Ohhh, definitely want to avoid getting Dead Butt Syndrome. Maybe I should push my Gym workouts to twice a week. It's just that it's soo hard to get up early after a track workout (when I'm not able to get to bed until 11).

Here's our Community Running Monday night track workout plan for the season. I'll go into details on what the workouts actually are as we do them each week. As you can see, last night was a (1200, 1000, 800, 600) x 2 @ 5k workout. What does that mean? Click the continue reading link below to find out...

Date	Workout	Type
December 20	(1200, 1000, 800, 600) x 2 @5K	Interval
December 27	Track Bingo	Fun
January 3	3 x 1800 @ (5k, 10k, 1/2 Marathon)	Interval
January 10	ELF 3 x 10 laps with worksheet	Pacing/Cruise
January 17	8 x 600 @ 5k w/one lap shuffle	Interval
January 24	600 easy, 200 hard x 5, Break, Repeat	Speed
January 31	4 x 1800 @ (5k, 10k, 1/2 Marathon)	Interval
February 7	ELF 4 x 10 laps with worksheet	Pacing/Tempo
February 14	8 x 600 @ 5k w/one lap shuffle	Interval
February 21	Track Bingo	Fun
February 28	(1200, 1000, 800, 600, 400) x 2 @5K	Interval
March 7	5 x 1800 @ (10k, 1/2 Marathon, Marathon)	Pacing/Cruise
March 14	10 x 600 @ 5k w/one lap shuffle	Interval
March 21	2 x 1 mile @ Marathon, then "Survivor"	Fun
March 28	5 x 1800 @ (10k, 1/2 Marathon, Marathon)	Pacing/Cruise
April 4	5 x 1 mile @ Marathon	Pacing/Tempo
April 11	3 x 1 mile @ Marathon	Pacing
April 18	Boston Marathon	Race

Short runs this week were 4 miles yesterday at home and 6 miles this morning around the Charles. Decent enough runs, except it was freezing out. Seems that the transition from fall (40-50 degrees during the early morning) and winter (20-30 degrees just after sunrise) was non-existent.

For temps under 40, what would be considered a gentle cooling breeze during the rest of the year becomes an arctic blast in the winter. Immediately after starting both yesterday's and this morning's runs my face felt like it was going to freeze and fall off. In moments my whole head began to burn in pain from the cold air. It calmed down by the end of the first mile, and by mile three the cold became bearable. But that's the best that can be said.

Last night was my first track practice of the season with Community Running. Every Monday evening from 7:00 PM to 8:30 PM throughout the winter Community Running offers coached speed interval workouts at the MIT Indoor track. Brian Hamill, a coach for Run for Research is also head coach for Community Running, and a healthy amount of Liver folk like me join Community Running as part of our training for the Boston Marathon. We always start off with a short 1.8 mile warm up run outside, followed by various types of speed workouts on the track each week. 

This week it was an 8 x 600 interval workout. But, first, a comment on the outdoor warm-up: It was snowing!

Well, I think I can say that training has formally started. I ran six miles this morning and will run four miles tomorrow. On Saturday I join a bunch of folk from Liver and other charities for the first team long run out of Fitcorp @One Beacon Street (10 miles: One Beacon to Cleveland Circle and Back). Yeah, 20 miles in three days after what's basically been two weeks off isn't the smartest approach. But I've established a pretty good 20+ mile a week base in October and November, and I'm making them very easy miles.

Now I just have to kick the fundraising into gear!