East River Mile Repeats

Thursday nights are track workout nights for my running team, the Dashing Whippets. Although I've been running with them for a little over two months now, before this week I had only made it to one track workout. There are two main reasons why I haven't been to more workouts. First, when I joined, I was halfway through my marathon training plan and didn't want to switch plans midway through the cycle. Second, these workouts are at the East River Park track. While it's a pretty decent facility, it happens to be about 1.2 miles from the nearest subway. As you may remember from a previous post a good track is hard to find in Manhattan.

I really want to get faster this year so last night I sucked it up and headed to the East Village after work. I always dread track workouts (any speed work, really) and I was still sore from Tuesday's workout so I had no idea what to expect from myself. The schedule called for 4 - 6x1600m repeats at 10k pace with 400m recoveries in between. As Scott, the coach, explained, the idea is to train yourself to run tired. It's as much mental as anything else. He offered the three of us who had run Boston an alternate workout (3 - 5x1200m with 800m recoveries) but we all decided to try the 1600s.

The workout actually went pretty well. I did the first 1600 in 6:10 but felt surprisingly good. After what seemed like an incredibly short recovery I did the next one in 6:06. Scott had said that those of us still in marathon recovery could stop at 3 if we wanted so as I began the third one I paid special attention to how my legs were feeling. I did it in 6:07 and decided I felt good enough to end on a even number. It helped that one of my teammates, Tom (who also did Boston), was running at about the same pace.

For the final repeat I tried to stay on pace for the first three laps. Once I got to the 200 mark, though, I began picking it up. When I hit the final straightaway I kicked it to finish the mile in 5:57. It was definitely tiring but I was extremely happy that I stuck with it. Now I'm really looking forward to a summer of speed work.
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 Yesterday's Run: 7.5 miles total.

Getting Your @$$ Kicked By a Cat

Last night was my first speed workout since Boston and, as it turned out, my first set of hill repeats since last year's Boston training cycle (in my usual training I replace repeats with hilly long runs).  Anyway, on Tuesday nights my team--like so many others--meets for speed work in Central Park. With Brooklyn just over two weeks away I figured it was time to get my legs moving again.

Last night's workout? 5x800m hill repeats on Cat Hill. For those of you who (a) don't live in New York or (b) don't run in Central Park, Cat Hill is located on East Drive between approximately E 75thand E 81st. It's called Cat Hill because of Edward Kemeys' bronze "Still Hunt" sculpture of a cougar.* At just about a quarter mile and an average of 3.7% grade it's not the longest or steepest hill in the park--those distinctions belong to Harlem hill which is a third of a mile at 4.4% grade--but it still makes for a good workout. To get 800m we kept going after the crest of the hill, enjoying some downhilll, another rise, and some flat to finish just past the Met.

Our goal was to do the repeats at 10k pace. I haven't run a 10k since last summer but my old pace was around 6:10. Several of the guys said they would be running around a 6:15 pace and that sounded good so I set off with them. The first one felt comfortably hard. Could I have kept running at the end? Yes. Did I want to? No. Turns out we had run it in a sub-6 pace. We jogged back down and tackled the next one--5:45 pace. I joked about doing the third one at 5:30 pace--we didn't, but it was still sub-6. By now I could feel the marathon in my legs.

After three I wanted to stop (the workout schedule did say 3 to 5 repeats) but one my teammates suggested I do the next one a little slower and at least get in an even 4. I heeded his advice and did a 4th, still under 6:00 pace. After that one I knew I had to do all 5 but I took the last one a little easier, right around 6:08 pace--probably my actual 10k pace these days. After the repeats (including a slower 6th one to pace a teammate who still had one to go) I jogged home making it 9 miles for the night. It was a tough workout but I was really happy with myself afterward. I can't say my legs were happy with this morning, but that's why they invented the recovery run.

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* Before Kemeys' statue was added in 1883 this stretch was called Cedar Hill.

Dumb Ideas: Running the Brooklyn Bridge at Lunchtime

Yesterday I decided to go for a lunchtime run. Things aren't super busy this week at work and the extra hour or more of sleep that I get when I don't run in the morning sounded nice. All would have gone well but I overlooked one crucial fact--as soon as the weather turns nice, the Brooklyn Bridge walkway turns into a clusterf***.

Photo credit: Streetsblog.org

While the iconic bridge offers some of the best views in the city and is tantalizingly close to my office, it is no place to run at lunchtime on a nice day. Early morning? Okay. Raining outside? Should be fine. Warm and sunny? You'd have better luck traversing the seventh circle of hell. Of the three East River bridges that connect Brooklyn to Manhattan none draw tourists like the Brooklyn Bridge which unfortunately happens to have the narrowest walkway. It's divided by a white line between bikers and walkers, but few tourists manage to stay inside the line. I'm hardly the first person to document this phenomena (check out Vincent Mounier's post from last year for some great photos on the subject).

I have nothing against these tourists but the moral of the story is clear: if you want to quickly traverse the East River during peak hours, you are better off going north to the unloved Manhattan Bridge. The extra distance is more than made up by the time you save dodging oblivious tourists and the occasional angry biker. I think I'll save the Brooklyn Bridge for my crack of dawn commute runs from now on.
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Yesterday's Run: 5.2 miles at 7:48 pace.