I didn’t bonk! I didn’t hit my target time either, though. I would consider my recent 5K race mostly a success because it was a chance to gain more running experience while measuring myself against what I did back in September.

So, what was my target time? It was 19:59. What did I finish the 5K in? I finished in 21:21. Quite a bit better than the 21:59 a few months ago, but still a ways off from going sub-20:00. I do think that being a halfway decent runner at one point in my life has doomed me to having somewhat unrealistic expectations, but I will climb this mountain again. Even if it takes longer than I expected. The journey is part of the fun, after all!

Takeaways

• Old-school tech is not great when it comes to running shoes.
• There’s a lot of “feel” to pacing that only comes with repetition.
• Running in-person races is better than virtual ones (this one was done as safely as possible).
• It’s a fine line between leaving it all on the course successfully and finishing with too much left in the tank.

Next Training Block Begins

After my calves recover a bit I’ll begin my next training block. Seriously, those Lunaracers, while they felt fine during the 5K, destroyed my calves. I’ve been stretching, massaging, applying various creams, etc., and they’re just now unwinding. Definitely have to pick up something newer than circa 2010. Currently, I have a 5K race on August 14 penciled in. That would be a 15-week training block, which is quite long, but I need the extra time to dial in pacing and (intelligently) build up my mileage. In any case, I’ll still be aiming for that 19:59 until I hit it and move onto the next ambitious goal.

You may remember this post from a few months ago where I briefly went through my “bonking” during a 5K time trial. Well, it’s been quite a bit longer than eight weeks (thanks holidays!), but I’m scheduled to run another 5K race this coming Saturday. I will certainly be drawing on that experience from September in order to run a smarter race. Thankfully, I’ve also built a better base of mileage, and I’ve put in some speed work. Which is why you see those old school Lunaracer 1s at the top of this post.

I broke those out last week because I’m planning to race in them and wanted to make sure they were ready for it. Despite their age (I’ve probably put less than 15 miles on them), they seem ready for the challenge. I don’t remember exactly when I purchased them, but it’s probably been at least 10 years ago and 99% of that time they’ve been in a box. To be sure, they are old school. No carbon plate, an upper that’s a bit rough around the edges and Lunarlon in the midsole. However, they’ll get the job done on Saturday. After that, I’ll determine whether I want to upgrade the footwear I’m using for speedier intervals as well as 5K and 10K races.

Work that Speed

Speaking of intervals, the most recent workout I ran was 6x600m with 200m active recovery between each rep (with a mile warmup and a mile cool down). I have to say, I felt great afterwards. Definitely worn out, but not overly so. In fact, I was running it at what I thought my 5K pace for Saturday should be, but probably could have dropped it down a few seconds. Certainly a good problem to have. I am looking forward to adding in more interval training after this race. I started out with mostly 8x400m (might be a bit too “track-focused” for big 5K improvements but I like them anyway), but threw in some ladders here and there. Running that 800-1000-1200-1000-800 with two minutes of active recovery between each rep definitely had me fondly remembering the 400m intervals I had been running. In just a few days I’ll see what all of this work has accomplished. My hope is that I’ll be able to run both smarter and harder.