By Carissa
I embarked upon a bit of an adventure several weeks ago when I decided to train for a 10k. My first move was to pick a Hal Higdon training plan. Hal’s plans are familiar to me. I trust the process. I know the workouts and I feel challenged by them.
The first workout made me cringe. I was to run five miles with three at 10k pace. For training purposes I picked 6:40 min/mile as my pace. I can’t think of a time outside of racing that I’ve ever tried to maintain that fast of a pace for consecutive miles. To my surprise the run went great. I was working for it but I could maintain my pace. That was good because I would be running fast and furious a lot.
A typical week for Hal Higdon’s Advanced 10K plan included 400s at the track, a tempo run, a pace run and a “long” run (between 6 and 10 miles) with the last 25% at race pace. My watch was hitting 6:XX regularly. I enjoyed that my runs were shorter and yet I still felt like I was getting a great workout. I felt strong and I was getting faster. One week when the plan called for a 5K tune up race I simulated my own 5K and raced a PR by a few seconds. It made me excited for my target race and a potential new 10K PR.
