the fun started!
Well, kinda. Early in the week it was the same old shit. Monday and Tuesday were typical days, Wednesday I got out there and realized I'd forgot to take my drugs so I had to cut it short... Then it rained Thursday and Friday. Feeling fairly well rested, I decided to make Saturday a "long run" day. I did 10 miles, with 7 of it being at todays "race pace." I haven't done 10 miles since I started over.
My 10K time was 4 mins faster than my current PR. That's a 40 second per mile improvement. Going the 7 miles was also close to 30 mins further than I've gone before doing all 3/1.5's. Not too bad. I'm going to start slowly shortening the walk intervals soon. Maybe Wednesday.
So, switching gears... I don't think I've talked about getting on a team for the
Texas Independence Relay.
These guys had a booth at last years Houston Marathon Expo. A full 15 months before the event. They were just starting to put it all together and had not gotten all the logistics worked out. I signed up for email updates and have been watching it ever since. For many different reasons, I really, really, really wanted to do this thing.
When the time requirements came out, I was really bummed. The pace requirement is 10:15. A team could have runners slower than that, but they'd need some speedsters to make up all the time a slower runner lost. Any team I was on would find themselves having to make up a lot of time. This event is really one of the main reasons I decided to spend this race season not doing events, but trying to improve my speed.
All the race updates were driving me absolutely crazy. I haven't made huge improvements, but I'm starting to see some decent improvements. I just couldn't take it anymore... The site has a message board so I decided to lay it all out and beg for a spot on a team. And, I do mean beg! I played all the sympathy cards I could. But, I was honest, and I said I'd be running 12:30'ish miles and not to pick me unless you were in it just for fun.
Well, I got an email from one of the team captains a couple of days later and
I'M IN!!!! I'm really stoked. We are a 12 person team, and I've never met anybody on the team.
The race starts Saturday morning, March 1st in Gonzales Texas and finishes 40 exchanges and 207 miles later on Sunday afternoon at the San Jacinto Monument.
Lots of logistics to work out... food, drink, rest spots, and chase vehicles, etc. More to come about all that soon!
