When I decided last spring to take a season away from coaching middle school track, I hadn’t yet decided what my running goals for this year would be. Last spring I was training for a 50-miler and targeting a 100-miler. And that 100-mile race was sidelined when on a warm spring day I was feeling fast and decided to do some intervals. Rrrrrrip! I tore my calf. It didn’t heal in time for me to get back on track for a 100 and I lost the season to injury.
So, when I decided to challenge myself this year by running a mile, my goal was pretty basic: see how fast this aging body can run a mile without getting injured along the way.
I explained my motivation to know my limits in a previous newsletter. The upshot that is a pretty fast road mile 20 years ago opened my eyes to lost opportunity. It’s the sort of thing that would have made me ashamed had I not done a lot of work on self-compassion.
I’ve learned that mistakes can be separated from my self-identity. I can understand the things that happened in my youth that prevented me from achieving my peak potential as a runner. Regret can be a motivator, not a one-way ticket to self-loathing. I don’t have to stop seeking that potential as an adult just because I will never know what I could have done. Instead I am motivated to find out what I can do now.
So, here’s an update on how the training is going with some data that I can’t hide from. I previously posted about the initial phase of my training being some 200m repeats to “wake up” my legs to faster turnover than I’d been doing for the past few years doing ultramarathons.
A few weeks ago, I started adding 400m repeats to the week. Three weeks ago I did four 400m intervals with full 400m recovery jog/walks. And, to be honest, they were a little too fast. The screenshot below is that workout.
I intended to run 85 seconds per interval. Instead I ran an 83 followed by three 78s. And I was a bit gassed, won’t lie.
That’s not even really that fast. But it doesn’t help me toward my goal. So, last week, I did five 400m intervals with the goal of simply getting consistent. Here’s what that workout looked like:
My splits were much more consistent: 85, 86, 85, 84 and 83. The idea here is to find controlled, consistent intervals at a pace fast enough to show me what I might push for without getting injured.
This week, I feel I did that. Here’s my workout from Thursday, where I did six 400m intervals with full walk/jog recoveries:
I did 85, 83, 84, 83, 83, and 82. I felt this workout was a moderately difficult one. I could have probably done two more intervals around 85. But I’m pretty sure my form would have fallen apart and I would’ve been pushing the last one. I also ran 12×200 on Tuesday and to behonest, I wasn’t sharp at all. Each one was around 41 seconds and felt like effort, when what I had hoped for was 37-38s in a nice controlled fashion.
What this tells me is I’m still discovering how to consistently hold speed and form, but my legs are basically awakened to faster turnover. Importantly I believe I have a window to the floor of how fast I can run a mile in July. Right now, I feel like it’s reasonable to expect that by July I can run faster than 5:30. I’m not even close to that now. At my current repeats of 85s, That’s a 5:40ish mile. And I would struggle right this minute to race a 5:45. But the ability is right there. By July, I see no reason why I can’t push my interval times down a few seconds while piling on a higher number, making me fit enough for a 5:30 floor.
What’s the ceiling?
Honestly, I have no idea.
But I can start to guess. I think a sub-5 mile is out of the question. I’m not sure my body and my VO2Max combine to even allow that. I have torn a muscle each time I tried running 5:15 pace the past two years.
So for now, I think 5:25 is the ceiling. Not bad for a guy my age, but here’s some perspective: The 55-59 age group world record for the mile is 4:38, and that’s a second faster than I was able to run 20 years ago. So, no records will fall in my effort, that’s for sure.
So, I’ll keep training and see if I can push my speeds without getting hurt and try to raise the ceiling!
If you are interested in all the raw info, you can follow me on Garmin Connect. I’m opening my profile up publicly (tho I will review followers before they can see everything).
Have a great weekend!