11mi. I had asked Lanae if she was interested in running the day after Christmas, being I had not done a morning run or ride on the 25th. She said she was doing a hill repeat workout with Sharon at 7:30am and I was welcome to join. Great. I didn’t run the usual bridge workout yesterday, this would be like sleeping late, then running the bridge. Perfect!
I arrived first, but Lanae and Sharon were close behind. We began with a 2 mile run around Singer Island. This went east on Blue Heron Blvd, to Lake Ave, past Sharon’s house and Sailfish Marina, to a path along the water. It was sunny and humid, temps at 71 when we started. We ran to the Ocean Mall then back to the bridge. Now we began hill repeats. – intervals of 1:30 at a good clip. This was challenging, because regardless of where the girls were, really I was running against my own limits, speed, legs and lungs. The 1:30 time saw me get right short of the top, to a pole I used as my finish point for the next 5 intervals. Once I completed 3 hills, I kept thinking about “not degrading.” I didn’t want to slow my pace on the latter 3 tries. Once we hit 6 of these, we did the same thing with 1:00 long sprints up the hill, yeah 6 of those, too. Then we stopped to drink the water we brought and left by the utility pole. Now it was 2 miles of 7:20 or better pace out and back on the island. I felt my right Achilles tighter than it should have been, and I was working and thinking hard to keep myself at the good pace. I don’t train like this, this is focused and aimed at delivering improvement! We finished the 2 miles at 7:15 miles, a good goal pace for Sharon, looking to pace her friend at 3:15 goal time in the last half of her marathon. We found all of our water and lanae’s shirt we missing from the utility pole once we returned. Not sure if it was the park employees or the homeless folks, we went into the park and I saw the park white pickup so I ran towards it. The man in the truck I think saw me running to him, got in the truck and started driving away… With nowhere to go. I an towards where he was heading, he stopped and did not roll down thepassenger window to talk, he got out of the driver’s side of the car and denied knowing anything about cleaning up our waters or taking Lanae’s shirt. Lanae confronted a homeless lady at the ladies room, but no info outta her, either. We got a drink from the fountain, and went back to run the bridge, this time :30 sec blasts at 6:20 pace or better. I was feeling the effects of the earlier workout already, my legs were tight (still from the running with Vibram shoes I guess) but I went well up the hill. All this and it’s now after 9am, my “makeup for not running yesterday” has spun awry. We finish the session with a cool down run in the parking lot, ruled of course by the reading of Lanae’s Endomondo app for the exact measurement of our 11 mile jaunt. This was a good tough run for me.
We finished up and I met Lanae at Dunkin Donuts for a drink and to give her Christmas gifts. Lori Fulton was our waitress, thankfully she had her name badge on or I wouldn’t know who she was. What a great way to start Boxing Day, the day John and I leave for a great Las Vegas trip!
8mi. Today I was first to the lot, first to run, and first to encounter the high or drunk homeless guy at the water fountain and bathroom. He asked me if I knew what time it was, when I said (and showed him) I didn’t have a watch, he started to yell at me that,”I’d better have one next time, do you hear me?” That was enough for me – I saw Lilia coming around the Harbormaster’s building, so I ran by her to make sure she didn’t drift over by this wacko. We ran away from him towards the cars and started the bridge laps. Lilia ran two with me, then joined Kylan and Lanae. I went solo for the remaining four laps and felt very good. A breeze from the west made one way better, but even the other direction was cooler than previous weeks. I had a good frame of mind and positive thoughts. Once others came I warned them it was one of thos e rare days when we had to make sure no one we care about got tangled up with the drunk guy. I finished solo and felt like I pushed a good pace today.
