Tuesday, January 18, 2011

How to have fun at the gym...

After my long run on Sunday I was suppsed to have a day off. Looking at the weather for the week gave me other ideas though.... Since it is currently blizzarding (again) I decided to do Tuesday's workout on Monday and Wednesdays workout on Tuesday in the super early morning before the snow could arrive. (Always an excellent decision on legs that had just completed 10 miles for the first time in their existance!)

In reality, it wasn't all that bad. The worst part is that I'm stuck at the gym since it hasn't gotten out of the low single digits in my town. Gorgeous! In order to make things entertaining for myself I decided that I'd do some little treadmill hills on Monday and then do my Race Plan workout of mile repeate on Tuesday.

Here is how it went down:

Monday:
Mile 0-1 @ 9:31 on a 6% incline
Mile 1-2 @ 8:00 on a 1% incline
Mile 2-3 @ 9:13 on a 5% incline
Mile 3-3.5 @ 9:31 on an 8% incline
Mile 3.5-4 @ 7:49 on a 1% incline

Tuesday: (done literally at the asscrack of dawn. my legs were SO not awake!)
mile 0-1 @ 9:13
Mile 1-2 @ 8:31
Mile 2-2.5 @ 9:00
Mile 2.5-3.5 @ 8:00
Mile 3.5-4 @ 9:00
Mile 4-5 @ 7:35
Mile 5-6 done between 8.0 and 9.0

I was more ambitious in my mile repeats then "the plan" told me to be. BUT... After my legs finally warmed/woke up around the end of mile two it occured to me that keeping the designated pace of 8:34 fast mile 10:30 slow mile/half mile would not even be remotely pushing me beyond my comfort zone. As is was, this was vigorous but not bad at all. I was sweaty but mostly because there are no fans at this gym and running with no ari is similar to running in a sauna. Yuck!

I am definately taking tomorrow off since I've knocked out 20 miles this week already (and it's only Tuesday, snap!) Since it's snowing like a bastard out there I'll probably have to spend the day shoveling out the door yard anyway. Good times.

6 comments:

  1. wow good for you for doing hills on the treadmill. that looks like such a tough workout

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  2. Great job. I hate real life hills - I can't imagine the awfulness of treadmill hills!

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  3. That's an amazing accomplishment on the treadmill! And I agree with the no fans--I always sweat like a overgrown piggy at the gym cause there is no air flow! Must have a fan blowing on me!

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  4. That's why I love a treadmill for drills. It becomes like a game to me.

    20 miles by Tuesday? You ANIMAL!

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  5. I find that the best treadmill workouts are the ones like these, where you're mixing things up. I've never tried serious hill repeats like this on the 'mill, though... I might have to man up and jump on!

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  6. Great work! I can't imagine running hills on the TM.

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