Running for the first time on Thursday morning, I decided to see how fast I would have to move my legs in order to achieve a certain pace. Given this was my first time running after Ironman Brazil, I was going to run a form run but at the end I usually do some fast running for 30 seconds with 30 seconds break.
After 10 minutes of drills, I made it to the second half of my 20 minute run at which time I began my fast short runs. I compacted my stride and proceeded to speed up, rest, speed up, rest. I made it all the way up to 9 MPH which is about a 6:20 min/mile. Boy did my legs cycle! Normally when I run track workouts on the treadmill, I can get almost up to 10 MPH (6:00 min/mile). But that is with my normal stride. Compacting my stride really made my legs churn FAST! I knew that I would have train this specifically to get my body accustomed to such a high cycle rate for my legs.
Then today, I went out for a 2 hour ride. Feeling good upon reaching home, I decided I would start shuffle training today. So I threw on my running shoes and then I shot out the door with two goals in mind. First, I really needed to get my body used to hitting the ground running after the bike so as not to lose time on the run. Second, I ran with the Ironman shuffle as fast as possible to see just how it would feel.
It was tough! My legs were tired from the ride, and I could not lengthen my stride at all. I was forced to run with the shuffle! So I just churned them as fast as I could. I went out into my neighborhood and then around and back for only about 7:30 minutes. I knew after this run that this would take some time and effort to train. Next time I will have to bring my GPS to see how fast I am actually running with the shuffle style.