When the thermometer say 4*F and the winds are around 10 mph, even Bennie doesn’t dwaddle along. While it was sure purty down-back, when we got to the lower gate, it was time to definitely turn-around. By the time we got back to the house, there was no hesitation on his or my part about heading up the drive-way.

While it looked gorgeous out there the temps were just too miserable to run outside this morning for me. It was below my self-imposed low temperature standard, so I headed into Planet Fitness for another bout on the treadmill.

Now I am not training for a marathon, but until I get the Hansons Half Marathon training guide in, I thought I would play around with a week or two of their marathon training plan. After looking at things, it seemed that the Beginner plan would be what I would use if I was going to train for a marathon. I figured I was somewhere around week 5, so I have been adapting that to my life week. I wanted to see if I could keep up with the 3:40:00 pace marathon workouts or not. That would be a BQ for my age group and something I do eventually want to get, but not yet.

Today I was supposed to do a 1.0 mile warm-up, 5.0 mile tempo run at marathon pace (8:13) and then a one mile cool-down.

How did I do?

Actually, I have been doing a little more on the pre-run warm-up, then 1/2 mile fast walking to get the body ready, before I start my warm-up mile at 6.2 mph. That first mile went by pretty quickly even though it was still pretty close to 10:00 minute pace.

Once I got the warm-up mile done, I increased the speed to 7.3 mph (about 8:12 pace) and ran. I was feeling good, despite yesterday’s tough yard clean-up and cleaning 12-15 inches of wet, heavy arse snow off the 24×48 garage. The arms were the most in need of TLC – chicken wings do not do well lifting lots of heavy stuff.

While running at the tempo pace I felt fine the entire 5.0 miles and could have easily gone longer. Unfortunately, though when I finished up the tempo part of the run, I immediately had to quick-march to the locker room for a quick break. However, those have been fewer and further between, since I have started experimenting with a lower carb diet and cut a lot of crap stuff out of what goes down the pie-hole.

Although I did increase the speed slightly to get to the finish just a little quicker, when I hit the last .4 to go.

After getting back on the treadmill, it was tough to get back in the groove to finish up that 1.0 mile cool-down and then another .3 walk after the running part finished.

When I looked at the stats for the run I was pleasantly surprised at how good they looked and the best part is that I didn’t feel off at all during the tempo pace part.

A very good run, but sadly I have a feeling for the next few days it will be more of the same, treadmill time. Although I was sort of invited to head out to do a 10 miler up in Belgrade tomorrow morning. However, with the temps already below zero, as much as I might think about going, I know that I will not. I have the low temperature standard going for a reason and I am pretty sure that I will stick pretty close to it.

Not too bad of a run and one that makes me go mmmm. No Harold do not even think about it. Nothing more than training for a half marathon right now. Then take a look at how you held up before you go and do something stupid. 🙂