So I've taken a couple of weeks "off" from hard-core running and I'm ready to get going again. I'm just really pumped about this coming season. The school's 400 m record is going down. All I need is some serious speed work. Last season my 200m splits were identical…sometimes the second 200 was even marginally faster. Last night I couldn't sleep because I kept thinking about how fast each 200 needs to be to run a 58.0 400. The first is going to need to be somewhere between 27 and 28, and the second between 30 and 31. My 200 PR is 28.8. I ran that race over two years ago, freshman year, and haven't run it since so I doubt if that time is a good guideline. My freshman and sophomore year our team was weaker in the short sprints, so that is what I trained. At that time we had 4 girls going 60.0 or a little faster in the 400, and three girls running about 2:20 in the 800. This year, though, we had NO ONE who ran middle distance. So I took one for the team and started training mostly for the 400. It was slow going, as I started out running about a 67 or 68. Toward the end of the season my times started to fall, until at regionals I ran a 31.5+31.5 leg in the mile relay. Now the 400 is my favorite race, because it's a very mental one and I can manipulate it to my will since I'm such an analytical person. I'm confident I can shave off five more seconds in the next eleven months through maintaining my endurance but increasing my speed. This will also help my long-jumping. Freshman and sophomore year I was running mostly the 100, so my speed was a lot better than it is now, but my form was so bad, I PR'd by over a foot this year even though I'm running so much slower. I've seen myself on tape and I seem to just jog up to the board, then compensate by getting a good pop-off, driving my arms, and getting my legs way out in front of me.
Anywho, my emphasis is going to be on speed training, since that's where I'm weak. One thing you'll very quickly notice is that I don't just go out and run a lot. This is for two reasons: 1) I live in Indiana, where in summer it's hotter than Hades and as humid as the Amazon Rain Forest, not to mention the fact we've had tornados and strong thunderstorms for two weeks straight, so often outdoors activity is limited 2) The school track is padlocked during the summer and I'm much mistaken if there aren't at least three armed guards keeping all non-football players away. I tend to have shin problems so running on concrete sidewalks would be a death sentence, and every grassy area around here is under two feet of water at the moment.
Having said that, rain does not deter me. In fact, just yesterday I played Ultimate Frisbee for an hour and half in torrential rains. Besides Frisbee, I also like to substitute dancing or aerobics of some kind for a distance run, and I enjoy Pilates and weight-lifting and plyometrics, which can be done in the air-conditioning. Hallelujah. One option I have entertained is driving to the track either at IU or IUPUI, but with gas prices so high and me paying for my own gas…it's not likely to happen. As soon as it stops raining here, I plan to do some 60 yard sprints through the quagmire that is my backyard. Until later. :saint: