Running with (well, at least closer to) the Kenyans

Today was a big breakthrough day for me.  For about the past seven Thursdays I’ve been going to the group fartlek run.  “Fartlek” is Swedish for “speed play” and the Kenyan fartlek is usually one minute hard followed by one minute moderate or two minutes hard followed by one minute moderate, repeated for 30-60 minutes total.  To add to the challenge the run is mostly uphill.  It is a hard run for all.  Usually I see the lead group for about 10 minutes, and then run with a goup of women and some straggling men.

There were over 100 runners at the workout today.  I love the energy of running with so many people.  It’s quite congested at the beginning, but things clear up within about 3 minutes.  Wilson Kipsang, who ran 2:04:57 for the marathon last fall (that’s 4:46 per mile, folks!), is the leader of the group.  He said we would be doing 25x1:1, and counted down so we could synchronize our watches.

I wasn’t feeling particularly good during my 30 minute warm-up, and as usual I started the workout near the back of the group.  I had a goal of 15x 1:1, and I wanted to finish on an uphill section a little higher than I’d gone before.  After about 5 minutes I caught up to Carol, who I have run the last two fartleks with.  I was surprised that I was running quite a bit faster than her.

I kept catching up with people, including several men.  At about 15 minutes I realized with surprise that I could still see the leaders.  Yes they were about a minute ahead of me, but I could see them!  There were about 40 people in a tight group, followed by smaller groups and individuals who had fallen off the pace.

We reached an intersection at about 25 minutes.  In an earlier workout I remember wondering which way the leaders had gone.  But this time I could still see them.  As we climbed the hill I was planning to finish on, I saw the leaders and checked my watch: 28 minutes.  I arrived at that spot less than 2 minutes later.  I was so jazzed I decided to do two more, so I finished at 34 minutes.  I caught up to a group of men who had been with the leaders but finished their workout at 30 minutes; they were cooling down.  About two and a half miles of easy jogging brought me back home.

Now, I still think it’s a distinct possibility that the group’s pace was lower than it has been in previous weeks.  And it’s probably a good bet that the people in the lead group were running a lot easier than me.  And of course, most of them ran for 50 minutes, while I stopped at 34.  However, it was great to be in sight of the group of world class runners on a hard run.  I was almost running with the Kenyans!