I ran 2.5 miles today in the afternoon (with jeans). That was not fun, but necessary at the time.

When I got home, I changed into my running gear and set off to the track for some speedwork. I got a mile warmup in there first.

I've found that to get the most out of speedwork and running in general, keeping pace is the most important thing on which to concentrate. I wanted to do 4 x 880s. Well, in the past week, I've run 7 minute miles and consistent 7:30 and 8 minute miles on the treadmill in succession.

My goal for the 880s was to run at 7minute pace, so 3:30s. That should be easy considering I ran 7min in the middle of a run without killing myself tyring to do it.

1 - 3:29
2 - 3:34
3 - 3:33
4 - 3:16 (ran as fast I could without any sprinting or overstriding)

I am really trying to work on keeping my form and not overstriding. With that in mind, I had the 3:30 half / 1:45 quarter time set in mind. Last year when I was doing my speedwork, I elongated my stride anytime I needed to pick up the pace and it hurt my knees every time. I have been able to keep down the level of pain by keeping my foot in line with my knee on foot strike and increase my turnover to increase speed. It's working. I have to maintain constant mental control due to my naturnal instinct to stride out and almost float while running. That's more comfortable for me during the run, but more painly afterwards.

Anyway, I did the 4 x 880s with a 440 recovery on each. Also did 1 mile cooldown.

5 miles during the workout, plus the 2.5 earlier in the day.
7.5 total all day.

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I really want to get back under the 6 minute mile mark.
1:30 - 1:30
1:30 - 3:00
1:30 - 4:30
1:30 - 6:00

I think I will need to be able to run 1:15s when I do my 440 speed work. Since I am at the 1:30 mark now, I will try 1:25 on the next workout, 1:20 after that, and then 1:15. This will probably take me a few months to reach.