Week 1: Pace Run

Well, this is the week where I officially shift from a "miles per week" mentality to an "hours of training per week" process. It's the beginning of my 13-week plan to the IM70.3 World Championship Race. I met with my coach yesterday who helped me strategize on how to put my weekly schedule together. That's just it...He cautioned us not to look ahead to October, November, or even the beginning of September. Just work a week or two in advance. Because I consider myself a runner and a marathoner first and foremost, I will schedule those workouts first and build everything else around those. The next big thing to schedule is the long bike ride that will usually take place on Saturdays or Sundays. From there, I will fill in swim workouts and additional cycling.

This week, I have 10.5 hours to fill. Believe me it won't be hard with a 20-mile run and 40 mile bike ride scheduled this week. That's almost 6 hours in two workouts!

The week started off with a 10-mile Pace Run and I can FINALLY say that I ran it correctly. Run slow the first two miles, find my Marathon Goal Pace for the next 6 miles and then "drop the bomb" for the last two and finish fast. I did just that today with the assistance of Mike and Thon. Here are my split times. As per usual, the Garmin isn't perfect, but it's a great indicator!
I finished with a little steam left in the engine...not much, but it felt good to run it correctly.


Mile 1 9:58
Mile 2 8:54
Mile 3 8:50 (very odd--Mike clocked 8:15 and Thon clocked 8:10--not sure what happened with the watch as we were side-by-side)
Mile 4 7:51
Mile 5 7:42
Mile 6 7:54
Mile 7 7:45
Mile 8 8:09
Mile 9 7:36
Mile 10 7:26
Mile 11 (.12 miles) 7:10

Total 10.12 miles
1:23 flat** 8:12 pace per mile

**I stopped my watch at our waterstop under the bridge for about a minute