Un-Official Personal Record

Just a quick entry here, I just wanted to write about my run last weekend. It was an 8 mile run, but more significantly I ran a 10k (6.2 miles) as fast as I could and then coasted the last 1.8 miles. My splits for the 10k were as follows:

Mile 1 - 7:57
Mile 2 - 7:55
Mile 3 - 8:00
Mile 4 - 7:59
Mile 5 - 8:21
Mile 6 - 8:30
Last .2 miles - 1:42
Total 10k time 50:24

If you look to the right you will see that my official PR (personal record - clocked in a race on an official course) for the 10k is 51:43. That was set just in March. A whole 1:19 slower than my run last weekend. By besting this in a training run where I wasn't even motivated by all the things a "race" involves has me VERY excited that breaking the 50 minute barrier in my Memorial Day race is a real possibility. Although I hit a bit of a wall at the 4 mile mark I didn't die off completely and I definitely didn't sprint or try to "finish strong" on my run which could have cut quite a bit else off. Also, after considering this during my run last night I realized that probably 80% of my runs are less than 4 miles. My body was hitting a wall because I don't train the longer distances as much.

In looking at my training log I am definitely seeing that I am ahead of where I was last fall. In the fall (Aug-Nov) 19 of my 37 training runs (51%) were slower than 9 min/mile pace where this spring (Mar-May) only 9 of my 33 training runs (27%) have been slower than that pace. If you wonder why that is such a magical number for me... My half-marathon was run at 9:05 pace to get me in just under 2 hours. My goal is a sub-4 hour marathon this fall so I don't want to train much slower than that on my short runs and no more than 20-30 seconds per mile slower on my long weekend runs. (You think this engineer gets caught up in the numbers sometimes?)

As for the poll, this is the last day so if you miss it, don't blame me. I will declare a winner tomorrow! I'm worried because for right now it is a tie and then I am back in the same boat. So, if you haven't voted, please do so. If you feel the need to change your vote, feel free to do so. But it all ends tomorrow morning... And don't worry, my wife had a good idea that whatever I don't do this time I could do for my second marathon... , and third, fourth, etc.

And BTW, for my weight, I've broken my plateau and I'm down in the 196 range again and seem to be dropping fast. Hopefully I can ride it all the way down to my goal without another plateau...