Sometimes I Wonder.

Today I went to my old high school's cross country practice and the practice made me realize how much they have changed. While the team dynamic is still there, it's weird to think that after this year, everyone will be "new" to me. And by "new" I mean that I didn't personally run with them during high school. While that's just a natural part of growing up, I just thought that it was interesting because now I can start a legacy of being an "alumni with lots of wisdom" haha.

So the original workout that the coach told me at the beginning of practice was five to six one-mile repeats. Without even thinking about it, I knew that he was going to cut the workout down because there was no way that they would have been able to complete five repeats. Anyways, after they did some dynamics and stretched for a little bit, we gradually made our way over to the starting line.

As we began the repeats, three guys on the team (Taigen, Alec, and Marcus) bolted ahead of the rest us. Fortunately for them, the repeats measured out to .90 miles instead of a full mile, one less tenth of a mile they would have to suffer. I finished the first repeat about 15 seconds behind Taigen, the top runner from last year (17:13 5k PR) and at the same time as Alec. Now I know that typically during repeats people tend to run the first reps too fast and today was no exception. After the first interval, neither Marcus nor Alec would be within 20 seconds of me for the remaining intervals. I didn't know, coming into this practice, that I was going to be running repeats that day, so when I ran the first one at 5:47/mile, I felt pretty good, considering my tempo pace is 6:00/mile.

My coach has never been a stickler for active recovery between repeats; he also allows too much recovery between reps and once again, today was no exception. I got about four to five minutes of recovery for each interval, which means that Taigen, (who ended up running ahead of me the entire workout) had even more. My second interval was ran a 5:43/mile pace, which felt hard, but a solid effort. My third effort started off easier because I was trying to help Marcus maintain pace throughout the workout. I stayed with him for the first 800-900 meters, but then I just slowly started to pull away.

Overall, I think that the workout went very well. I was able to average 5:52/mile pace for the three repeats, (wouldn't have minded doing a fourth repeat). Tomorrow I plan on doing an easy/longer run (50-55 minutes), which is between 7-8 miles. Then on Thursday I will be joining them again in some 1/4 mile tough hill repeats. Shooting for four repeats total, which along with a 2 mile WM + 2 mile CD, a six-mile day. I have just over a month till I start XC camp. Time to get serious...