Finally.

It's about freaking time that an interval workout actually felt good!

Today's plan was 1mi w/u, 4x800m at goal 10k pace with 400m jog rest, 1mi c/d. Thanks to ye olde wintry mix in Pittsburgh making the sidewalks deathtraps, I hit the gym and the treadmill for this.

I dreaded this for a few reasons:
1) I am a narcissist and running slowly on the treadmill at the gym somehow embarrasses me. I get it, nobody's looking and nobody's judging, but I still feel like I want a sign on my forehead saying "I CAN RUN FASTER THAN THIS I SWEAR". Does not bother me remotely when running outside, but for some reason seeing a number starting with a 5 on the treadmill just makes me cringe. Working on it.
2) The last time I ran 800s (x3) it kind of sucked. This time, I was halving my rest intervals to 400m, and tossing in an extra 800.
3) I woke up at 4am today to drive to the airport and fly back from Boston. So tired.

Anyway, I sucked it up and hit the gym. (McMillan told me my goal 10k pace for a 2 hour half marathon is around 8:40, so that was the goal.)

1 mile warmup - random lv2 0-2.2% incline, 5.6 (10:43)
800m - 1.0% incline, 6.8 (8:49)
400m rest - 5.6
800m - 6.9 (8:42)
400m rest - 5.6
800m - 7.0 (8:34)
400m rest - 5.6
800m - 7.1 (8:27)

By this point I felt so freaking fabulous that I ditched my last 400m rest in favor of a progressive quarter mile...

400m - 7.2-7.6 (low 8s)
1 mile cooldown - random lv2 0-2.2% incline, 5.6-6.0 (1030ish)

I mean, honestly, I felt like I could have run forever. My breathing was fairly easy, my legs felt fresh and great, I could go on. Definitely excited to be seeing progress and having workouts I'm dreading go better than expected!

(Disclaimer... this weekend was my bridal shower and I made it a "cheat weekend" from my diet... and managed to gain FIVE POUNDS in 2 days. I'm not even mad, I'm honestly amazed! I'm sure the majority of it is water weight, but I wonder if the intense accidental carb loading played a role in how I felt today?)