Trail Sprints

BE ONE WITH THE WOODS!!

Tonite was track and we had a specific regement to follow. The schedule is emailed to us on Tuesday so we can figure our splits before hand. Mine was 4x200 @110% of my mile time with 100 recovery between. Then 6x1 mile @85% with 200 recovery.

Honestly it sounded kind of mundane to run 6...1 mile intervals on an oval track ....that is 24 laps!

Instead I decided to do Trail sprints but as somewhat the same schedule as track.
I went to Pineland because I felt the terrain would be better to pull of the intervals. The trails are a bit more open and each uphill is rewarded with a down hill to counteract the change in speed. On this terrain, anything in the 8 minute pace or better takes some good effort.

Instead of 4x200, I started with 800,400,200,200 and used perceived effort instead of pace because of the uneven terrain. The sprints went well and I felt the burn much more than track runs.

Next I did the 6x1 miles but more as a tempo style. my plan was to do the first one at 85%, then 90%, 95%,95%,90% and the last back at 85%. It didn't work quite as I planned but I did run the fastest two in the middle.

At one point during the recovery 200 I found myself face to face with a white tail deer. He just stood there in the trail and stared at me....I stared back....finally I said, "are you going to move or what?" He looked at me funny and then ran off.

Total workout felt very tough and rewarding. I ran a total of about 10 miles counting the cooldown and the recoveries.

Sprints:.........aver..max
800...9:19pace...131---152
400...6:02pace...140---158(pretty big downhill)
200...8:08pace...139---155
200...8:25pace...146---158 (pretty big uphill)

Tempo/intervals

6xmile:
11:09pace...143-153
10:24pace...150-158
7:19pace...147-156
8:20pace...154-165(big hill here)
9:02pace...153-160
9:19pace...147-160
12:17pace...138-153(this was mile 7..I added one because I ran too fast on the 6th for the tempo)

1 mile cooldown and went home and swam some laps for more cooldown.

This whole workout felt great....I sure was tired. Pineland is a perfect place for track workouts!