Thursday, January 15, 2009 (5 x arroyo tempo)

Ian and I continued our steady-state campaign, upping the ante from four loops last week to five today. Last week, we passed Danny Martinez (blew past, actually) heading north along the arroyo early in our run. This week I told Ian he missed it when Martinez came back south after a week in hibernation at the aquatic center, recognized me, and waved, but he (Ian) appeared to see right through my ruse. You're right, Ian. I definitely did not see Danny Martinez in the arroyo today. (PS - for people other than Ian (I'll write this in code so he can't read it) !aHaHaH .flesym ot lla tnemom cigam taht peek ot teg I won tub ,mih ees did I seY)

The run was good. I do not have a feeling of strong aerobic fitness like I sometimes had in the past - the feeling that my lungs and legs are simply churning in perfect synchrony and I can purr along at high performance for an hour unstressed - but nonetheless my actual times are progressing well. The laps went

8:55
17:44 (8:49)
26:35 (8:51)
36:21ish (8:46ish)
44:04 (8:43ish)

5 loops, 8:49 avg.

My watch switches over from mm:ss:1/100 to hh:mm:ss at 30 minutes, so it's hard to catch the lap 4 split with accuracy.

The average pace was a little faster than last week.

I think the key now will be not to push too hard on these in a vain effort to get faster every single week. This was a good run. I'll take it and be happy. I'll do another next week, but I'll need to keep the attitude that allowed me to run well today - simply focusing on today, running based on what I'm feeling.

Also, Ian probably won't admit it on the internet, but he's in some pretty killer shape, and if he runs track races this year, we could see the same sort of times that got posted in the men's locker room all those years ago.

No pressure, though.