“It’s amazing how the same pace in practice can feel so much harder than on race day. Stay confident. Trust the process.” – Sara Hall
There are going to be days when the marathon pace segments of your weekend long runs or the paces of your interval and tempo workouts end up being slower than your targets.
There are several possible explanations for why it happens. You could be coming down with a bug, you could be a little sleep deprived, you could be a little dehydrated, you may be under stress at work or home, you may have run too fast on your recovery days, or, as is very often the case in the summertime, it’s simply too hot to expect to be able to hit your target paces.
As we approach the arrival of summer weather, keep in mind that when you’re dealing with the oppressive heat and humidity that we often get on summer days in the D.C. area, your body has to expend a lot more energy on temperature regulation and you have to expect that you are going to run slower as a result.
Do not make the mistake of trying to force yourself to hit some target that you find in the Pace Chart, or force yourself to do your long run MP segments at or below your target MP when the weather conditions dictate that it is imprudent to do so.
On hot, humid summer days, if you slow down to adjust for the weather you will still be getting almost identical aerobic development from your workouts as you would if you were running a bit faster in milder weather conditions. Think of our D.C. heat and humidity as the equivalent of high altitude training in the Rockies. You can’t expect to be running as fast as you would at sea level when you’re training at 5,000 feet of elevation and you can’t expect to be running as fast as you would on a 50 degree day when you’re training in 80+ degree weather. You’re still going to be building fitness and you will be prepared for your race days even if your training sessions are slower than you would like.
So as we head into summer, slow things down, keep churning out the workouts and HYDRATE! When we get into some cooler weather in the fall, you’ll feel like a million bucks and you’ll reap the benefits of all of that steamy summer training.
George Buckheit is the leader and coach of Capital Area Runners. CAR is a DC metropolitan area club that was founded to provide group training opportunities for highly motivated and competitive minded runners of all ability levels.
