I’ve been pondering this for a few days and I wanted to see what the thoughts were.

 

Let’s say you have to do a tempo, 5 miles at 7:20 for example.

Let’s also suppose that Sunday I did a long run, Monday I rested. 

 

option 1- I could wait to Wednesday to be fully rested and ready (i take a bit to recover, could be the lack of sleep, could be my yummy nutrition, whatever!)

 

option 2- Or I could do it Tuesday, and get the week moving so I can do a recovery on Wednesday, fun run on thursday, then rest for the long run on Saturday.

 

If I do option 2, I might actually hit my pace.

If I do option 1, I know I won’t. I might average 7:40, or 7:50.

 

I usually go with option 1, as I am constantly exhausted (who has time to rest in NYC?!?!?), so I don’t usually hit any of my paces. I usually just rest before a race, I take two or three full days. 

 

BUT, here is my question. Am I getting the same value workout because I am NOT hitting my pace? Instead of doing 7:20 in fresh legs, I am doing 7:50 in tired legs. I am still getting a great workout but is there a reason why it’s NOT as good? I don’t get the mental boost, knowing that I CAN hit 7:20, but other than that, am I missing anything?

 

Obviously, the problem is injury and overtraining risk, but besides that… I don’t know that running slower/tired is such a huge problem, right? Thoughts?