27- Triple Tuesday? and conquering my fear of speed work!

Oh, man.  Today was a good running day in the land of Tmart!  Throughout this training period, my speed work has been less than ideal.  I've thrown in some tempo on the treadmill, and done good hill work, but serious, on the track, gasping for air, balls to the walls speedwork has been lacking.  Until today.

The guys I run with on Thursday night have been running 800 repeats the last few Tuesday nights, and finally I could join them!  Buttt, the day is just not complete without running first thing.  And, I wanted to get yesterday's pseudo-long run off my legs.  So, I was up and at it at 5:30am this morning.  I didn't want to run in the dark, so I hit up the Y, knowing that I could swim there too and save time.  I took it easy/fast with 5 miles on the treadmill, then workout #2 was a refreshing, but slightly intense swim.  I left feeling satisfied and refreshed (and more ready for a nap than the workday ahead!)

Honestly, for the rest of the day I was SOOO SCARED.  I am like a guy in the sense that I don't like losing or looking slow/stupid etc.  I've mentioned that the one guy I usually run with on Thursdays is my pace/slightly faster.  I got an email saying we would be doing 10x800 repeats on the track.  Yikes!  They did 6 the first week, 8 last week, and 10 were planned for this week.  Needless to say, considering my backround of very little speedwork (due to injury/being scared!) I was freaked.  And, I didn't have the two weeks of buildup.  Yasso's here I come!

I booked it to the track from work.  It was nice out (50s and sunny) but on the warmup we could feel how windy the backstretch was.  That was fun x20.  My bud told me he wanted to hit them all under 3 minutes like last week.  I laughed.  I honestly didn't even know if I was capable of one three minute half mile!  But, fears aside, we began.  Let me tell you- THIS WORKOUT ROCKED!  It. was. intense.  But nothing that I felt like I couldn't handle.  We did a 400m rest between each one.  The backstretch sucked and my bud was drafting off of me and letting me lead!  Splits were as follows:

2:53, 2:55, 2:57, 2:55, 2:55, 2:57, 2:56, 2:53, 2:55, 2:56

Or something like that.  All I know is they were all between 2:53-2:57.  Happy.  Quads were burning a bit by the end, but mostly just from fighting the wind.  And, the three of us ended feeling so hard core.  Bad ass.  Yes.

So, in the end, I conquered my fear and proved to myself where I am at fitness wise.  Feels good.  My legs are alittle tired now, but not too bad.  Mostly I'm just hungry :) I'm at the bakery at 6am tomorrow, so I'll probably run after work, before swim class so that my legs get a bit more than 8 hours of recovery!

Hope everyone had a day filled with good runs and good times! :)