That feeling in the middle of your run up until the end where your breathing becomes relaxed and you can speed up without feeling many changes in breathing - I love when it happens, but I can't do it on all of my easy to moderate runs.
So I know the value of a good warmup. after a 1 mile warmup/dynamic stretching, I will start at a slow pace to get into the rhythm, and usually the first .5 miles will be a shoc k to my system.
At the 1 mile point, my breathing starts to even out, and TEMPORARILy, i feel that sense of light, weightlessness, for about .5-1 mile. When I try to speed up at this point (which I always do) it just becomes harder than ever (still bearable, but the pain is noticable).
I don't know what it is, but sometimes, say I am doing, say a 6 mile moderate run, at 2-4 miles, it hurts a lot. From 4, the pain slowly starts to subside, and by the end I'm striding at a pace 2-3 minutes faster than what I started at (~8 --> ~6) at a lot less effort.
I'm asking because I really enjoy the runs where I can feel in ease at the end of the run. Earlier this week I did a 6.4 mile run, splits were:
8:24
8:14
7:56
8:09
6:41
6:18
(last .4) 6:02
Yeah, I know I'm slow, and I'm still trying to get better.
The last .4, I was still feeling good - my breathing was still in control and when I stopped I didn't have to double over on my knees and stop. This was all on roads (asphalt + concrete?)
So my question is, how can I consistently be feeling this in my runs? Should I stay at a slower pace for more miles to get my body ready? I'm trying to hit 7:20-7:30 for my easy run pace, rather than this slow buildup pace. Any legit advice would be good, thanks.