Morning interval workout: Probably one of the best workouts of my life in terms of feel and execution

As I told yesterday I want to become a morning runner again, so I put the alarm again at 7:00 a.m., but woke up way before the alarm at 6:39 a.m., but as yesterday, I applied for some Jobs for a while, drank a lot wáter so that I could got o the bathroom and not have  GI problems during the workout.

The plan was to do 4 x 1k, but I was not in the mood to warm up to the Turia Park with all the traffic, so did an Interval workout, but decided to do 4 x 1  lap and 1 x 2 mins ( to complete the extra meters to get to 4k worth of fast running) in the Blasco park which is around 900m, I really wanted to do a workout there so that I can see what time I could run in a fast lap doing intervals. On the flip side, after todays great workout, I wanted to see what time I actually could run in a full 1k intervals.

I had a lot of time without doing an Interval workout in the morning, in fact, my last morning workout was on Guadalupe and it was at 11 a.m. if I recall correctly. I think that running fasted is also overthought, I mean, I did the workout fasted, ate my last meal, yesterday at 9 something, and ran the workout today at 8:30 am without eating anything and without having any problems. However, I understand that it could vary from person to person.

I headed out the door at around 8:30 a.m., which is not that early, but for me these days it is, and given that here the sun is rising at 8 a.m. or so, so at 7:XX is very dark.

It was a cold morning, it was in 6 degrees, which felt cooler with the wind, I wore my hat and my windbreaker, then walked to the park and the warm up started, did 1 lap in 6:05, very easy ( The soreness is gone), then at 10:00 within the warm up I had to go to pee and it was urgent, could not run the whole workout feeling like that, so ran to home again, went to the bathroom and inmediately went back to the park, however, I did around 2 strides of around 50m or a bit less, from the park to home and then when I left the house again going to the park, did 1 stride, then when I got the park the watch read 14:00, so inmediately I did around another fast 50m stride to finish up the warm up, continued running easy until the 15 mins, then stopped for around 30 secs  to 1 mins and the 4 x 1 lap started. Rest planned was 3:30 between repeats, so plenty of recovery.

I was ready to roll and started the first repeat at a good pace and at a controlled effort, pretty much maintained at even pace throughout, did the 1st repeat in 3:57, was kind of surprised, I thought that I was going slower, but just did mything, recovered and the 2nd repeat started, the process was the same, fast pace, hard effort, but an effort that I felt I could sustain for the whole repeat, second came in 3:50, I had to look at the watch several times to make sure what I was seeing was correct, calculate what would be that in 1 full kilometer, I calculated around 4:15-4:16, which is great for me. Anyway, recovered 3:30, and the 3rd repeat started, in this one I could feel the hard breathing earlier, but I hang in there and tried not to slow down, keeping effort and pace while running relaxed, by the last 100m my breathing was very fast, but the stride/pace was relaxed, fast, but controlled. 3rd came in 3:50, again surprised. By now, I knew that I was having a great day and was feeling awesome. 4th repeat started and again the hard breathing started earlier, but I just kept my effort and pace, was huffing and puffing by the end, but I could really sustain the pace without struggling. Last repeat came in 3:49, wow much better than expected.

After the last "lap repeats" I rest around 3:15, and then started at the same effort pace, but the repeat only would for 2 mins. By the end of those 2 mins I was ready to be done, the breathing was fast, but my form was great, of course I was tired, but I could have gone longer, but left it at that, because this is my first Interval workout in around 2 months, and you dont want to over do it.

For cool down, I did 2 laps in 11:56 (6:05,5:51), then kept running until the watch read 13:30 and walked home. That cool down felt like walking, those intervals must have loosened up my legs so that that pace feel that easy. Around 10k for the day or so.

I must admit that I was really surprised with the workout, before the workout I suspect that I could go 4:03-4:05, with the last one really pushing sub 4 mins, but in all honestly, I was working hard, but I could have gone faster if I would have pushed in the last 100m stretch, instead I just kept good running form and good effort, that is the key running the intervals workouts and other types of workouts for that matter. In the past I would leave my races in workouts, workouts times and races times did not match up so to speak, so I really wanted to be "conservative" on this one, but it was difficult given how good I felt and how good the weather was. Next time, I Will go to the Turia Park to see what my actual fitness really is in measured distance. Maybe I am in better shape than I think, but you have to show that in races, not workouts.

Anyway, good workout, tomorrow I ll just run easy to recover or Will take the day off, probably Will run tomorrow morning and rest on Thursday!

Another thing, maybe the yesterday`s strides really helped to loosen up the legs, or it was today`s strides for wam up, maybe both? in the end, this is a puzle and every component of training is important.

Have a great Tuesday!