Yeah, I did 12 hill repeats on a 2.5% grade for two telephone poles at a hard effort. Not a terribly big hill or long effort, but it allowed me to do a few things.

• Finish the workout as planned
• Work on my running efficiency at faster speeds and using a hill to create more resistance
• See whether my Zoom Fly SP are part of the problem with my left leg issues

The weather wasn’t terrible, but it was still was in the 70’s and sunny, so a bit warmish for a hard workout, but I was able to get into the shady areas for most of the hard work, unlike at a track where the sun just beats on you. Even so, I felt pretty good throughout the workout and it was not a variable that had a huge impact on my run today.

Unfortunately, I haven’t been able complete my planned track workouts lately (heat, sun and humidity) and while I try to not let it bother me too much and do what the body lets me do that day. Not finishing those workouts does weigh on me more than I want to admit, so I really wanted to finish the 12 x 2 telephone pole workout (about 20-25 seconds per repeat) that I had planned for today.

So I set myself up to succeed. I could have gone down-back and done the steeper hills, without any guarantee of being able to do the workout completely. I figured that this fairly easy hill would add an extra challenge to the repeats, but not enough to kick my butt too much.

As you can see I didn’t do anything super-fast, I worked at focusing on maintaining good form (running efficiently) more than attempting to go all out and having my arms and legs getting all akimbo while attempting to run faster.

I think that I accomplished what I wanted to do on each of those 20-25 repeats, because I still felt strong enough to do a pretty fast for me quarter after finishing the 12 hill repeats. Then I thought about doing another faster quarter and after starting, I gave it about a half-hearted effort. By that time I was pretty tired.

As you can see Bennie was relaxing for me at this point.

I also needed to see if the Nike Zoom Fly SP were part of the problem with my left leg.

After my harder effort in them on Saturday, my left leg has been bothering enough that I feel I need the extra support of calf sleeves to run comfortably. I know that I run slightly differently in the Zoom Fly series of shoes and it concerned me that it might just be enough of a difference that they might work too good for me.

So I decided to use the SPs for this workout figuring that if the left leg bothered too much I could simply bounce into the house and get a different pair of shoes to finish the workout.

Thankfully, the leg felt great and the shoes did exactly what I wanted them to do. I ran without any issues when running faster and during the slower warm-up and recovery portions of the run. Which helped a lot with my confidence and also satisfied my worries about the Zoom Fly SP and my ability to run without issues in them.

All I can say is that they are a fast for me shoes and provide a “pop” that I don’t feel in other shoes. At some point I will probably find a pair of Vapor Fly 4% just to find out for myself how much of a difference they might make in my running, but until I do, the ZF SP are a pretty amazing shoe to my way of running.

Yes, I used my Garmin today, but it was a workout day where I wanted to review the data after I got through running. For these kind of workouts, I really find that being able to review the data is valuable and will continue to use it for them.

The bad part was that my Timex Ironman fogged up and wouldn’t switch modes this morning, so I had to use my Garmin whether I wanted to or not today. It is a nice back-up.

The reality is that

I finished the workout as planned and felt good enough that I did a little extra too, so that was a good thing. When you add in the confidence builder that I got by doing the short uphill strides at a good hard effort 12 times, I was very happy with the run.

The biggest thing that the run accomplished was that the Zoom Fly SP did not bother my left leg, which was a huge worry for me after Saturday’s run. I was very worried that the different stride that the ZF make me have, wasn’t going to work with the body that I now own. Which would have sucked big time, because I run good for me in them, maybe a little too good at times and that might be the problem. 🙂

I am glad that I ordered the new Timex Ironman the other night and should get it tomorrow.

A very good workout!