A Saturday Zoo Run: a comparison (of sorts)

7 am rolls around, and Mark Zimmerman and I head down to the MD/DC boundary on Beach Drive.  It's a brisk morning (to this Floridian, it was downright cold!), and the sun is just starting to light up the sky.  The plan: Run down Beach Drive from the MD/DC boundary to the National Zoo and back - a 12.2 mile run, and the goal: negative split.  The distance is a piece of cake for ultra-marathoning Mark, and still in the relatively comfortable range for me, but negative splitting always makes things tough. 

As we get layered up and ready to start, a group of 3 runners start their morning run heading in the same direction.  We say hi as they go by, and a few minutes later, Mark says "go" and we're off.  We chatter for the first few miles and try to get warmed up, which is difficult on the brisk morning.  Mark stops at various water foundations along the way for a quick "check" to see if they're working - in general, they are, and he comes back with ice starting to form in his beard. Another confirmation that it's really cold, and we're pretty crazy!  It's a bit on an ego boost when we see those 3 runners we started near turn around after 4 miles.  The first 6.1 miles fly by and all of a sudden, we're at the National Zoo.  

We turn around and set back - the run is halfway over!  We chatter about movies and TV shows, and I try desperately to keep the topic of conversation away from my thesis work.  I hit a bit of a wall around mile 7, and everything starts to hurt - calves, quads, hamstrings - everything.  Mark points out that everything can't possibly hurt ... After all, I can't feel my eyebrows anymore!  I should also point out that my Gatorade is now completely frozen in my bottle, so that's no help at all.  The next 3 miles are mentally tough for me, but I struggle to keep the pace we've set, and though we've slowed a little bit, we're still moving at a decent pace and Mark is pulling me along.  When Mark tells me that we've gotten to "2 miles to go," we start pouring on the steam.  I'm not sure where the steam was coming from in my case, but we tough it out, including that nice hill at Wise Road, and coast on down around the curves to the finish.  We finish, walk a bit, stretch out, and I pull off my ear warmer ... Yup, you got it, ice falls out of my hair!

The splits:

Miles 1-2: 22:25 (11:12 pace)

Mile 3: 10:12

Mile 4: 10:46

Mile 5: 10:27

Mile 6: 9:56 (1:03:46 for the first 6 miles)

Mile 7: 9:51

Mile 8: 10:16

Mile 9: 10:37

Mile 10: 9:32

Miles 11-12: 18:47 (9:23 pace) (59:03 for the last 6 miles)

And with that, we achieved the goal - a negative split 12 mile run! :)

Now for a quick comparison, Mark and I did this exact same run back on August 9th.  I won't write out the splits for that run, but our first 6 miles were 1:14:08 (12:09 min/mile pace), and our second 6 miles were 1:09:08 (11:20 min/mile pace).  For more info on that run, see Mark's notes.  Compare the August 9th run to Saturday's run: 1:03:46 (10:37 min/mile) and 59:03 (9:50 min/mile).  

What a difference 6 months will make!