So I'm 33 and ran 14:05 for 5000m in college, beat a guy in xc who ran 29:20 that spring (I never ran a 10,000m on the track). Anyway, I've never really stopped running completely, but I have barely run the last several years, like probably one or two 3 mile runs per week the last year. I lift mostly and currently weigh about 15 pounds more than I did when I was running a lot, still quite lean. Today I ran 3 miles going pretty up-tempo from the start, was running "hard" but not all out effort by 1 mile in, then around 1.5 miles in I ran pretty hard for half a mile because I know that stretch is exactly half a mile, and I ran it at 5:38 pace. Then I walked a bit and did a 1 mile easy run/cool down. I ran hard, but not all out. I figure I could have run that half mile portion at least 10 seconds faster in an all out effort, so we'll say 5:20 pace.
This is not fast at all, but I've also only been running about 3-6 mpw the last year. There's a half marathon here in 7 weeks... How fast do you think I could run if I trained semi-seriously for it? I am thinking holding 6:00 pace might be possible if training goes well. Simply running every day and getting a couple long runs in of 8-10 miles would help a lot. I basically ran what I did today off nothing.
Thoughts?