Wednesday Workout - AU

From Coach Jerry:

Note that this week and next week we are at American due to conflicts at BCC. Let’s try to get started as close to 7:00 as possible on Wednesday, as there are no lights at AU and we will get kicked off the track by the campus police when it gets dark. On the men’s side, we’re going to have a very small A group presence again this week. The workout for the B group will be 8 x 1200 with a 400 jog. Target paces are 2 @ 76s, 2 @ 75s,, 2 @ 74s, 2 @ 73s. If anyone wants to make adjustments based on imminent races, let me know. Also, Dickson will be doing his 3 mile tempo at marathon goal pace prior to his imminent triumph in Gettysburg, and if anyone wants to join him, I’m sure he’d enjoy the company.

For the women, we’ll do 4 x 2k with a 3 minute rest. We’ll shoot for going through the 1600 in 6:00, 5:55, 5:50, 5:45. I’ll see you at AU on Wednesday.

POST RACE ANALYSIS FROM COACH JERRY: What an amazing run by Sam on Friday at Princeton! To put Sam’s accomplishment into context, consider that while Sam ran 14:15.2, our own Dave Nightingale won in 13:58.6, running what track-side observers unanimously agreed was an excellent race. Dave has qualified for the Olympic Trials in the marathon and ran 48:39 at Cherry Blossom. Sam was less than 17 seconds behind Dave on Friday. And consider that on Friday Sam was less than 7 seconds behind Lucas Meyer, who ran 48:26 at Cherry Blossom and was the first American. Sam went head to head with an elite field on Friday and proved that he belonged out there with them. Major breakthroughs like that do not happen by accident, and Sam has worked extremely hard to put himself in a position to run with the big boys. And Sam is just getting started on the Luff triple crown, as he is shooting for a big 10k PR on Thursday at the Penn Relays and will then take his shot at a fast half marathon at Grandmas in June. I'm looking forward to more great performances from him, starting this week! On a personal level, it was a thrill for me to be there to see Sam's race. Over my 20 plus years in coaching I've given many, many pep talks after races to disappointed runners and it is a rare pleasure indeed to have the opportunity to greet a runner after a race who has exceeded his own expectations. The look of pride and accomplishment on Sam’s face after the race is precisely what motivates me to find the time to continue coaching despite all of my other personal and professional obligations. One final observation is that it has become clear to me in the last several weeks that at our level it is critical to choose races carefully. It is no accident that Ryan's 3k club record and Sam's 5k club record occurred at very competitive meets, and that we had a slew of PRs at Pikes Peak, an extremely fast race. Running against good competition is no guarantee of success, but it is important to put yourself in a position to succeed by running races where there will be others out there to push you out of your comfort zone. I'm enjoying this string of PRs too much to not make sure that we keep them coming, so let's all make the sacrifices necessary to get into races where the competition is there to allow you to run well.