sub-5 minute miling

Henry Rono, the former triple world record-holder who's making a comeback aged 55, will run the Carlsbad 5000 on April 1.

The world-class 5k road race staged in San Diego is dubbed "World's Fastest 5k" and has the distinction of being a place where world bests are set -- and for featuring separate races for masters. But although Henry will run with world masters mile record-holder Nolan Shaheed at Carlsbad, he is not predicting a super-fast time.

Henry has been getting some stick on the letsrun forum where he logs his progress reports, with some readers disbelieving that he is serious about racing at a high level again, and others obsessing over his weight and why he hasn't lost more despite running about two hours a day for nearly 8 months. He has only had one low-key race this year -- running 19:20 in Cincinnati in December.

We were promised this would be "fun".

Well, it was. Which just goes to show that I am as cracked as the rest of you, given that the four one-minute repeats with ever-decreasing rest periods left me literally on my knees gasping for oxygen like a stranded fish. (Not that fish have knees, of course. Or do repeats on a running track, for that matter.)

This time I did not make the mistake of trying to keep up with Kyle. I can't say it made things noticeably easier. I set my watch to bleep at me every 20 seconds. So I'd "sprint" off, hear a bleep, thank Something Great that I was a third of the way through, try to recover a little.. just in time for the next bleep signalling the final 20 seconds, in response to which I had determined to produce a blistering finishing burst. Yes, well.

There's dedication for you!

Coach Bobby McGee and assistant Marci Roschke chip and shovel ice off the track so we can do our drills and 5k test. Kyle warms up. Eagles watch from the tree.