Tuesday the 13th

Since there hasn't been a posting today yet and I actually did get out and run finally, I thought I would do the honors. I went up to the track (1/8 mile, indoor) with the intention of running 6 miles at a reasonable pace, but after 1/4 mile warm-up and then stretch I ran the first mile in like 9 minutes. I freaked out that I was so slow and decided to pick it way up. So as I was running around the track now (instead of merely jogging at a BFTW pace, that's barely faster than walking for your information) and starting to feel my legs burn I decided I should probably just see what I could do for 2.5 miles to compare with Jason's recent posting. The competitor in me kicked in a bit I guess because I held a ~7:10 pace for the first two miles and then decided to make it an even 3 miles to make the times easier for me to calculate. Did 7:20 on the last mile of those three, putting my total to 4.25 miles so far. I then thought, "you know, I should make this symmetric" and proceeded to run another mile at the slower pace (kind of a cool down, sortof) but fell short and did that mile in like 10 minutes, truly a BFTW if I have ever seen one. Then I decided that since I was already at 5.25 miles I might as well just go all the way to 6. Unfortunately the slacker in my kicked back in around 5.5 though and I just quit, but at least I sprinted the last 1/8 of a mile (one lap) just for kicks.

Not bad for the first run in quite a while, but not great either. The problem is that it just took me so much time to do the whole thing. Just the going upstairs and getting changed into running clothes, going up to the track, back down to the locker room, showering, changing, and going back down to my lab took about 20 minutes or so. When you combine that lost time with the actual running time it just seems like way too much time to be gone during the day. There must be a better way. How do you guys get in a good workout in a short amount of time?