Happy New Year!
Last year, I ran 644.4 miles. Not as much as the previous 799.6 miles in 2021. However, in the past few months I’ve shaved off about 15 secs from my pace but not confident that this is really the case and whether it will now be consistent.
What I think has helped are the once a week Interval and Surges workouts. Last year, I never did these work outs but I think they’ve made a difference in training. Physically, the legs feel fatigued after the work out but they then feel miraculously a bit more stronger during the next run. The recent Surges work outs have been 4.8 miles with 1.5 miles of relaxed run then 1 minute at 7:10 followed by 1 minute 10:30 (total of 10 intervals) then 1 mile cool down. It happens that 4.8 miles is about the distance from home to the hospital – convenient. So to make things a bit more complicated, add a backpack to doing a Surges work out. Annoyingly, it still then averages to about 10 minute miles. But that is okay, I trust it will be faster without the backpack. So like every training session, make it count.
Like in many across the country, the hospital I work at is overwhelmed. High volume, high acuity. Many patients unwell, many staff also unwell. At home, we already had our winter viral illnesses. I had a lingering cough that one night after work, became dramatic complete with sore throat overnight. Something didn’t feel right – so swabbed myself and sure enough, Covid – back again. Off from work and also too unwell to go out for a run. Just what I needed.
Now negative and asymptomatic, I braved the cold. I raced David to the hospital – me a 4.8 mile Surges workout and David drove the car – to get to the hospital nursery to pick up the kids. Happy to say, I got there first. I did get a 10 minute head start though.
Reach for the Seven Stars 