Too fast

Back in January 2005, i started running on the treadmill. My goal was to run three days a week, for twenty minutes. After six months of running, i was able to increase the distance from about a mile to two and a half miles. However, my average time for a mile stubbornly stayed between 11.5 and 12.5 minutes. My friends suggested that i shouldn't worry about it, that by the end of the year, speed would naturally increase.

However, in June, it became too hot to run indoors. First, i moved the treadmill from the second floor to the first. That gave me a month. Then, i started running outside. Instantly, my times dropped. The induced wind cools me down, and though i'm breathing harder, i'm running faster. After two months of running outside, my times have dropped to about 7 minutes and 20 seconds per mile. My times are erratic, but follow the outside temperature pretty accurately. Hot is slow, cool is fast, more or less.

Now I have a new problem. My speed goal was to get the mile down to nine minutes. All of my problems should be this difficult.

So, i need a new goal. In order to keep the running time over twenty minutes, the distance has to be increased to at least three miles. That's easy enough to do on a treadmill. Outside, it will take a new course. I'll have to measure it.

On the other hand, despite achieving something like running once a week in August, I'm considering attempting to run every day. The New Food Pyramid program suggests exactly that. However, i exceed the suggested pace, as near as I can tell. Yet, though i ran yesterday, it just didn't happen today.