Return of the difficult to remember workout

When I develop a running plan for myself, I typically do so in a nice organized Excel spreadsheet (shout-out to Lindsay).  This morning, I looked at the plan (I moved my speed work to Thursday due to lingering effects of my encounter with the dobermans) and simply saw a brief notation that said, “See Jack Daniels, pg. 244”.  It’s never a good sign when the workout doesn’t fit in the spreadsheet.  I spent about 5 minutes trying to memorize the workout and then another 10 drawing diagrams of the park where I usually run, trying to figure out how to use the mile markers there as guides while completing the workout.

Officially, the workout is 4 x (200 m R pace with 200 m jog + 200 m R pace with 400 m jog + 800 m R pace with 400 m jog).  I grabbed some sidewalk chalk, drove to the park and ran a warmup lap, marking the halfway points between the quarter mile markers at the park based on information from my Garmin.  The workout turned into a somewhat convoluted series of runs, jogs, and 180 degree turns, but I made it through pretty well.  My “R” pace is currently 6:00 min/mile, so that means 45 second 200 m repeats and 3:00 800’s.  Here’s how it went:

200 m – 0:39

200 m – 0:42

800 m – 2:57

200 m – 0:42

200 m – 0:42

800 m – 2:59

200 m – 0:44

200 m – 0:47

800 m -2:59

200 m – 0:39

200 m – 0:42

800 m – 3:00

So, I hit them all except one.  I’ll admit I was loafing a bit on the 0:47 200, but it served as a nice wake-up call.  My calf (presumably injured during my race with the dog) felt pretty good.  It’s healed very nicely everyday since I’ve been exchanging my morning easy runs for equal amounts of time on the stationary bike.  Hopefully, tomorrow morning won’t reveal further damage.  As it is, I managed an easy 3 mile run with Alice tonight sans pain, so I’m pretty confident.