Last Race Salvation

I guess I should wrap up what happened, now that I've had time to reflect on it.

It started a few days after the league championships. I went in and talked to Coach, wondering what the fuck happened this season. It wasn't fair, I had put in more work slowly and steadily, without injury, without making myself too sore, and I hadn't seen any rewards.

We looked over my training schedule. Upon closer inspection, we came to two conclusions. First, I was running my base runs far too fast. I thought that a little more quality rather than quantity would be a good thing, but I overdid it. I had a 77 mile week (from a Wednesday-Wednesday) where my average pace on the week was a blistering 6:14/mile. Average. I was running my normal runs around 6:10 pace, my hard runs around 5:45 pace, and my long runs around 6:40 pace. Even with the 7+min pace warm ups for workouts, it was just too much. While each run wasn't making me sore itself, the accumulation of all that tired, tired muscle was just too much on my body, and I wasn't responding to track workouts.

It was not like it hadn't helped. I was absolutely crushing the over-distance work, compared to myself previously. But the speed, though it wasn't that bad, wasn't fast. In fact, the times were as fast as I had ever run at the beginning of the season, first workout, first race, and I was excited. Look back a couple months and see, I really was excited.

But then I didn't get faster, and the workouts didn't get any easier (at the same pace), and I didn't get any more 'pop' in my legs.

The second thing we noticed was that I was doing the same thing, I.E. stimulating the same muscles over the past 8 months. I would do 10 mile base runs without fail, 1 workout of mile or 1k repeats, 1 10mile hard run, and a 14-16 mile long run. Repeat for 30 weeks. Sure, it makes you strong, but not the kind of strong that middle distance runners should be. Strong, but not powerful. And in the 1500m you need to be just that - powerful.

I was not overly excited going into what was likely my last race of the season. The times hadn't played out for me like I had thought it would, not even close. The wins were there, and that was fun, but I need the times to get to the next level.

So, we did what we thought I should have been doing, and rested. All week, I did nothing but 40min trots and ONE 6x200 @ 31s pace. Just resting.

As I toed the line for the last time, I was probably as unenthusiastic for a race as I had been in years. I just thought - fuck it, sit in and see what happens.

I was pulled through in 63, and then 2:05....and I felt fine. It was 3 seconds faster than I had gone through all season, and I felt just fine. Just sitting. With one lap to go I was at 2:52.low, and I still felt fine. Hit 1200m at 3:07.mid, and I just started sprinting. Sprinting and sprinting and sprinting, I wanted to run a good mark so bad. All of the memory of work and hopes and sweat and vomit came rushing back as I sprinted my legs out from under me. I sprinted too early, and was a walking dead man in the home straight. It was stupid, it was amateur, but I didn't care. I was being passed by people who had timed their move right, but I didn't care. I just willed my stone legs forward until I crossed the god damn line in 3:54 and it's not the time I had planned for the season but fuck it its finally vindicated what I put myself through and no matter what happens from here on out at least I can say that on one day I ran a 3:54.

Is that good enough for me? Of course it's not, I'm a runner. I'm not in it for the views and the lovely pace of trotting along, feeling great about myself for how in shape I am. I'm in it for the transformative pain that one can only learn about by putting themselves through it, without anyone else to tell them when or why. I ran a smart race with a dumb kick, and I'll learn from it.

And hey, if I start my season next year at 3:54 after what I've learned, I'll know what to look forward to.