The Devil's Workout

Last week I made the mistake of looking ahead on my training program.  DON'T LOOK AHEAD ON THE TRAINING PROGRAM.  Needless to say, I've been freaking out about my hardest workout on the 12 week schedule:  7 miles; 4 x 1 mile repeats @ 7:33-7:43 with 800 m. jogs.  I vaguely remember dominating said repeats a couple of weeks ago, but there were only 3 of them.  Not FOUR.  Four is a lot.  Ick.  Also, those were done on a treadmill, without elements.  Again, freak out central.

So here's the deal.  I decided to play a game with my brain.  See, I convinced myself that I would do my mile repeats on Wednesday.  After deciding Monday night that I didn't want to run, the thought briefly occurred to me that I could do my mile repeats Tuesday morning before work since my legs would be nice and fresh.  However, I didn't let this information go to the freak out part of my brain to obsess over.  Instead, freak out part of the brain still thought I was doing an easy paced 9 miles.

When my alarm sounded, I got out of bed and grabbed a couple of bites of a protein bar and got ready for my run.  That's when I let my brain know what was up...... to some.... uh... resistance.... (apparently part of my brain is a child).

Jeri:  Guess what..... time to do some mile repeats!
Freak Out Brain:  Nuh uh.
Jeri.  Yup.  No reason not to.
FOB:  Sure there is.  Don't wanna.
Jeri:  It's light out.  It's nice out.
FOB:  Don't care.
Jeri:  You're going to have to do them on the treadmill otherwise.  You hate that.
FOB:  So.
Jeri:  You'll be stuck doing them with tired legs.  You'll freak out even more about that.
FOB:  Nuh uh.
Jeri:  If you do them today you don't have to obsess over them for the rest of the week.  You can start obsessing about the 22 miler instead.
FOB:  Lalallalalalalala...not LISTENING to you......
Jeri:  Fine.  You can wear all green for the run.
FOB:  Well ok then.

Once I got Leprecauned Up, I hit the road for the run.  It was freakin' chilly out there.  It took me through the first mile warm up and first mile to actually felt like I was warm.  Honestly, the first repeat might've been one of my most difficult.  Also, didn't help that it was almost primarily in to the wind.  The second mile was great because my legs seemed to memorize the pace.  The third mile I lost my headphones (FYI yurbuds may be sweatproof, but they're not jeri sweat proof) and was shocked at how hard I was breathing.  Yikes.  It's almost nice to have the music cranked up just to block that out!  The fourth mile was tough.  I had to haul some major booty the last quarter of a mile to get my pace where it needed to be.  Stole borrowed a mantra that kept me going almost as much as Taylor Swift has been lately (yes, I did listen to Haunted on repeat for a good chunk of one of the miles....shocker):  Don't think just run.  Yes, by repeating this mantra, I actually was having to think, but let's ignore that point, k?

I did the repeats in 7:39, 7:38, 7:39, 7:39.

Consistent little bugger huh?