Officially a member of the club

I had a true Jack Daniels workout planned for Monday morning:

2 x 2 miles at threshold pace with 2 minute jogging recovery

3 x 800 m at interval pace with 2 minute jogging recoveries

3 x 400 m at repetition pace with 400 m jogging recoveries

As I was headed to the park, Richie called and asked if I wanted company.  He met me at the park and we warmed up for 2 miles as he described his previous weekend’s adventures in racing (a 39:47 10K).  Then we hit the intervals.  Here’s how it went:

2 miles in 13:42

2 miles in 13:30

I was true to form with a 400 m (2:20) jogging break between 2 mile efforts.  I had planned a 7:00 minute mile pace and beat that easily in both intervals.

After the 2nd 2 miler, I took a walking/jogging/water break and continued with the 800’s (planned at 3:00)

800 m in 2:59 (dry heave as I finished)

I walked around for a minute or two and then Richie paced me through the 2nd.  I got about 700 m before I started to dry heave again.  At 750 m, I was spewing a little breakfast.  I tried to finish, but I was full fledged puking before I could reach the marker.  I had to lean over a tree as I emptied my stomach of the morning’s breakfast.  Meanwhile, Richie had somehow gotten behind me.  It was a clever move on his part.  I think he heard the heaves coming and just got the hell out of the way.

“Hey, hey!” he was yelling, “welcome to the club buddy!  You’re a real runner now.”  I was smiling as I was puking.  It felt kind of good to be a “real runner” and a good hearty barf is always an allowable excuse for skipping the rest of a workout, eh?

“What did you have for breakfast?” asked Richie.

“A small bowl of cereal,” I replied.

“Milk?”

“Yes”

“When?”

“About 7:00”.  That was a lie.  It had actually been about 7:30 – a mere half hour before the start of the workout.

“No sympathy,” he said shaking his head, “you had breakfast an hour before a hard workout?  That’s two stupid things you’ve done in one week”.  He was, of course, referring to the “walking in a 5K” incident.  Technically, that happened last week, so I’m still averaging one stupid thing per week.

“Alright,” he said waving me back to the starting post, “have some water and let’s get back to it.”  I downed a swallow of water and lined up behind him.

“Let’s get it over with,” I said.  I was already feeling pretty crumby in the first 200 m.  He sensed I wasn’t going to pull off another 800 and stopped it at 400 m (1:32).  I walked.

“I want you jogging,” Richie said, “even if it’s a shuffle.  I’ll give you a goal.  If you finish the next two 400’s in less than 1:30 you’re done.  If not, you do another.”

“Fair enough,” I thought.  The 400’s didn’t seem so bad.  We jogged back to the start for the next two 400’s:

400 m in 1:24

400 m in 1:23

Nailed those with plenty of time to spare.  We immediately went into a cool down and rounded the whole workout off for 10 miles total.

Puking during a workout is not fun, but it did actually feel good that I pushed hard enough to get to that point without my head getting in the way – even if it was stupid to have a bowl of cereal so close to the workout time.