First tempo run in... a long time.

Let me tell you a secret:

I wish I was a faster runner.

Okay, so that isn't a secret... I'm fairly certain that's a mutual wish of nearly all runners.

Here's a better secret:

I wish I was a faster runner, but I suck at/dislike speed work.


When I go out to do "speed work," I usually end up doing something like, do a half-ass warm up for 5 minutes, during which I get nowhere close to being properly warmed up, go all out for as long as I can (read: an absolute max of two-tenths of a mile), walk to recover, go hard again (for about half the original distance), jog to recover (which means... walk twice as long as I ran), then decide it's time to cool down (which means, start out at a good cool down pace, then gradually pick it up because I want to be down... thereby not cooling down at all).

So uh... yeah... I'm not that great at it. At all.


I rarely do real quality speed or pace work because... I don't like it. I don't like being uncomfortable. I can do distance runs because, when I get uncomfortable, I can just slow down... pace doesn't matter, the distance does.

Not the case with speed work.

And with tempo runs? Pace and distance matter.

Well, shit.



In the past, I'd either not warm up fully, go out too fast, or give in to the first bit of discomfort and take a walk break, which would just ruin my rhythm for the whole run... It was usually the latter.


But today, with the help of a treadmill for pacing, I ran my first real, proper tempo run in years.


I looked up what my tempo pace should be based on my current 1 mile time, and I held that pace for 3 straight miles, with a good quality (read: slow and gentle) warm up mile beforehand, and then a nice cool down mile outside during a rare break in the rain.


So, that's another 5 miles, bringing my total mileage since I started Miles for Mothers to 8 miles. Not much, but I did start during a recovery week!

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