This week in running: week 5

This was a great week running-wise ... until my long run. Pesky long runs can make or break the week, in my opinion. If it's not good, I start to worry. But, I'll focus on the positive first.

Monday

Not a normal running day, but since our last long run got cut short by thunderstorms, I decided to tack on some miles around the neighborhood. I felt great, but I'd just rather not run by myself. I miss my running group!

Distance: 3 miles

Tuesday

Yay! It's running group day! Yay! It's speed work day! (Yes, I just typed that.)

I did my first official track workout, but I did it on a sidewalk. I've heard mention of these 400 meter repeats, and I never really knew what it was. Now I do. Well, kind of ... I don't fully understand all of the terminology, but I know I did them.

I *think* we did three sets of 400 meter repeats. We ran 400 meters, had a 1-minute break, ran 400 meters, had a 2-minute break, and then ran 400 meters. We repeated this three times with longer breaks in between sets. Our goal was to continually get faster, like this.

 
Instead, mine looked like this.

Yeah, not how it's supposed to look. Oops.

But, I loved every second of this workout. From the easy run down to our "track" to the repeats (all of them) to the easy run back, I loved it. I felt awesome. I felt, dare I say it, fast.

Distance: 3.73 miles

Thursday

This was supposed to be a 50-minute run broken out into repeating 10 easy minutes followed by 10 minutes at a faster pace. It really didn't happen for my running buddy and me. We just ran for 50 minutes, and it all rocked.

Our coach said this was fine if we feel we don't really have a faster, sustainable pace. She'd rather us just run a solid 50 minutes. So that's what we did. Maybe someday I'll have a pace besides slow.

Distance: 4 miles

Sunday

OK, here's the bad one. 

It is still way too hot in Florida at 7 a.m. People keep talking about this foreign concept, "fall," and it is definitely not happening here.

I just felt overwhelmed by the heat at first. My face just felt like it was burning up.

I finally settled in and felt a little cooler once we made a turn to run by the bay (yay for breezes off the water). I didn't feel too shabby (aside from the initial heat issues) up until mile 4. Pesky mile 4 made me feel like all of my energy was zapped. I kept pushing on for the next few miles, but I just didn't feel that great. 

So, I finished not feeling that great and feeling hot and frustrated. 

Not feeling great and feeling hot and frustrated

I guess looking back, it wasn't really that bad. But, I feel like it really could have gone better. 

Distance: 6 miles

How was your week in running? Have you done track workouts? Do you like them? Do they help you get faster? Do you base how good your training week was by your long run?