Tuesday, November 29, 2011

2012 5k challenge

Sometimes I have stupid ideas, however, I can not claim full responsibility for this one. I partially have to blame my friend Brad. On his blog he posted that he wanted to run a 5k every week, under 20 minutes. One of the things he wrote was, “Ambitious, but will demand consistency that I need in order to improve my speed throughout the year.” This struck a chord with me as I read it, and for a few fleeting moments, I thought it was a great idea, and  (and this is where I got stupid) I told him as such in the comments section – now, 20 minutes is way out of the question for me, my PR is 23.34 – so maybe I will shoot for 24.

Once I posted the comment of course I immediately regretted it.  And then Brad went and saw it and commented we would be able to provide accountability for each other. Crap. I guess now then I am committed.

So, here are my self imposed rules –
    • one 5k every week. Yes, that is 52 x 5k’s
    • 24 minutes or under. (60 seconds grace for January only – I have only ever twice ran under 24 minutes)
    • It can be on the treadmill, down a hill, on the flat, a split in a longer race, it just has to be done
    • It can be a race.
    • Late spring, I will sign up for a 5k race, shoot for a PR and adjust my required weekly time target to within 30 seconds of that race time. In the fall, I will race another 5k and adjust again
Anyone with me and Brad? Feel free to make up your own rules too.

4 comments:

  1. ambitious! I'm surprised that you don't have any sort of rule about the week before or after a 100. Is that an oversight? A sub-24 5K 5 days after TRT would be awesome!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I may only do one or two of mine in an actual race. The bulk of them will be on the track a couple miles from home. I haven't run a 5k race in over a year. I'll be spending the next four weeks building up to the first one. July and August are going to be tough! (as well as the one the week after Uwharrie.)

    Let the good times roll!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I love this in some ways! Should help you speed for sure. I just worry about injury . . .

    ReplyDelete