Running Log: 11/20

First, a bit of background... after finishing my fourth marathon in October, I'm pointing toward the Boston Marathon in April, 2008, in what I'm calling my "farewell" marathon. However, I hope to go out with a bang. My marathon PR is 3:13, set in 2006. In my only previous Boston Marathon, I recorded a respectable 3:26. For this race, I hope to go under 3:15... a great time on a course as tough as Boston.

To accomplish this, I'll need to do two things: lose a bunch of weight that I put on following a knee problem a year ago, and regain some serious speed. On the weight front, I need to drop about 10 pounds to get down to an ideal race weight of 162. On the speed front, my focus for the rest of 2007 will be on short, fast runs and tempo / interval training.

I initiated the speed work focus two weeks ago. In order to track progress, I'm doing a weekly 3-mile "time trial" along with at least one speed work session during the week. My first two times were 20:20 and 19:48, respectively. In order to be where I want to be, I should really be seeing a 3 mile time of under 18:45, or 6:15 per mile. At my best, I could go well under this, but from where I am today, it will be a challenge.

WIth the background out of the way, on to today's workout... normally Tuesdays are reserved for my "time trial" but with a likely Turkey Trot race on Thursday, I went with speed work today. Four (4) x 3:00 at my "interval" pace was the goal... ideally my "I" pace would be about 6:00 miles, but today I was probably lucky if I was holding 6:20 pace. I was running repeats on a somewhat hilly road and felt okay. My knee, which has continued to give me problems, held up well although I'm headed for the ice pack again tonight.

So, wish me luck... I'll rest tomorrow and hit a 4 mile Turkey Trot race on Thursday. Hopefully I'll see continued progress and my time at the 3 mile mark should be in the 19:30-19:40 range. If so, it will be another week of improvement, but still a long way to go.