~4.5 miles @ ~8.5 min/mi

The old right knee is twinging but I venture out again with Stephanie to circle the office parking lot and help her get a feel of what might be her 5k "race pace". The ~1.5 mile circuit takes us ~14 min (= ~9.3 min/mi), at which point my comrade punches out. She ran yesterday and this is perhaps faster than she has ever gone this distance before. I continue onward too fast, ~11.6 min (= ~7.7 min/mi), then run out of steam. The final lap is ~12.1 min (= ~8.1 min/mi). There's a 10 mile race on Sunday and I'm trying to calibrate what pace to endeavor. Today suggests sub-9 but probably not sub-8. That lines up with my rule-of-thumb for deceleration, 0.5-1.0 min/mi slower every time the distance doubles.

(cf. Year of Running - 2009 - Further Observations (2010-02-01), ...) - ^z - 2010-02-27