A Relatively Speedy 5K

I've been running slow as molasses recently, so tonight I thought it would be fun and interesting to push the pace a little bit. The plan was to do something resembling intervals going fast a kilometre here, slow a kilometre there, and so on.

It was beautiful weather today, and when I got home the temperature was still in the low teens (Celsius, that is, for the other would mean it was extremely cold). If anything I totally overdressed and should have simply gone with shorts and t-shirt, leaving the sweatshirt at home. I regretted my mistake as I started to overheat within the first third of my run.

I decided to just have fun and run on feel for the first kilometre. At the end when I heard the Garmin beep I was pleasantly surprised to find that my first split was 4:51 (7:48/mile pace). I picked up the pace for the second kilometre on account of the interval plan thing and managed to complete it in 4:21 (7:00/mile pace). I then slowed down since my heart rate had gone up to 171bpm and managed the third split (I'll call it the recovery split) in 5:10 (8:20/mile pace). Then I really wanted to push it a bit on the fourth split, and let me tell you it hurt. Definitely overheated on this one, and reached a heart rate that I haven't seen since I was a young swimmer. I managed this split in 4:10 (6:42/mile pace) and the average heart rate was 174bpm, with a max of 180! I then took off my sweatshirt and cooled down on the last kilometre, which I finished in 5:29 (8:50/mile pace).

The entire 5km took me 24:02 at an average pace of 4:48/km (7:44/mile pace). The average heart rate was a bit high at 160bpm, but I think that was partly due to the lingering effects of that cold I had over the weekend and the overheating.

But it sure was fun to try and actually "run" rather than jog. We'll see how my body reacts, and now I have to go do some foot stretching and strengthening stuff to make sure that I don't have a setback on the plantar fasciitis front.

Garmin don't lie.