WWJD.......What Would Jumbo Do?

Back to the track again,this time for my long repeat session,10x400m w/ an 800m jog in between each.
The great Jumbo Elliot favoured this workout,although he had his runners do 20x400m w/ a 800m jog in between,my feeling is if I start out at 10 and slowly work my way up I can eventually get up to 20,the mindset being each month add 2 more 400s so come mid January should everything go to plan I'll be upping this repeat to 12x400m.....all in good time,let's get used to 10 first b4 we start talk of conquering that.

Conditions were brisk when I arrived at Temple around 11.10am,probably hovering around the freezing mark,at least the sun was out and and the wind was at a minimum,30 laps of running come out to 7.5 miles so I factored in 5 laps to warm up,5 laps to cool down would give me a nice even 10 miles and put me at 44 miles for the week w/ a 16 miler on tap tomorrow to round me out at 60 miles for the week,the bench mark mileage in a non competitive week,once races start,I'll have to tweak my mileage but I'm looking to keep a 55 mile a week mark even if it means running 7 days a week not 6,again let's walk b4 we can run.....

Stripped down to fleece and tights attire w/ the obligatory thermal gloves and skull cap it was"have at it" time.
Going in to today I felt if I could keep my 400s between 66-68 seconds that'd be a good start.
#1 400m 65.2.As the self proclaimed worlds worst judge of pace the opening repeat be it 400m,600m,800m,1,000m,mile is always crucial to proceedings,this was not a bad start if I say so myself.
#2 400m 69.9.No matter how many different tracks I run on and no matter how many of them post signs that ask walkers/joggers to use the outside lanes there's always someone who wants to walk/jog in lane 1,today was no different as"Tubby"made it very clear he wasn't yielding lane 1 to me,you'd have thought having gone by him 5 times on my warm up laps he'd have gotten the hint,but no,the rotund one wasn't budging from lane 1 so I had to conduct this repeat out in lane 2.....thanks you fat bastard,hope you get stuck down a chimney next Friday!!!
#3 400m 66.3.If I could hold on to this pace for the remaining 7 400s I'd be ok.
#4 400m 67.3.Once again I was forced to swing wide of "Tubby" but at least the majority of this lap was conducted in lane 1.
#5 400m 67.5.Half way there and feeling good.
#6 400m 65.0.Believe it or not another lap I had to swing wide of"Tubmeister" on the back straight,I think at this point I'd gotten so pissed off he hadn't gotten the hint I dropped the hammer a little on this repeat!
#7 400m 67.9.Now it was beginning to take it's toil but frankly that's what I expected,began telling myself the great lie all runners tell themselves on repeats that it's actually only 2 more to go because you know that last one call be as balls out as you can because afterwards it's all over.
#8 400m 68.1.Yea,Tubby"had exited the track during my 800m jog prior to this repeat.8 down 2 to go....even though I was psyching myself up for only 1 to go!
#9 400m 69.0.Couldn't pin this one on "Tubby" over the coming weeks this is where being consistent over the entire repeat is going to pay dividends and eliminating these 69 second 400s.
#10 400m 65.0.BOYAH!! way to drop the hammer on the final 400m.

So all in all a good start to my 10x400m repeats,clearly there's room for improvement still but to have notched 3x65 seconds,1x66 seconds,3x67 seconds,1x68 seconds and 2x69 seconds was not a bad start and I look forward to a second crack at this next weekend,since Friday is the holiday as far as work is concerned I should be able to access the track Friday not Saturday.....hopefully all the fat bastards will be getting ready to deliver presents......