Track Workout & Speedy Splits!

I am happy to report, that this week is shaping up to be a good one for running. (At least for me.) I headed to the track last night in Mt. P to do some speedwork, and I warmed up with 3 miles. I really hate running anything more than a mile at a track, but it's just more convenient for me to run it there and then immediately jump into 100 m sprints.

I was looking over my Garmin Connect data for the last time I ran at the track, and it was a few weeks back on February 13th. Now, I seem to remember that week (my birthday week!) as me being pretty lazy running wise, so I am taking this with a grain of salt. BUT my 3 mile total for that day was 31 minutes even. (That's slow even for me.)

Last night, I ran it in 26:56 shaving over 4 minutes off my time!! I usually don't try to run this too quick as I know I will be doing sprints afterward, plus it's on a track, ugh. But I was feeling pretty good last night. I usually do run 3 milers pretty quickly, but my best time even in a 5k race is only 26:17!

After looking at those numbers, I am pretty excited to see how well I will run my 5k race on Saturday.

I do have a question for you guys though, I am planning on running my long run Sunday morning after the race on Saturday. I will probably aim for anything above 15 (17 would be ideal) and then next weekend, will probably back down to about 12 as Abby suggested, then back up again to 18 or 19 the next week.

I am not running today as I have a meeting I forgot about after work (ugh, messes up my plans!) So my question is, what should I run tomorrow? I will most likely do it in the morning so I will have plenty of recovery time for the race on Friday, but I also don't want to overdo it and be too tired by Sunday morning. Any suggestions would be great!

So just to review, this has been my week:
Saturday: 15 miles in way too long
Sunday: OFF
Monday: OFF
Tuesday: 6 miles in 56:17
Wednesday: 3 miles in 26:XX and 6 x 100m
Thursday: OFF, Yoga
Friday: ????
Saturday: 5k race, Yoga
Sunday: 15-17 miles

Thanks for helping! :)

March Goal #3: YOGA:
In other news, I mentioned that one of my March goals was to start doing yoga more frequently. This morning when I was reading through everyone's blogs I was happy to find that Lisa over at On the Run (she's the race director for the NC Marathon that I am training for on May 2nd) posted today about how starting yoga in this stage of training for a May marathon can really benefit you.

Here are a few snippets from her post:

Running, as (my yoga teacher) put it, makes you strong but tightens and shortens your muscles. Yoga stretches them, lengthens them.

One great warm-up: She (my yoga teacher) would bring a bag of tennis balls so we could sit first on one cheek, then the other, and roll around on the little ball. It got right to the spot where your overworked hamstring connects to the glute, or butt, muscles. My left one chronically tightens up on any run longer than six miles, and sitting on that ball gets right to the trouble and massages the knotted up stuff.

Makes sense, right? So why am I am not taking the time to do it? I have the YogaDownload.com Yoga for Runners free session, and I am definitely going to take the time to do it tonight.

I look forward to reading any suggestions about my run tomorrow! I am also glad that I have found a few local running bloggers this week as well. :)

I am now headed off to a meeting and then MEXI NIGHT with Matt!* Be jealous!

*Matt is the boyfriend, figured if I have posted his picture I might as well post his name too!