with a group, the 2nd mile of the tempo run by myself, and the last two miles were done with Bruno, or chasing Bruno. I felt great on the tempo run despite the humidity and quick pace.

Speed Ladder

Today: 9 miles

Week: 9 miles

Workout: 4 miles on bridle path and reservoir, 1 mile YMCA to West Side Hwy bike path, intervals of 1200, 1000, 800, 600, 400, and 200 meters with 2 blocks jog in between each. 1 mile cool down back to YMCA.

16 weeks until the NYC Marathon!

The 4 miles I did before the speed ladder made a huge difference. I was warmed up and ready to go on the first interval. Usually I'm trying to get warmed up on the first interval, and it's always my slowest. The distances of each interval were only approximations. We had to judge the distance using blocks, using the scale of 20 blocks = 1 mile. Before we head out on the run, we tried to go over how many blocks each interval would be. For example, our first interval was supposed to begin on 59th Street and end at 44th Street. Then, we were supposed to jog to 42nd Street. Some people wrote the streets on their arms.

I thought I had memorized where we were supposed to begin and end each interval. However, I missed the end of one of the intervals because I didn't see the street sign and ran one block too far. These were my times for each interval: 1200 (4:20), 1000 (3:22), 800 (3:06), 600 (1:42), 400 (1:19), 200 (0:46). The rest between each interval was about a minute. I think the 800 was the one where I ran a block too far. Anyway, it was a really good workout. I probably would not have run as fast as I did if I hadn't been chasing Bruno for most of the workout.

After everyone finished the intervals, we were all resting and Stacy described this new plank workout she has been using. I thought she was just sharing it. But we ended up DOING the workout on the grass! There's nothing like doing planks after a hard interval workout.

Bruno's Beer Mile

On the roof of Bruno's apartment.

Bruno's Beer Mile (with a 70s theme) was a huge success. As someone who didn't participate, I can say that it was thoroughly entertaining. The people who dressed up in a 70s theme looked great. I thought I might regret not taking part, but after seeing how difficult it was for some people to finish, I am 100% sure I made the right decision.

A beer mile consists of running 4 laps on the track, but the runner (or should I say the drinker) must drink one can of beer before each lap. If I listened carefully, I could hear all that beer sloshing around in everyone's stomach. The winner finished in just over 7 minutes! Are you kidding me?! The people who finished in 10 or 20 minutes were just as impressive. If I had participated, I'm sure it would have taken me about an hour to finish. Everyone finished just in time. As we were cleaning up, two police officers on bicycles rode past us.

After the race, we walked over to Bruno's apartment and enjoyed the amazing view from the roof of his apartment. At some point, Farbod came up with the crazy idea to climb the water tower on the roof. When Farbod asked me if I wanted to go, a small voice in my head said, "Yeah, go ahead, it will be fun!" But a much louder voice in my head said, "WTF! Are you crazy?!" I took the advice of the louder voice. Bruno and Joe, on the other hand, took Farbod up on his offer, and the next thing I know, the three of them were scaling the ladder. I kept waiting for someone to end up IN the water tower. It looked rather old, and I wasn't sure it would hold three people. Fortunately, everyone made it up and back down without incident. When and where will the next beer mile take place? Who knows, but it will be tough to top this one.

West Side Hwy

Today: 9 1/2 miles

Week: 9 1/2 miles

21 Weeks Until the NYC Marathon

OK. I'm a little shocked at the moment. Imagine my surprise when I saw that there were actually people who signed up to follow this blog! Suddenly, I feel a little pressure to make the blog mildly entertaining. Obviously, just blogging about my workouts is not going to be enough. I'm going to rely heavily on my fellow running club members for their witty conversations and suggestions for this blog.

Upon meeting everyone at the Y, one of the first things Stacy announced was that there would be a change in the Wednesday workout. We would not be doing mile repeats on Wednesday because of the Corporate Challenge. Yes!!! (I mean...DAMN! I was sooooo looking forward to that workout.)

Today's workout: run to the bike (oops, I mean running) path along the West Side Hwy, run 30 minutes downtown, turn around, and come back. It seemed simple enough before I started. I didn't want to run too hard because I intend to run the 1500 meter race at Randall's Island tomorrow. I figured I would settle into a comfortable pace. Bruno and Farbod were running a little too quick for me, so I ran solo. After turning around and heading back, I felt good and picked up the pace. Despite my best intentions, I ended up running a little too fast. Oh well. We'll see what happens tomorrow. Maybe it was the humidity or something else, but my legs felt drained after the run. Although, I don't think I felt as bad as Farbod who seemed to be limping a little and Denie who was complaining about his left buttocks. (Don't ask me about it. I only report what I hear.) Erika wasn't injured, but she shared her freakish shin muscle and her "tennis" muscle with us.

After everyone had finished with the run, Stacy decided that we would do some repeats around the baseball fields on Wednesday. Then, we will be going to the Boat Basin for a little relaxation AND to celebrate David's birthday!

In case you haven't seen Farbod's video of the Mini 10K on YouTube, what are you waiting for?! Check it out! I'm sure Farbod is a great doctor, but I think he has a future as a photographer or videographer.