Back In

I've decided that I'm officially in training again.

Not for the marathon, though. Not yet. I'm officially in training for the Capitol 10K here in Austin that will happen in late March. I haven't signed up yet, but I've been considering it for a while, and I had a couple moments of revelation the last few weeks.

First, I missed running the Austin Half Marathon. If it wasn't so ridiculously expensive, I might have gone for it, but alas, I needed to spend that money on shoes this month. No harm, no foul. Still, I'm not one for the sidelines, and since I know that I'll be in town for the race (since I've got a show opening that weekend), I have no excuse. I want to race more often, and here's one in my own backyard.

Besides that, I've realized that I'm getting faster. On Friday, it was cold and rainy, so I let myself push the pace a bit in order to finish more quickly. Today, the opposite was true: it was beautiful out, so I let myself push the pace a bit because I felt so good. Also, I really wanted to test the new shoes.

I love them. I glanced at my watch once to see that my downhill pace was sub-6:00 which is, of course, way too fast for a training run. It was early on, though, so I settled a bit and focused on maintaining my heightened pace. Why? Because I could, and because my shoes were actually pushing me forward. Each time I left the ground, I felt the toe flip back, shoving me just a little bit harder. I did get winded on the back stretch, but my legs never felt tired, even heading up my last little hill.

With one last circle around the block, I finished a 5.15 mile training run a mere 21 seconds slower than my last 5 mile race. My pace was better by nearly 7 seconds per mile. And I didn't even have competition.

So I decided to officially begin training for the Capitol 10K. This doesn't change much in my routine other than my decision to push my 5-mile runs a little harder and adjust my pace in the 6 and 8 milers. The main adjustment will be my mindset. Instead of thinking about how much longer I've got to run, I'll focus, for once, on how much faster. That way, when I get back to "marathon" training in March, I'll have the speed.

Then all I'll need is the distance.

Monday's Run:
65 Degree / Perfect
5.15 Miles