Intervals

Today I ran intervals at the track - first time in a VERY long time. I wanted to run them like this: 200, 400, 800, 400, 200. Probably too short of a distance for 5k preparation but I feel that I need to get my speed up a little. I'm feeling that my lungs and cardiovascular system are improving steadily, but sometimes my legs feel heavy and sluggish. I'm hoping intervals will give me some strength and put some hop back in my step.

I went into this workout completely blind. The last time I remember doing intervals my goal times were around 23s for 200 and 53-54s for the 400. I knew I couldn't touch that at this point, but also had no idea what to pace myself at. I started off the two hundred feeling like I was going about 80% ... it turned out to be too much and I ran out of gas the final 75m and finished in about 32s. It was a painful lesson gave me a benchmark from which I could finish my workout. Here are my goal times (set after my initial 200m) and the actual times.

Goal:

200m - 32s
400m - 90s
800m - 3min
400m - 90s
200m - 32s

Actual:

200m - 32s
400m - 81s
800m - 3:11
400m - 82s
200m - 33s