Speedy McSpeedy

Yesterday was a speed workout day with 8x400m on the table. The plan as it usually is on Wednesday is to drive home from the lab, pick Jason up downtown and drive over to the lakefront to get the workouts in. We both like doing speedwork on the lakefront path because for the obvious reasons that there is no traffic lights and traffic when just crossing regular side streets.

But then someone with short hair who is attempting to grow it out, forgot all barrettes/bandannas at home and so I had to leave work earlier, drive home (there was an accident on Rt. 59 and it took me over 30 minutes to go what usually takes about 5. I LOVE the suburbs and they're "We moved here for the traffic." Right. But let's not get into that shall we.) So right. Drove home and then picked up the JMan at the Division Blue line stop since I was so late and couldn't downtown to pick him up.

So to the lakefront path we went. We did this 2 weeks ago but had forgotten to charge the Garmin and so we had guesstimated what a 1/4 mile was. Yesterday we did a one mile warm up and then decided to do the repeats at the same place we had done them before to check ourselves. So we ended up being too long last time, but only by a couple of yards. Gotta love being able to pace out 8 min/miles. (We ran for 2 minutes at what we thought was an 8 min/mile).

So Yesterday with Garmin fully charged I set it up for Auto Lapping every 0.25 miles. The routine was do the interval for 0.25 miles, turn around, walk for 0.1, jog for 0.15 and repeat. I love the auto lap feature as it really made this so much easier. So they say to do these at your 5K pace. So I have now idea what that would be and I think I ended up thinking 7 min/mile and then each repeat should be about 1:45, but actually I think that is way too fast. Oh well. I get a number in my head and I stick with it. So here is how the 400s went :

1 - 1:36 ; 6:24 min/mile
2 - 1:43 ; 6:52 min/mile
3 - 1:43 ; 6:52 min/mile
4 - 1:40 ; 6:40 min/mile
5 - 1:42 ; 6:48 min/mile
6 - 1:43 ; 6:52 min/mile
7 - 1:42 ; 6:48 min/mile
8 - 1:40 ; 6:40 min/mile

So maybe (absolutely) too fast, but at least consistent and we were able to stick with it for the duration of the workout. We finished up with a mile cooldown (pretty slow) clocking a nice 6 miles for the night.

On the way home we stopped at Small Bar for Fat Tires and dinner....and since we have done this for the past two weeks we are saying that it's tradition now so we'll always have to treat ourselves after a good speed workout. We love Small Bar and our favorite waitress was there and so as always a good time was had there.

We got home and watched some American Idol voting off. I love dreadlocks, he's so flippin' goofy. Poor Chickeze, but I mean with that guy he was either super awesome, or super sucky. Gotta be more consistent than that.

In to the lab early today to work on some corrections for my analysis, and then same deal tomorrow but I have to make sure to get here on time because I'm meeting with my adviser earlyish. Tonight it's just 3 miles with strength. Maybe we'll really do the strength today. MAYBE. It takes like an extra 20 minutes, I don't know why I feel that it's such a hassle, I mean I'm already at the stupid gym.