5K Tempo run: 23:30

This morning   I ran fasted (and drank a couple of beers after dinner yesterday). I did my 5k tempo with my brother at 10 a.m. The idea was to do it earlier, but I woke up at 4:45 a.m. and I could not get back to sleep till 7 a.m., so We moved the workout to 10 a.m., I started running from home to the Turia park, then ran some more there till complete 16 mins for warm up. In that period incorporated 5 x 50m or so acceleration strides.

I felt tired in the warm up, was still sore, but was going to do the workout anyway. My brother told me He wanted to the 5k in less than 23 mins, so much faster than his current 10k race pace. My goal was not that ambitious, I wanted to run 23:15-23:30, around my 10k race pace.

From the get go He was ahead of me, but I was running my pace, crossed the 200m in 54 seconds, I was running a tad faster than expected, then eased into my goal pace, first km was in 4:38, right where I wanted to be. At that point my brother was more than 8 seconds ahead, I tried to keep the same effort/pace, but after the mile, I started to feel tired,2k came by in 9:20 (4:42 for that km), halfway came in 11:39 (that 500m in 2:19), then lost around 3 seconds in the turn around. My brother crossed in 11:28 or so, so He was running strong, but I was gaining on him little by little. I crossed the 3k in 14:00 (4:40 for 3rd km), I was keeping my pace and it felt sustainable, but at that point I was running close to the pace I ran in my 10k race 4 weeks ago, I wonder if I could sustain that pace for 10k today and the answer was clear, no!! I was huffing and puffing already and the pace was difficult to maintain after 3 km, after the mile I felt sore and its obvious that I was not recovered from the hard interval session I did on Wednesday evening,

I was gaining on my brother very fast, in the 4th km which I crossed in 18:49 (4:49 for that km, after that I knew that it was not my day), my brother had 3 seconds on me, but as soon as We crossed the last km, with around 900m to go I passed him, I tried to regroup in the last km, but did not push the pace, just tried to relax and tried to maintain my effort, no point in pushing a pace to dig yourself in a tempo run, stimulus in these workouts its whats important. I finished the 5k in 23:30, running 4:41 for the last km. My brother finished in 23:43.

I felt really tired and huffing and puffing. This is the first time that I do a positive split in a tempo run, positive split the thing by 12 seconds. My brother did for 45 seconds, so He hit the wall very hard.

Weather was very hot today and sun was in full force today. However, as I said I felt tired even before starting the workout. All in all, I think that I did a decent workout, right in the range that I was hoping for. We jogged 1.7k or so for cool down to complete 9.2k for the day.

Tomorrow We rest since We are traveling to Barcelona to see family. We will walk a lot tomorrow I expect. I almost run a second run today, but thought better of it, better to rest for Tuesday workout and be as rested as possible. Tomorrow will be a rest day off running, but definitely all that walking will be quiet a workout!