Saturday, May 7

Weather - Sunny, in the high 50s

Clothing - Black running shorts (Nike), Short sleeve tech shirt (Rockstar),  fuel belt, arm wallet with cell phone

Nutrition -  (1) 8 oz water, (1) 8 oz powerade

Route - Dangerfield Island on the Mount Vernon Trail / Mile Marker 12

Distance Completed: 3  miles

Time:  Started at 8:16am, took 33 minutes

J.W., T., A., and I met with the training group this morning.  The purpose of today's meeting was solely to find out what pace group you'd be running in.  It could anything from 9 minute miles to 14 minute miles.  We ran one mile as a warm-up, did the 2nd mile at the actual pace and then the 3rd mile was a cool down.  My time for the 2nd mile was 10:40.  I feel this is a good estimate of what I can do without pushing it too much.

Anything I'd do different?  No.  I love everything about this group and really want to sign up with them.  I was excited to go this morning and see what pace group I'd be put in.  My only hesitation is that you can't run with music.  I am not sure this is possible for me on the longer runs and frankly, I don't even know if I want to try.  I spoke to the program director who is very encouraging that I give the training group a try for the month of May before having to officially register.  The problem is the next couple of Saturdays already have some conflicts and I won't be able to make it.  J.W. and I are going to run next Sunday instead and do 11 miles.  

I believe we may have a plan to form our own little training group.  We are going to meet one night this week and go over the many different training schedules I've found online and see what works best for us.  Plus, we'll coordinate our schedules and figure out best when to do the long runs, based on trips, holidays, other scheduling commitments, etc.

Mid-week runs - ran 5 miles on Tuesday, ran 4 miles on Thursday; both on the treadmill at the gym.  Tried to play with the speed to help go faster.  I was most impressed that for the 4 mile run I was able to keep the pace at 6.0mph or 6.2mph setting on the treadmill for the running part.  Yay!