When I peeked at my training plan last week and discovered two speed sessions for this week, I was actually pleased. The treadmill is conducive to speed training. The biggest reason I prefer the treadmill is because I am not bothered by the frequent interruptions of little ones needing this or that. Often, while attempting to run longer distances at a moderate pace my workout looks more like interval training due to these distractions.
However, Wes recently reminded me of the fact that because of lack of wind resistance while running on a treadmill, the effort of running on a treadmill at 0% incline is less than that of running on a level road at the same pace. I thereby googled a pace conversion chart and adjusted the incline to appropriate outdoor conditions as best as possible. I selected a 1% incline so a 8:34 treadmill pace would be roughly equivalent to a 8:32 outdoor pace.
The prescribed plan for yesterday was:
2 x 1 mile at Cruise (7:30)
4 x 800 at Speed Interval (3:30)
2 x 1 mile at Cruise
My training paces are relatively arbitary, however. Based on my desired goal pace of 8:30, I looked at a few charts (McMillan, etc.) and came up with the following.
Goal Pace 8:30
Tempo 8:10
Cruise 7:30 (1 mile) 3:45 (800)
Speed Intervals 3:30 (800) 1:45 (400)
So, anyway... I ran a comfortable 1 mile warm-up at a 10 min pace and proceeded with the speed workout.
The goal was a pace of 7:30 (with the conversion chart it was equivalent to 7:30). The first mile kicked my butt. I rested and did a 2nd mile at the same pace. I was toast. Going into the 800s, I had a feeling I wouldn't be able to finish them at the prescribed pace but I tried to stay positive. In the end, I finished only 2 - both at 3:34 (7:08).
Buddy had been taking a nap while Sweetie was playing Numberz on the computer, so when he woke, just after my 2nd 800, I figured it was a good time to finish up. I thereby ran one more mile (considered my cool-down) at 8:34 and called it a day.
Perhaps I'll do the other half of this workout today. Perhaps not.
Speedy! What Wes says makes a lot of sense. Can you post a link to the chart?
ReplyDeleteThe link is embedded in the post ... just click on 'pace conversion chart'. There is also a link in my side bar under 'Running Resources'.
ReplyDelete:D
I think there's actually very little correlation between treadmill speed and running speed. The workouts are still good to stress your cardiovascular system and leg turnover time, but the muscular demands are significantly different.
ReplyDeleteOr maybe it's just because I hate treadmills so much. Nice job on the workout.
Sounds kind of complicated. I think I will just stick to my run 30 minutes, run 40 minutes, run 8 miles, etc. Maybe I will throw in some speed intervals here and there to spice things up! hehehe!
ReplyDelete