Distance: 8:16
So, since I've missed a couple weeks I'm going to toss away with my total mileage unfortunately. I know I've hit all the long runs, but I don't remember the distances I ran during the week. I blame it on moving to Calumet :-) You can check out the distances I ran on endomondo.
This week was a break week, I was supposed to to 12 miles but since I'm at distances where I'm hitting the wall, I felt I needed a bit more of a break. Especially since this Saturday is 18 miles!
So I'd like to talk about pacing in this post. You might have noticed my pace decreasing almost to a crawl. I was originally aiming for 10min/mile pace, now I'm aiming for 12min/mile pace and I tend to run significantly slower than that (>13min/mile). There is a reason for this, and it isn't laziness.
I feel that my injury came from too high of a pace. Not only was I aiming for a pace I had difficulty sustaining for 3 miles, but I was trying to run that pace every time I went out. Both of these were mistakes, but I'll focus on the latter.
Hal Higdon, in his book, mentions that anything close to or below race pace he considers 'speed training'. He warns that this is primarily for people who really know what they are doing at an advanced level. And I'd agree. The more important factor in endurance training (at least in my experience so far) is the distance you run, not the speed you run it at. My half marathon at 10:40 pace after weeks of 12+min pace I think proves that. If you try to run the large miles per week at race pace, you WILL get injured like I did and miss out on training time. Hal explains it like this: the pace you train at should be a comfortable pace, one where you feel comfortable talking with someone for the first half of the run.
So this at least explains why I take such a leisurely pace during my training. I'm glad I did, because I would probably have failed again, and harder, a few weeks ago.
