The First Workout

As I was running back home this morning, watching the sun come up behind the statues standing guard over Monument Avenue, I thought about what I should write for my first post. Should it be abstract? A description perhaps? Maybe I should ponder the meaning of running in my life...

Nah! The meanings will make themselves known without me having to force them onto the page (or the screen). What I really want this blog to be about is the reality of running: the workouts, the goals, and the frustrations. The down-and-dirty stuff. Hopefully it will allow me to share my experiences with others, document my running life, and practice my writing. So in that spirit, I will talk about today's workout.

A little background: I am on week 21 of 30 of Jack Daniel's marathon training plan in Daniels' Running Formula. Today's workout was hard, no thanks to the 15 mile-per-hour winds that whipped around the track. I did a two-mile warm-up through the dark streets of Richmond. (It made me sad to see all of the Christmas lights disappear, but at least the weather was balmy.) On the track I did 2 x 15 minutes at tempo pace, which for me right now is 7:42, with three minute rests, and 1 x 10 minutes at tempo pace. Then, with the lovely feeling of tired legs, I shuffled home.

In addition to thinking about this post, I also thought about my improvement in running, a subject that I've been thinking about a lot lately. Not only have I gotten faster since a month ago (not to mention since ten years ago), but I've improved my running intelligence. I was training for the same marathon a year ago, and my approach to each workout and the training as a whole was so different: it's now much more specific, I stay hydrated (duh!), and my stride is more efficient. It's amazing how such a seemingly simple sport can reveal its secrets to you so slowly. I wonder, do the running gods make you earn it?