A.M. Big Workout at 5:00 AM. Ted did not make it, I suppose due to his knee pain. Part of it was with Clyde and Adam for portions of it. Adam turned around at 3.88. Clyde joined me for the first 2 miles of the tempo - his legs were still sore. First 6.22 in 47:03. Noticed some wind, did not like it. Then started the tempo. I was lazy. Clyde had his horses neighing at first. So I took the first quarter in 1:28, Clyde responded with 1:20 on his. Odd, felt fast but not 5:20 pace fast. Then I took mine in 1:27, Clyde responded with a 1:25, 5:40 mile. I did mine in 1:28, Clyde did his in 1:23. Around that time I started liking Clyde's quarters, but still lacked the initiative on mine. Then I took no splits for a while - it was dark, and I kept missing the marks. Clyde all of a sudden lost steam and bailed out at 2 - I guess his legs started to complain a lot. I continued on in my laziness. Hit a 5:53 mile (slight up) before the turnaround with the last quarter of 1:29. Talk about a lazy bum. 14:24 at the turnaround. On the way back tried to wake up. Hit the next mile in 5:44. Then things started to come together a bit, next mile in 5:38. Starting to gain on the 5:40 finally, but there seems to be some odd wind out there, and it is still dark. I am still not feeling extra motivated. Just as I about settled into a nice 5:38 rhythm, there was a gust head wind that slowed me down to a 1:29 quarter. 14:16 for the second 2.5, 28:40 for 5 miles. On the way back, the tail wind helped me get into a nice 5:36 rhythm after hitting the first quarter in 1:26 recovering from a 180 turn. Prior to hitting the headwind earlier I had hopes to catch the 5:40 guy, but now my goal was to just break 14:00 on the last 2.5. So I was just cruising along at 5:36 pace knowing that I could eat away the 2 second deficit on the last mile barring the headwind or something crazy like that. Next mile in 5:38. Then with 1.5 to go the sun started to rise, and I began to see some light. I may also have gotten a brief gust of tailwind as well. That gave me extra momentum and with about the same effort I hit a 1:22 quarter. From then on, I did all of the quarters in 1:22 up until the last, and with a little bit of concentration but not really kicking hit the last one in 1:20. So that gave me 8:10 for the last 1.5, 5:26 for the last mile (slight up), 13:48 for the last 2.5, and 42:28 for the entire 7.5 tempo, 2 seconds ahead of the 5:40 guy, and a PR for the 5:00 AM version of that run. Ran the cool down (1.38) in 10:34, total time for 15.1 was 1:40:05, 6:37.68 avg. Observed an interesting phenomenon that I've seen many times before. When I hit the headwind I had a certain negative feeling in the quads. That feeling comes usually when it is cold and I am trying to either run hard or not super hard but I am not yet warmed up, e.g I can get it going as slow as 7:00 pace in the first mile on a cold morning. I can also get it on a warmer day running hard uphill or into a headwind, and on a cold day that feeling is more pronounced when the quads are in high power mode (uphill, headwind). It can happen at slower than marathon pace effort heart rate, so it is not lactic acid build-up, that feeling is distinctly different from anaerobic running, but it is similar in that it seems to signal to the brain to back off. I can even get it by just walking up the stairs. I am thinking that feeling comes from the blood vessels being too constricted to handle the blood flow in required quantities. So the question for those with exercise physiology background - when running uphill or into ahead wind, would the increased contraction of the muscle squeeze the blood vessels to restrict blood flow to some perceivable degree? P.M. 2 miles with Benjamin and Lost Sheep Stu in 17:23. Pushed Joseph in the single stroller. Then put Joseph and Benjamin in the double stroller and ran 2 more miles with Lost Sheep Stu in 14:49. Then 1.05 with Jenny and Julia in 10:55, 0.5 more with Jenny in 4:39, and 0.7 by myself in 5:03, no stroller.
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