8K kickdown

My coach promised that this was a very hard workout. He was right, though at 8K it wasn't as hard as I thought it might be. These are going to increase quickly to 12k over the next few weeks, and that will be much harder.

So what is it? Basically, an acceleration workout in 4 parts: start easyish for 2 km, then kick it down 10 sec/km for the next 2 km, then 10 sec/km faster for the next 2 km, and finally on the last 2 km give it all you've got - pedal to the metal, essentially. My coach said the last 2 km of these are often slower than race pace, despite going all out, because you are pre-fatiguing the muscles. My guess is that the easy pace sets you up for more slow twitch muscles being active, and then when you turn it on harder it's more difficult to recruit the fast twitch muscles. Or something like that.

I started off downhill slightly to Liberty Park, a favorite flat place to do hard workouts. I'm easily bored, so don't want to do all of these hard workouts on the track, and really, it doesn't matter if the 2 km are exactly correct, or if my times are perfectly accurate. They probably aren't...I'm using GPS to monitor them, and it's close, but it can be off by 1-2% in my experience. What's important is the effort, and getting the hard work done.

Side note: I took my dog Copper with me. She's fast and fit, and can do the hard miles. I think if pushed that she is much faster than I am...sad but true!

The first 2K felt very easy, because I was fresh, and it was downhill (Garmin says about 40m, or around 125 ft); I did it in 13:16, HR 136 ave/143 max. The second 2K felt good, too - moderate effort, flat as a pancake around the park, 12:43 with HR 151 ave/158 max. The third 2K was where it got interesting. It was uphill (slight, but noticeable!) from about 550 East to 800 East along 1300 South, and then left on 800 E where it was essentially flat for the remainder. I put in a moderately hard effort, and did it in 12:37 with HR 160 ave/164 max. I was trying to keep it comfortably hard, though, if there really is such a thing. I wish the 3rd one was a little faster, or maybe the 2nd one a little slower, because the times were close. However, with the hill (18m; about 60 feet), I think I actually was probably right on pace for the 3rd one.

Then the fun began. Yes, this is a hard workout, but it's not THAT bad, because the only really painful part was the last 2K. I figured I could do anything for 12 minutes (however, when these get to be 12K and I'm doing 3K for the last one, it will hurt a lot more!). I pretended I was racing and chasing down some of the fast ladies I have raced. It was a very hard effort; probably about 95% or more. Breathing was very labored and I concentrated hard on maintaining the most efficient form possible. I felt slow and wondered what my time would be (too hard to calculate it when working so hard!). When I reached the end and hit the lap button I was surprised: 11:43! Wow! Not bad. Ave HR 169/max 173, and yes, that really hurt.

I walked 2K to get home, easy (uphill, 14:38; Garmin said 1.95K so that was a very slow 7:30/km). I stretched (ahhhhh) and felt very satisfied with my hard work.

Next week is an easy recovery week. I think I need it, though I'm going to go a little stir crazy with two rest days in the schedule. They say "optional" so not sure I have to rest...just e-mailed the coach to find out if some x-training would be OK on one of those days.

Oh, and my foot? Didn't even think about it. When I got home it was a little achy; I did my PT exercises and iced it. It's really improved a lot over the past 2 weeks!