I love the 80s

This girl did not like to run.

I grew up in the 80's and have photo documentation of big hair and dramatic make up to vouch for that (right). I still love to dance to 80s music and watch reruns of bad 80s sitcoms. Mostly now, I like to run in the 80s. Last week was my first 80 mile week. This week I'm shooting for 87 miles. And, in my workout tonight the 80s were a recurring theme.

I had a workout of 16 x 400m with 1 minute jog recovery. I met up with some super fast ladies for a long warm up of about 6 miles and then we busted out the 400s on the track. 

splits: 83, 82, 80, 81, 82, 81, 80, 81, 80, 78, 80, 80, 80, 80, 79, 78; average = 80

Yeah, so I went back to the 70s a few times there. It wasn't a bad decade. For this girl, that is pretty darn fast. This is on par with workouts I was running prior to running my fastest marathon times in 2009-2010. It gives me hope that my legs are coming around. I am usually not as strong on the shorter workouts, so this is a pleasant surprise.

I am always strong on my longer workouts, like the one I had on Sunday. Again, I was graced with great company and a great pace pusher. She sat on my tail the whole way to remind me that she would eat me up if I fell back. This was the same workout we had run the day I tried not to poop my pants. Here's a comparison of the two workouts:

August 18th: 17 miles in 2:00  
5 x 1 mile @ 6:10-6:20 w/ 1 mile coast @ 7:00-7:30 
actual splits: 
6:14
7:07
6:06
7:14
6:12
7:24
6:12
7:20
6:12
7:12

September 15th: 20 miles in 2:20 
5 x 1 mile @ 6:00-6:10 ) w/1 mile coast @ 7:00-7:15
actual splits:
5:57
7:06
6:01
7:00
5:55
7:07
5:53
7:10
5:51
7:15   

Pretty amazing difference. Now, I know I was impaired during the August workout, but I actually almost repeated the same pre-race ritual for this last weekend's workout. I had a gig the night before, but this one was in the late afternoon. I still managed to get drunk but this time I passed out at around 9. I think the sleep made all the difference and this time, my bowels cooperated--mostly.

Things are starting to click and I am cautiously optimistic that I might have some good fall racing leading up to my first attempt at a Trials qualifier at CIM. As I have stated before, I just need to get into the same shape I was in before Chicago 2010 to feel like I can run sub-2:43 because I believe I was in shape for that time that day had the weather not been so hot. Then, all I need is perfect weather, a great taper and some fast people to pace off of. Not too much to ask, is it?  

I am doing everything I can at this point to stack the deck in my favor. I'll be cutting out alcohol from here on out (after this last beer tonight-I promise!); trying to get as much sleep as I can; trying to get my butt down to racing weight; taking my workout fueling to the next level; and working on the mental aspect of my training. We're getting serious here folks!