I'm staying at Camp Carroll , a small Army post near Daegu. It's hot, humid, and I don't know the area. How do I get in some quality workouts, including a desparately needed long run?
Carroll happens to have a narrow track circling the athletic field, that according to my Garmin, measures 20 meters or so longer than 400 meters.
Last week I went a little crazy and did 20 x 400 in 90-91 sec with 30 sec rest (3 min break after 10). I ran the last 6 barefoot on the turf. The very next day I warmed up and strangely felt very good. Back at the track I did 5 x 1 mile in 6:13, 6:08, 6:07, 6:07, with number 5 barefoot in 6:03 on the turf, each followed by 2 min rest.
I topped both workouts yesterday, running 9 x 2 miles in a total running time of 2:10(I stopped the watch during the rest periods), or 7:13 per mile, all on turf with the last one barefoot. After a very slow first 2, I knocked off the next 5-6 under 7 min pace, but unfortunatly was not looking at anything but overall average pace. While all long runs are hard, this 18 miles felt relatively easy- probably due to a combination of the 2 min breaks I took between each, plenty of water taken each time, and the softer surface. Even more amazing is this morning 6 miles at 7:30 pace felt very easy!
I've been struggling with long runs up to 15 miles, so am intrigued by building on this workout, either by running 3 mile reps, shortening the break to 1 minute, or keeping everything the same to work on a faster average pace.
While running in circles for 2 hours may seem mentally challenging, I found it easy knowing I had a break coming every 14-15 minutes. I'll admit, in all my years of running, I've never done anything like it.
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