Slow it Down

I did the Saturday workout with the Southern Cal Walkers. Many of them were going to do a race on Sunday so it was a very easy drill. After the usual warm up we did build ups--one lap slow with arms down, the next a slow racewalk, then with good form and finally an easy lap. I took the opportunity to see if I could find my 11:27 min/mi marathon pace. I was able to do two sets before the workout was over.

1st attempt - 2:38 = 10:32 min/mile
2nd attempt - 2:47 = 11:08 min/mile

All that speed work I was doing the past couple of weeks distorted my perspective of how fast I was going. It did feel good taking a slow lap and finding out that it wasn't really that slow. The first attempt I was faster than the fastest walkers in last year's L.A. Marathon--funny, when I started racewalking it seemed impossible for me to ever reach that speed. On my second try I really tried to slow it down but was still about 20 seconds per mile faster than my target pace.