Tuesday, May 8, 2012

High Cliff Hills

Hello Runners!
I hope everyone is doing great today, as it was a beautiful day for running in Northeast Wisconsin.  Sunny, temps of around 60 and a nice cool breeze made for a perfect running day.  My initial plan was to run a 4 mile tempo with a mile warm-up and cool-down, however, after much deliberation, I decided to run hills instead.  I've done tempo runs for four consecutive weeks and after last weeks piss-poor showing, I decided to mix up my workout routine a bit.  Having already made plans to meet my sister in Green Bay today, I moved my workout of of Neenah, and across Lake Winnebago to High Cliff State Park.


High Cliff is a beautiful park, situated on the east side of Lake Winnebago.  Neenah, being on the west side of the lake is a complete contrast.  Neenah is as flat as a pancake, with our most famous hills being highway overpasses.  Yuck.  High Cliff on the other hand, is exactly as it sounds... a high cliff.  The entrance to the park is at "Lake level" while the main road carves up through the rock to the top of the cliff.  This hill/incline is just shy of .5 miles long, a gradual incline with a steepening section over the final 150 meters.  


I did a two mile warm-up, running around the trails of the park.  I then ran 3 "High Cliff hills" at about 7:20/mile pace (a little slower on the last).  My rest period was the ~3 minutes to run back down the hill.  I'm definitely not in hill shape, but thankfully the Green Bay Half Marathon is mostly flat.  I also think hill workouts are good strengthening workouts.  Once my "real" mile training begins, I'll run some smaller, steeper hills to build strength and speed.  Anyway, I felt great today.  The hills were difficult (as to be expected) but overall my body responded well.  


After the run I drove up to Green Bay to hang out with my sister and her kids.  I love hanging out with my niece and nephew.  They're fun, and good kids.  Oh yeah, it's great to see my sister too.  Not only that, I only made my niece cry twice!  It was actually the first (and second) time I've ever made my niece cry so... I'm actually surprised it didn't happen earlier.  So, after a good run, and and afternoon of hanging with my sister's family, I made it home in time to watch the Brewer game and eat a Domino's pizza for dinner.  It probably wasn't the best dinner decision.  Oh well, I enjoyed it.  


Tomorrow I'm planning on running 6-7 miles at an easy/comfortable pace.  I'm also going to do another day of Slow Jimmy's this week, either Thursday or Friday.  The half marathon taper has begun!!  That's all for tonight everyone, good night and good luck... running that is!

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