I finally conquered the track

Soooo yeah. When I got up on Tuesday morning I could definitely feel Monday's run, so I decided that my cross-training day would be a yoga day. Last night I did 45 minutes of yoga and pilates. It was great for stretching my legs and working my abs, which I noticed have gotten stronger since I started training. I felt a lot better about my running life this morning, relative to the past few mornings.

But there was no time to revel in the moment; Wednesdays are track practice days. These are usually pretty brutal. The whole point is to run short distances at faster paces than you run longer distances. Theoretically this helps you to gain speed on your long runs. It's painful, which means I'd like to discredit it, but I really can't. I do think the track practices are fairly instrumental.

Today's workout was the following:
1 mile warm-up (slow)
3x400 (3/4 mi.)
3x400
3x400
4x100 (sprints/strides)
1 mile cool-down (very slow!)

All together, 4.5 miles. I have to say, I was proud of my pace on the 1200's. I don't know what my time was on the first one, but on the second two I finished somewhere between 5min40 and 5 min 45, so somewhere around a 7:30 minute mile pace. The last timed mile I ran was (I think) around 7 minutes 45 seconds or so, so I've definitely gotten a little bit faster. The "strides" at the end, I just had to laugh at myself. I try so hard! I just can't sprint.

Overall, I felt good today. I felt like I was fast, consistent, and didn't hurt too much. I hate to say this, but I kind of liked it!