My goal of sub 4:00 1500-I will not stop until I reach my goal.

Good to see that things are looking up for you, eddy. You're a sophomore, right? You've got good things ahead of you as long as you keep at it (and listen to people like jonesy, haha).

Today was a delicious 20x400 outside, since randomly the NJ weather decided to do a flip turn and be 60 degrees out. Kinda rainy, REALLY windy. I could be happier about the times but I still got out there and did it.

Averaged probably 70 seconds, with two hammers on #9 and #16 being 66 and 68, with rest varying between 60 and 75 seconds.

Ran to the track with my team - 2 mi out, 2 mi back.

I will probably tack on some more this evening merely because my long run sucked. I didn't eat nearly enough and almost bit the dust on the treadmill doing it.

great to see you back eddy. just don't go to practice too often! that'll keep you healthy.

nice 20x4, boingo. good strength work at that pace and with short rests.

Monday: 12.5 ran 12 at 6:41 pace, 6:56 out (6:30s and 6:40s after a 7:43,7:11,6:58 start), 6:26 avg. back, closing in 6:03. essentially did 6 close to MP. felt not too hard, but got dehydrated. need to drink more water at night before morning runs.

tuesday: 13

a.m. 8.5 t/f track, 3x200 w/u-40,35,36 (100 rest);

12x400 (200 rest)-all 72-74, avg.73

5 sec/lap faster than two weeks ago. solo. no wind.

p.m. 4.5 very easy--8:40s. legs felt very good.

jonesy,

I am curious how you know that you were running .83 mile sections of a run? Also, how do you know that you are running 6:41, 7:26 for a mile in the middle of a 12 mile run?

Is it really helpful to be taking the split at every mile?

I feel like the 10 milers I do if it is 66 minutes I just put 6:35 pace, but I don't keep track of splits per mile.

Also, how do you know your mile splits for every mile in a LONG RUN?

If you are using a Garmin, I would recommend you stop. Or at least you should just note your distance, time and then from that ... pace. But looking at your pace every mile is going to drive you crazy and put too much stress on you.

Time your intervals, time your tempos, but I do my long runs and easy runs by time mostly. This is a time to use Badger miles!

You broke your ankle!?!? That's awful man. Sorry to hear.

Boingo and jonesy, you guys are both having some great workouts, albeit in different parts of your training right now. keep up the good work. i did a long run pretty hard on sunday and a stead state monday. my femur has been bothering me so i didn't want to risk doing two really hard workouts this week. i'll do one tomorrow and then race a 5k saturday.

darkness, I measured the .83M segment on gmaps pedometer, and as it's a curve it may be a little longer. It's slightly downhill for part of it on the way out. On the Sunday runs, the second one comes about five miles after the first one (don't remember exactly). I do those because I'm running on those days with the ABQ RR and they like to do those. As for the measurements on the 12 milers, those are on the dirt road along the Rio Grande and there are markers every quarter mile north of bridge for about 8 miles and then less consistent markers south of bridge street. You're right that I'm probably checking too often and in fact I only look at the mile markers on the return trip usually. But effort is such a hazy guideline for me that I find it better to keep an eye on the times there.

Real sorry about the bad luck, eddy. it's easy for that to happen in those night runs.

ummmmmmmmm....that was not me. I am running well...no ankles were broken.

I was wondering if that was really you or not, glad to see that it wasn't.

Training is far from great right now. I've been playing it really safe so as not to make my femur hurt more than it is. I only did one workout this week (10x600m with 90 seconds rest, ran 1:48 the whole way) and I decided not to race this weekend. I will probably focus on training and not race again until outdoors. Maybe hop in a road race sometime.

I'm not sure this has been stated yet, but I just can't bring myself to ready through 12 pages to make sure...

It would seem you are doing a workout....every day almost. Cut back on the small workouts that won't get you much (4 x 350 meter repeats?) and instead do a couple very quality workouts per week, have a long run (we do ours on Sunday) and bump that mileage up. I suppose that is one way you could improve....or atleast that is what I would do....but I'm a 10k runner. Still, I've run under 4:00 in the 1500, so I guess I know a little bit.

3 workout week for me, so no tempo run - I'm going to see if I can drop it in for about 20 minutes in tomorrow's long run.

Weds: pure speed stuff.

3.5 mi wu/cd

350: 47.5

300: 41

250: 34

200: 28

150: 21

about 6 minutes between reps. definitely the fastest i've ever done this. i always feel like i'm going to vomit my brains out after the 250.

Fri: Cut a little short because of time constraints. Should be one more set.

4 mi wu/cd

2 x

600: 1:34 400: 61 300: 44 200: 26 100: nt

600: 1:36 400: 63 300: 46 200: 28 100: nt

jog the upcoming interval.

I should probably note that I'm doing all this speed stuff while sitting right behind two 1:56 800m / 50 point guys. They are quite generous in taking it out quick and letting me hang off them - no way I would be doing this on my own.

good to hear that real eddylee./>

Wednesday 12.5

Rio Grande-10.2 in 1:10:58 (6:57 pace). I'll just type in 7:18 out after an 8:12 start and 6:36 pace back, closing in 6:03. easy but got dehydrated.

p.m. run to airport w/big hill 2M-14:33

Thursday conservatively, call it 12M. 90 minutes.

Dallas, TX. 480 ft above sea level! ran various loops around downtown at night (pretty damn ugly and empty!). all the concrete and turning was hard on the achilles, but the running close to sea level was easy and pretty fast. sorry that I couldn't get good times per distances except for one section where I was :81 for a little over a quarter mile.

Friday 12 back in Albuquerque. a.m. 2M+-14:51 w/one big hill, from airport.

p.m. 10=1:08:22, 2x3M tempo w/UNM track team (2-3 min. rest?)-17:15 (5:36 (too quick, cramp>then solo),5:44,5:55: 5:45/M), 17:41 (75 (then solo),5:54,6:01,5:44: 5:54 avg.

about half on gravel/dirt, half on asphalt.

got dropped by almost all the guys but this was my fastest tempo here. whole abdomen cramped up, didn't get much warmup and had no stretching, plus had the fairly hard a.m. 2M, so plenty of excuses. hopefully a bit closer to their (easy) 5:30's next time.

Saturday 14.5

a.m. 7.2-59:30, very slow recovery.

p.m. ran up Spain Rd nr tramway to Sandia Mtns-Pino Trail and back-1:05-call it 7.3-snow/mud-eventually felt good where I could open up the stride.

Sunday 16.6

w/ABQ RR slow, 2:20 w/2x.83M easing into each in 4:33 and 4:39. had some achilles stiffness last four days, working on the stretching and icing.

93 for the week. another good week, mostly healthy, improvement but not anywhere near what boingo is doing, even counting the altitude difference.

timing all the miles that I can is just a way of gauging my progress at altitude, not a stressful deal at all.

Tried throwing in a little tempo during my long run today. Whoooo. I forgot how tired I usually feel at the end of long runs. ended up running about 14.1 miles with 20 near the end at 6 minute pace.

Now back to my undergrad thesis, blaaaaaaah.

monday 12.5 7:17 pace. felt like crap fighting a headwind for 6.1M out in 8:06 pace with only a few miles even under 8, then got a boost initially from the tailwind (later calm) on the return trip and ran 7:02,6:40,6:20,6:27,:30 (.1),6:15,5:50 back (6:26 pace). felt pretty easy on the way back.

tuesday 14 7.5 in the morning. 12x400m (avg. 72 seconds rest (walking)) w/UNM track.

avg. lap in 72 flat, all between 69.9 and 73.5. probably 1.5 sec or so faster than last week, but had a couple guys to run with. good progress. several more weeks and hopefully I'll be doing these mostly in high 60s territory. Might need to get a bit more 200 work to pick up the speed--seemed to work last summer.

afternoon 6.5 very slow. got anterior (outside) shin splints a little yesterday and a lot this afternoon, probably related to the eccentric calf raises. trying some exercises involving the movement you'd use to strike the bass drum in a drumset (lifting forefoot with heel resting on ground as the pivot) and looking for any advice on others.

I do the bass-drum calf raise pretty frequently. Try it when you're standing up, leaning against a wall. It seems to induce a mind-blowing burning sensation much quicker.

Some more race-pace prep stuff this week.

2 sets of 1x400, 1x800, 1x300 with 30 rest, then 60 rest, then full recovery.

Went 66, 2:12, 45

then 67, 2:19 UGH, 46.

I just wimped out bigtime on the second 800. 2:12 felt relaxed, and I'd hoped to go sub 2:10 on the second set, but oh well. The fact that the first set felt good was heartening to me, especially the day after doing some tempo stuff at the end of a long run.

When are you planning on racing, jonesy? And do you have any specific time goals for your season?

someone seems to have just registered my login, so I'll probably have to change my name here.

tx, boingo. I did sets of your exercise-not sure I got it right, but no doubt close enough. that brings the burning sensation with a very small movement.

don't worry about the 800 time, still a very good workout. seems like your coach places a lot of importance on nationals and a lot of importance on speed work below VO2 max distances (i.e. roughly sub 1k).

I'm going to try to get in a 1500m or possibly a track 5k in the Bay Area in mid March (there are no track races in ABQ this winter). After that, the only things for sure are the Healthy Kidney 10k in Central Park in mid-May and the NYRR track races at Icahn Stadium in late May and June. I would like to get into a sea level track meet in April or early May, maybe in L.A. if I can arrange that. My goal is just to get some big pr's this year at every distance (last year I pr'd at 3k,4M,5M,10k track/road,15k,1/2M,and marathon) and with health that is a possibility. Right now I don't want to jinx it, but if I open with a decent 1500m pr next month, then I'll start talking about specific time goals.

i'm glad everyone's training is going well.

monday: the school i help out at did their 10 minute all out test. i ran terrible and only just ran 3200m

tuesday: took out some frustration from yesterday's run. i ran 12 miles in 74 minutes. the first half i averaged 6:25, the last half i averaged 5:45

very nice run, solo joe. solid first half and excellent 6M tempo the last half, considering what you'd already done. hope the femur is o.k. that 3200M race is just a few seconds off your first 3k of the season and probably hard to get motivated at that kind of event.

thanks. i was planning on going out in 5 flat to help the team (they had 2 or 3 guys aiming for 3200m), and then pick it up. but only i wasn't able to pick it up, haha. 20-30mph winds might have had something to do with it.

i'm jealous of your altitude training. no that i'm not racing for a monthish i'm planning on upping the miles for a few weeks. the femur feels much better, so i should be okay.