More Charleston and F.I.R.S.T. Week 2

...after finishing shrimp & grits, we headed back to the hotel to clean up and spend some time in downtown Charleston. The temperature was in the 60s but it was raining. We walked up to Kings street and walked along it, stopping in some of the more interesting shops. We went into Half Moon Outfitters where I tried on a pair of Vibram Five Fingers. They didn't have the size I need or the kind I wanted, but I made a note of what I am looking for. I'm debating between a pair of V5s or a new pair of Mizunos. Just not sure if V5s are a good idea with my PF issue.






Adam shopped for a hat while we were there;)








We eventually stopped into King's Street Bar & Grill for a bite, some beers and to catch the NFL game. We took it easy the rest of the evening and went to Poogan's Porch for breakfast. I highly recommend Poogan's!

Poogan's Porch is in an old Charleston-style house on Queen St.

Back in Charlotte I enjoyed a relaxing Monday off from work since it was MLK day. Well not really. I actually got up early and made it to my athletic conditioning class and then went for a nice swim. After running a couple of errands I went home and sat on the couch for hours.

I usually do my speed workout on Mondays and I'd been doing them in the gym on the treadmill. I had decided that that really wasn't going to work and wasn't a good indicator of how fast I was really going and had resolved to finding a track. So I really wasn't relaxing on the couch as much as I was putting off going to the track. Finally around 3:00 I headed to a local school track. It was unseasonably warm but still cool enough to not get too hot. I need to do a 10 minute warm up, 12 x 400 (90 secs RI) and then a 10 minute cool down. I used to do my speed work on a street that was relatively flat and had the mile markers for 200 meters, 400 meters, etc. up to 800 meters and then you would run back to get in a full mile. I liked this but the track is closer. I had it in my head that I needed to run 12 times around the track with a 90 second rest in between. But for whatever reason, while I was warming up I somehow got it in my head that 400 meters was actually twice around the track and not once. I timed myself running twice around the track 10 times with a 90 second rest in between sets before it sunk in that I'd been doing 800s! Ugh! I thought well, I should finish what I started. But after doing my 11th one I realized that I'd done 5 1/2 miles of speed work and that's really too much. So I stopped. I was pretty beat anyway. My times were:

1. 3:49
2. 3:51
3. 3:55
4. 3:56
5. 3:57
6. 4:00
7. 3:55
8. 3:59
9. 4:02
10. 4:02
11. 4:05

So from this, I see some consistency. I also see an endurance issue. By the way, the first 4:00 was partially due to a pause when a little girl riding her bike on the track took a nasty spill. I was going to help her, but her dad was at the track and he helped her. She wasn't seriously hurt just startled.

My second run for the week, my tempo run, was postponed a day because of work. Luckily my training schedule is flexible enough that this wasn't a problem. I just ran the next morning instead of in the evening with my group. It was cold and my foot hurt (pf issue) for the first mile, but loosened up and didn't bother me again until after the run. The plan was 1 mile easy, 4 miles tempo, 1 mile easy. Unfortunately, when my run was moved to the next day, I had to run a route I'm not familiar with. This meant having to stop a couple of times and check my directions. I did manage to get the 4miles tempo in at 37:05. I was happy with this given the stop and go during the run due to not being familiar with the route. I think next week's tempo run will go a lot better.

For my third run this week I'm meeting a group to run part of it. I have to run 11 miles at a 10:20 pace. I don't think that will be a problem. I may try to run it at a sub-10 pace but it really depends on how I feel when I wake up that morning. I'm looking forward to running a long run with a group again.