3.5 under 9:00 = :)

After yesterday's long but unsatisfying run I decided to cut the distance and go for some speed. A person commented on emergingrunner.com that I should be doing tempos and intervals to get my speed up. I agreed with that and made it a point to actively think about my pace as I ran this morning. I went out around 7:00 AM before the sun got too hot and I tried to head off the initial leg pain with some dynamic stretching. I hit the road and felt a little better than I did on Friday but I also felt like I was expending a lot of effort and needed to throttle my speed if I was to complete even a short distance run.

My goal was to run about 30 minutes at a pace similar to my 5K run in May. I didn't feel the fluidity that I get at times but it was okay and I really liked the feel of the Asics 1130's I picked for today's run. I ran in the Brooks yesterday and while I have no complaints about them I think I like the feel of the Asics a little more. Hard to say, both are good. I took some less traveled streets, making up my route as I went along while staying conscious of my 30 minute timing. I wanted today's run to be low impact so I'd have something left for tomorrow.

As I hit the 26 minute mark I turned east to begin making my way home and stepped up the pace a little. It was beginning to get hot and I picked roads that had a lot of tree cover which really helped the way I felt. I was about a half a mile from home when I noticed an SUV pulling up along side me and saw a woman who had her window down to ask me the location of a street. I actually asked her to speed up because she was throwing off my pace and I carefully recited the series of lefts and rights she would need to follow to get where she wanted to go. It wasn't until afterward that I realized I was talking fairly well while pushing my speed.

In the end I ran 3.51 miles in 31 minutes for an 8:50 overall pace. I was happy to have broken 9:00 and I was very satisfied with my run. It's the weekend and back to work on Monday. I've put in a lot of miles this vacation week and I'm thinking that it's time to return my focus on speed.