The Yellow Brick Road to Success

I dont remember what the workout was and I forgot to record it but I do know that I did a 1mile warm up and cooldown.

Coach Lee of the Kenyan runners officially took over. We ran a 1 mile warm up and cooldown. The workout was 4 x 870 inside tech halls. My times were 1)2:57, 2)2:55, 3)3:07, 4) 3:07.

I dont remember what the rest times were. During the run it felt like my right leg wasn't contributing to my running at all. It was just along for the ride.

Today was our first day working out on the second floor track. This track is one giant turn. It is completely circular. This track is also 80 meters in circumference. Well as for the actual workout it was 6 by 4 laps(320 meters). Towards the end of the workout my arms were really dying. I found it very hard to keep a good pace on this track. I think that it was just my getting used to this track.

This is the beginning of Coach Lee's back to back to back hard workout regime. So today we ran 8 by 1 lap of tech hallways which is 290 meters exactly. My times were 1)47, 2)49, 3) 50, 4)49, 5) 50, 6)48, 7) 51, 8) 54. ON number six I was using little kid Sammy (actually an 8th grader) as my motivation since he just hopped in one with us. On the last two my arms were really hurting. I guess you can say that today was an ok day.

Well I ran a 2 mile warm up and a 3 lap cooldown in the halls. The actual workout which was with the team and inside of Tech was 5 by 2 lap(580 meters). My times were 1) 1:47, 2) 1:50, 3) 1:49, 4) 1:58, 5) 1:48. towards the end of the workout I got a little tired but I think the workout went ok overall. In hind sight I thought that the times were too slow and I have to speed them up.

Today was an easy run outside in Ft. Greene and it was my first time using the metronome that I bought. I bought the metronome so that I could begin increasing my stride rate since it was kind of low at 80 steps per minute (for each foot so 160 overall.) I must say that I loved the feeling of todays run with the metronome although it took a little time getting used to.

Well today was Martin Luther Kings Relays at the Armory in manhattan where I got to run the 800 again. I was also the anchor leg again for a 4 by 800. I Pr'd (set a personal record) today with a time of 2:20. I wasnt able to get my splits however. For some reason after my cooldown which was about 500 meters it hurt to raise my leg. I'm not quite sure why though.

Way before I ever got to practice my legs were hurting me. I had felt the pain all through this morning and up until practice. To start practice off I ran a 1200 meter warm up. Once I warmed up and did some drills minus the high skipping which aggravated my condition, and ran the workout my pain subsided. The workout was 7 by 1 lap(290 meters). I had to use the bathroom so I missed the 8th. Plus I really didnt want to do it. I wasnt able to get the times but they werent that great. My slowest time was 58 though. Unfortunately after walking 2 laps cooldown and going home I was in MAJOR pain. My hamstrings felt like they were going to rip. It didnt feel good at all. I dont think I'll be going to practice for a few days. Mysteriously I still dont know what brought about the pain that I felt today.

I was finally feeling better from last weeks workout on Wednesday. I ran this workout with Andrew outside at Midwood Field. I ran a 1 mile warm up with my metronome set to 85. After some light stretching I ran 4 by 1000 meters in very adverse conditions. It was very cold and the wind was continually blowing us. My times were- 1) 3:33, 2) 3:37, 3) 3:32, 4) 3:32.

My arms were really killing me at the end of this workout. I ran a 1200 meter cooldown.

This days running was broken up into two seperate workouts. For the first workout I ran at Midwood field with Andrew. I ran a 1 mile warm up witht he metronome at 90. Next I set off into a 600 meter run which I completed in 1:50. The wind at this point was treacherous and my arms (pectoralis major and minor) were dying. We decided to end the workout there. So after this we did a 800 meter cooldown.

Many hours later we showed up at the school to work out with the team. I ran a 2mile warm up with the metronome once again at 90. However this time I felt it quite difficult to keep up with it. Once I was finished with the warm up we began to run the workout which was 5 x 240(3 laps of the second floor track) with rest 3 minutes. After the 240's we ran 2 by 160 (2 laps of the 2nd floor track). My slowest 240 was 44 seconds and my slowest 160 was 28 seconds. To finish off the day we did a 900 meter cooldown. I dont think the day was too bad overall but it was a little bit tiring.

Today was another track meet where I must say I did exceptionally well. This was the end of my good times in track at least for the 3months give or take a week. I ran the mile and hte 800 today. Unfortunately the 800 was fifteen minutes after the mile. In my mile I ran a 5:08 which was a Pr of 14 seconds off of my previous time. Minutes later I ran trhe 800 in 2:21.98. I was very tired in that 800 and felt like I was really going no where. The mile race felt pretty easy as far as keeping the pace with the people who were racing with me and I never really felt like I couldnt keep going of became overly fatigued. It was one of the best races I've ever had in my life so far. However I must say that the first 200 was too fast. I came through in about 32 or 33. But it all evened back out eventually because my splits for both 800's were 2:33 and 2:38.

Ok Andrew and myself went running outside again but this time in floyd bennet field. Andrew rode me approximately halfway there when I decided to get off and Jog the last 3miles(approximate) from Toys R'us to Floyd Bennet. For the Actual workout we ran 5 by two minutes very hard with 4 minutes easy. We took a break after the first three since I was dying out. I ran the warm up at 90 spm (strides per minute) but it was a bit difficult to keep up with it. During the 2 minute bursts it was much easier to keep the 90 spm but as the workout went on and I got more tired I found it harder to keep that cadence. All in all this was one hell of a good workout. Now if only I had been smarter and taken the necessary recovery time afterwards. Foolish me.

Todays workout was inside Tech halls. I ran a warm up of 1 mile with out my metronome. Next the team proceeded to run 6 by 290meters with 3 minutes rest. The times were 1)44, 2)48, 3) appr. 49, 4)appr. 51, 5)appr 52, 6)appr 52. I felt extremely horrible over the last trhee and I had difficulty breathing and relaxing. My head was pounding on both sides. Darren said that he thought these were symptoms of dehydration. My arms were also in a lot of pain. This was so not a good day.