Last week I whined to Steve that his 1km intervals in the program was too long a distance and could I please shorten it. Basically the email I got back was to suck it up, do the damn distance as hard as I can and stop complaining. Ouch! I felt a bit miffed actually. I felt like I’d been chastised like a small, whiny kid. Sorry Steve, I’ll try harder #hardarse
So today was interval day. 5 x 1km sprints with a 5 minute break in between each one. So far when I’ve tried these I’ve managed 4 sprints, and sometimes shorter than 1km. They’re harrrrrrrrrrrrd. Sam suggested we try taking the run on a straight stretch of footpath instead of around a 330m oval. No cones to navigate around, plenty more light and a different scene. We opted for the South Perth foreshore. I love running here.
First up, I had a clothing issue to deal with. I was wearing a TRC t-shirt. Now, I had a pretty good idea that the shirt belonged to Sam. My sister gave it to me ages ago, but I’m pretty sure it didn’t belong to her. For the whole time I’ve had it, I’ve made sure I have never worn it when I see Sam, in case she recognised it, in case she called me an arsehole for keeping her shirt. But this morning I couldn’t find another shirt – I had to bite the bullet and wear the fucking shirt. I thought maybe enough time has passed, maybe Sam would think I’d gotten the shirt somewhere else, maybe even I could say my sister gave it to me (which she actually did) … The second I stepped out of the changeroom Sam saw the shirt and said “Hey, that’s my shirt”… mother fucker! Totally busted! I’m not even sorry, I love the shirt.
The first 1km sprint was painful. And excellent. And painful. I set a 1km PB of 4:31. Not. Even. Mad! I pulled up at exactly 1km behind Sam who clocked a speedy 4:23 and was heaving, hunched over on the grass. Blerghhhhhh ouchhhhh!! I was right behind her – sucking in air as hard as I could, lungs burning. Awesome.
1 down!
Goddamit the 5 minute break was up in like… 5 minutes. Time for another. Fuuuuuuuuck…. I was chasing Sam as hard as I could. I swear she got a head start! And so we went. Five times in total. Each interval at about 300m in I decided I wanted to quit, that it was too fucking hard, my body hurt too much, my legs were like jelly, I just needed to slow down a little bit. But Sam was still running. She was still ahead of me. I wouldn’t stop until she stopped. Goddammit. I wouldn’t quit. At the end of each sprint Sam was like “oh fuck man, I wanted to quit at like 500m” haha… Sam runs away from me, and I run to catch her. It works well for both of us mentally. I don’t think she’ll ever let me run faster than her!
Seriously, after the 4th interval I was ready to call it quits. But we didn’t. We pushed on to the final 1km sprint. What a fucker. It was harrrrrrrrrrd.
Sam’s times looked like this:
- Interval 1 – 4:23
- Interval 2 – 4:26
- Interval 3 – 4:30
- Interval 4 – 4:33
- Interval 5 – 4:30
My times looked like this:
- Interval 1 – 4:31
- Interval 2 – 4:34
- Interval 3 – 4:37
- Interval 4 – 4:49
- Interval 5 – 4:38
Booyeah Steve! Take that! Totally smashed it! Half marathon training is on track.
Totes lookin’ fit here
toughmudderof4 