Mr. Yasso, The Joke's On ME!

      I ran yesterday but felt like I wanted to get up off my butt (as people have been suggesting) and run again today. But I wanted to do something different.
   For a while now, I have been reading and hearing about how runners incorporate Yasso 800s into their training plans. These training sessions are named after Bart Yasso, running guru and CRO of Runner's World magazine. The man is a bit of a legend in the running community.
   What Yasso 800s involve is running 800 meter timed intervals, generally on a track, with timed rest periods in between. The rest periods should be about the same length of time as it takes you to run the 800 meters.
   This training method is primarily used by marathoners and it's Yasso's theory that your interval time should pretty closely correlate, by extrapolation, to your marathon time. As an example, if you found you could run an average interval of 3:30, then your marathon time would be close to 3 hours and 30 minutes.
   Now, I have never run track at any age, so I have absolutely no past experience as to what's fast and what's not, for amateur runners. What I have seen a lot of, though, is running bloggers saying they've run 800 intervals in around the afore-mentioned 3:30.
   When I read this I went what?? it took them a whole three minutes and thirty seconds to run around a piddly little football field twice?? No way! I could do it way faster!
   Are you giggling yet?
   So today, because I wanted to do something different, I headed out to my high school alma mater, Oakridge Secondary, to run Yasso 800s.
   I was really hoping to have the track to myself and such was the case when I arrived. I set my stuff down right at midfield, took a sip of water and off I went.
   Well, round about the time I hit the first turn I realized what a total miscalculation I'd made!

Starting line, right at the 55-yard line

   Thinking I was just going to breeze around this track, I immediately started off in (somewhat) high gear and knew by the first turn that I was done for, particularly at that speed. I dialed it way down the rest of the way and, gasping at the end, discovered I'd done my first ever Yasso 800 in the awesome time of 5:friggin 11! I'm sure the whooshing sound I heard just about then was the universe settling back into place and Brian gaining knowledge!
   I walked around for a few minutes, gaining my breath and enjoying that holy crap feeling of discovery. My original plan was to have run five of these intervals. The way I felt after the first one made me unsure as to whether I'd be able to run another one!
   When I thought I could breathe again, I set off on the second one, dialed down right from the beginning. Without the preliminary burst from the first one, the second one came in at 5:23. At the end of the second, I was pretty sure I only had one left.

The "sort of" track.

   I set off for the last time, this time paying a little more attention to my watch. Coming around the last bend, I saw that I had an opportunity to beat the previous interval and, knowing it was last interval of the day, I kicked it up a notch. Managed to come in at 5:17. Hooray, a negative friggin split!
   So, needless to say, I have new-found respect for anyone who can run a Yasso 800 in 3:30. Actually, I have new-found respect for anyone who can run a Yasso 800 period.

Sad high jump pits.

   About the only saving grace to the morning was that fact that I was back on the playing field of my high school days. It was pretty easy to look around the football field and recount past glories and failures, junior football adventures, phys ed classes, cross-country and yay for cheerleaders! It was also the first time I'd really been there in slightly over 40 years. Memories running rampant and all that. 
   On the way to the track I passed another and much newer high school track. It was tempting to stop there but my old school was just another minute of the road and, besides, it was a Catholic track and I'm not Catholic. Or anything for that matter. It is kind of embarrassing, though, that they have an

Ah, the good old days...

actual track and  Oakridge has, well... a gravel road that goes around in circles (see pic) Even the long jump pits are kinda pathetic (once again, see pic).
   If nothing else, I got out today for a tiring, heart-elevating run. It was also a change of pace, which is never a bad thing. On top of all that, I now have a bit of a Yasso baseline for the future. Oh, and by the results I guess I'm running a marathon in about 5 hours and 15 minutes! Oddly, about what I would have predicted!