Saturday, October 21, 2006

Measure Twice, Cut Once!



Thursday: 4 mile run in 47.54. A new PR sort of. Splits: 11.14/11.53/12.35/12.11
Friday: Softball nite. We lost a heartbreaker 9-7.
Saturday: Morning run with TnT. 4.6 miles of hills in South Mountain Park. 55.37 in 60 degree weather. It was beautiful.

I looked at Monday and Wednesdays workout and noticed that the third mile always took way longer than any of the other miles, including the fourth. Why? I remeasured my course and found I was going another 1/10 of a mile in mile three. At a 12 minute pace, thats over one minute more running. Makes sense. So on Thursday I ran the new measurement and shaved 30 seconds of my last time.

Here's my breakdown for last week by mile:

Mile 1: 11.54/11.23/11.14
Mile 2: 11.40/11.38/11.53
Mile 3: 13.27/13.11/12.35
Mile 4: 11.51/12.08/12.11

Running in South Mountain Park is beautiful. Desert running on the park road. We ran uphill for the first 2.3 miles and then retraced our steps back to the parking lot. The weather was just barely 60* at 6:30 am. There was two groups running, so when we started it was like a race with over 100 runners. TnT had two groups. The full marathoners went for a short 8 miler. The rest of us went for a four miler. My goal was to get back to the parking lot before any of the 8 milers did. Some of them are twice as fast as I am, so I thought it would be a great incentive. I made it to the half way point, 2.3 miles in about 28 minutes. The approximate elevation at this point is 1608 feet. We started at 1350, so we climbed 258 feet. It was a bit of a struggle up for this first time hiller. Downhill was a breeze. I took a one minute break at the top to drink some gatorade and a one minute bathroom break about half way down and made it to the parking lot in 27.5 minutes. A total time of 55.37, that I am happy with. Here's the route.

4 comments:

Phil said...

Running up hill can take a lot out of you. Next year you've got to try running the Arizona Road Racers 5K Summer series. One of the races is at South Mountain park, running along the same road you were on. You won't get a PR on this course, but you'll have a great time.

Thanks for including the picture.

Unknown said...

I checked out hte route and you really are out in the desert.

Nice running. Keep up the good work. Running with a group is a lot of fun.

Pat said...

South Mtn. Park is just 6 miles south of the Diamondbacks stadium and downtown Phoenix. If you like the desert, it's great living hear because you can get to a lot of interesting places pretty quickly.

J~Mom said...

I will have to check out that running route sometime! Sounds nice!

Come and check out my blog if you like..from another Arizona runner.

http://javamomontherun.blogspot.com/