3 miles @ ~8:30 min/mi

Comrade Ken lends me The Perfect Mile (by Neal Bascomb), an excellent book about Roger Bannister et al., and when I finish it I've got the urge to confirm how pitifully slow I really am. Mid-morning Saturday the old Blair High School track is slightly cluttered with walkers and joggers but the asphalt is resurfaced and the stripes are bright. After half a lap of warm-up it's time for a time trial. Hammering at top speed the laps go 1:48 + 1:51 + 1:57 + 1:56 = 7:33 ... so the 7-minute barrier still stands impregnable. Probably a record-breaking run wouldn't have counted anyway, since for the past five days I've been coating my arms with (cortico-) STEROIDS to knock down a bad poison ivy rash. My pulse is ~160, a hair below the death zone for my age, so I walk a lap and drink, then trot a more rational mile in 9:01, walk half a lap more, then finish up with an 8:40. So much for speedwork!