Consistency is the Name of the Game. Apparently so is "Rachel"

Since we'd done two straight Wednesdays of hills, last night we returned to speedwork.This workout was half mile repeats, meaning you run as fast as you can for a half mile, then jog at a very slow pace back to the start - and then do it again 3 more times. The goal is to make your repeats consistent, within 5-10 seconds of the previous rep, getting slightly faster with each one. My usual problem with workouts like this is that I go out too fast and can't hold the speed, whether it's within each repeat (i.e. running the first quarter mile too fast and backing off the second quarter) or getting slower with successive repeats. Last night, however, I was almost dead on with how we're supposed to run these:

• Rep 1 - 4:08
• Rep 2 - 3:55
• Rep 3 - 3:58
• Rep 4 - 3:54

The Rachels, icing our injuries in New Paltz

I not only increased speed throughout the workout in terms of each rep, but I was able to really finish strong and actually increase my speed for the last minute or so EACH TIME! And you will notice that with the exception of the 13 second jump between repeat 1 and 2, we were damn consistent in timing, and to top it off, we ran the last repeat the fastest. So freaking fantastic.

Now, you might be asking, "Who's 'we?'" For the second week in a row, I did my Wednesday workout with Rachel Bliner, a fellow San Diego alum, a fellow Phoenix mentor, and (obviously) a fellow Rachel. (She is also a fellow faller - she wiped out in New Paltz, too). This week, Michael Conlon didn't like that we were running together because in theory that would mean we weren't pushing each other. I know I wasn't holding back, and Rachel B says that I tend to push her anyway, so I think it was actually a pretty dead on workout for both of us.

At the end of the workout, I was really proud of what we'd accomplished. Setting these little mini-goals feels good, and crushing them feels even better. Rachel B told me after last night's workout she's dedicating the song "Defying Gravity" to me. For those of you unfamiliar, it's a song from the musical "Wicked", and listening to it gives you chills. Most of us ladies on the team really love the song, and I actually plan on singing it in my head for the entire Philly half marathon, which I'm running 2 weeks from Sunday. Speaking of the Philly half, I have some major goals for that race, which I'm not going to vocalize because it's a very personal thing. I am really focused on that race right now and I want to really see what I can do with that distance. I feel like if I can crush these small goals, I can work toward the bigger ones. It's a totally different approach to those races than I've taken in the past - I've never actually had a set time goal - so I find it both frightening and motivating, and I can feel the adrenaline pulsing through my veins already. I am PSYCHED.