you can always push a little more

Tonight was a group run, and we ran it in Bet Shemesh, not RBS. The BS loop is not as flat as the Dolev loop, so it is a bit harder, but also has the benefit that it allows a range of speeds and inclines.

Tonight we ran what was called an interval run. We ran the loop once as a warm-up run (1.9km), at regular pace. Then we broke into groups of varying speeds. Each loop would be run at intervals of different speeds. 1km faster than normal, than 900m at a slower speed.

the point is to improve speed.

So we ended up running the whole loop 6 times, including the warm-up, for a total of 11.4km.

I ran with a group at a fairly slow speed, but about half a minute faster than our normal pace. We were meant to be trying to keep our fast pace at about 5:40/km. Oh yeah. the rule is if you feel like you are going to keel over, you do not stop. You keep going. and then you slow down to a slower, jogging speed.

This was going to be tough. I thought I was already running at my maximum speed. So how would I run 5 loops at half a minute or so faster? And it was so humid, I could hardly breathe!

So we broke into our groups, and we ran faster than normal. We did the fast part at a pace of about 5:50 or so (it was fluctuating a bit), and then slowed. We did a couple loops like that and our little group slowly fell apart as people had to slow down and run at different paces.

Eventually I was running myself for a bit. Then I met up with someone from a different group that had been running faster than us. We joined up to run togwether and ran the last couple of loops. he pushed me a bit (amazing how you can do more when you run with other people), and we ran at an even faster pace than the previous loops. We ran [the fast part of] loop #4 of the intervals at 5:20/km or so, and then loop #5 at about 5:10 or so.

I could not believe I was able to do it, but it seems there is always room for a person to push himself a bit to do better.