Forums >Racing>The Waltons aka Advanced Half Marathon Training Thread - 2022 edition
I finished up my week today with the most miles in a week since July 5th of last year, I even got in a swim this week.
Going to try and incorporate swimming as part of my overall training.
PR's
1m 5:38 (2018)
5k 19:59 (2019)
HM 1:33:56 (2018)
FM 3:23:07 (2018)
Waltons ThreadLord
Zebano - You are absolutely right about how the body acclimates and adjusts. Two months ago 26º would had been brutal. Today it was pretty nice.
Darkwave - For me the light vest is a step down from a full jacket, which would be too warm for me. In addition to light insulation, it serves as a windbreaker. This way, I can shed heat from my arms & legs. I will say, sadly, the older I get, the more I seem to need to wear to keep warm.
I had a pretty good race today. My running partner, coming back from injury, hadn't run a half in 9 months and was raring to go. He kept getting ahead, but I wouldn't get sucked into his pace (knowing the hills as I do) and a couple of times he pulled over to wait for me. When we hit Harlem Hill for the third and last time in mile 13, he blew up and I went right past him. Since we were there together, I waited for him to catch up and urged him along to the finish. I managed to improve my best time for a Central Park half marathon from 2:04:04 to 2:01:55 (even with waiting for my RP). 40.2 miles for the week.
5k 23:48.45 (3/22); 4M 31:26 (2/22); 5M 38:55 (11/23); 10k 49:24 (10/22); 10M 1:29:33 (2/24); Half 1:48:32 (10/22); Marathon 4:29:58 (11/23)Upcoming races: RunAPalooza (Asbury Park) HM, 4/6; Clinton Country Run 15k, 4/27
Intl. correspondent
Zeb - So from what I’ve seen grease the groove can be useful if you’re stuck on a plateau, but not necessarily as a regular occurrence as it’s the equivalent to stating if you go outside and run half a mile a few times a day will make your running improve a lot.
Caitlin - Great job on the 6 hour run and also great job on taking it easy.
Watson - It’s what I can do at the moment. Caveat that it’s 3x9 so I suppose I could probably lift a little more if going for a max rep, but I’m absolutely not going for that at the moment.
My lower back is bothering me so I’m being very conservative and also I’m not very fit due to slacking on strength training during marathon training, I reckon my baseline has decreased.
My max ever was not that high, when I trained for the 1500 in 2019 I’ve only managed to top at 3x3 with 92kg.
My week below. I've almost conquered the 20 miler (in the whole week ).
PRs: 1500 4:54.1 2019 - 5K 17:53 2023 - 10K 37:55 2023 - HM 1:21:59 2021
Up next: no idea
Tool to generate Strava weekly
Mother of Cats
. I will say, sadly, the older I get, the more I seem to need to wear to keep warm.
Yup - my experience as well. A few years back, 28 degrees would have been a toss-up between shorts and tights.
Congrats on the half marathon course PR!
Cfarr - nice week, and great idea to add some swimming - I really like how it counterbalances running. I always feel better after a short swim.
Flavio - I've found that to be one of the big challenges of marathon training - you cut back on all the little things to make sure you're not overloading your body. And then the lack of those little things catches up.
***
My week:
61 miles running, 3 hours pool-running, and ~1500 yards swimming.
M: upper body weights/core and 90 minutes of pool-runningT: 12 miles, including 8 Iwo Jima hill repeats (~2 minutes uphill, 80 second jog, 40 second downhill stride, 60 second jog is one rep). Followed with leg strengthwork and 500 yards recovery swimming. Dry needling of legs in afternoon.W: Streaming yoga and 10 miles very easy outside (9:25) plus drills/strides. Deep tissue massage in afternoon.Th: 90 minutes pool-running and upper body weights/core. F: 12 miles on the treadmill, including a tempo workout of 4x7:30 at tempo effort (6:58 pace for each) with 90 second jog in between. Full recovery and then four short (30 second) intervals at between 9.5 and 10 mph with 90 second jog to work on turnover. Followed with leg strengthwork and 500 yards recovery swimming.Sa: 9 miles easy on treadmill (9:31), upper body weights/core and then 3 miles very easy outside (9:29) plus drills.Su: 15 miles progressive, split as first 5 averaging 9:18, next 5 miles averaging 8:08, next 5 miles averaging 7:16. Followed with leg strengthwork and 500 meters recovery swimming.
Played with holding my core stable this week, and that seemed to help things - I noted significantly improved paces on many of my runs for the same effort.
As I mentioned previously, I saw the physiatrist on Thursday and finally got the results for my lumbar/pelvic MRIs from two weeks ago. They're fairly good - a bit of narrowing where the nerves exit the spine, but nothing significantly changed from 18 months ago. However, the physiatrist offered to do an epidural at L5 - the idea is that if that improves things, then we've got some answers. I have that scheduled for Thursday morning but am going back and forth on whether to get it - mostly because I'm not a big fan of cortisone shots.
The physiatrist also reviewed my previous MRI of brain/spine and REALLY thinks I need a second neurology opinion. Which is consistent with my experience that EVERYONE except the neurologist thinks this is neurological...
Everyone's gotta running blog; I'm the only one with a POOL-RUNNING blog.
And...if you want a running Instagram where all the pictures are of cats, I've got you covered.
Jeff, 7 in 7 is pretty cool. Where did you you get the idea, was it a huge logistical challenge?
Piwi, good week.
Watson, solid week. Smart to play it safe with the fires.
Mark, great week. Very fun you got to combine your run with marathon cheering. Sorry about the new restrictions, hope your races still go.
Steve, so frustrating to be in limbo whether your race will happen. Nice week. These ultra runners are really onto something eating real food instead of gels. The gels sound so gross to me now.
James, great job taking things slowly and really listening to your hamstring.
Zebano, thanks
DW, sounds like real improvement, that's great! Are you scheduled to see a 2nd neurologist? My other sizable run was 2 weeks ago. I finally realized that I can't do back to back weeks of 16+ mi without injuring myself. So nothing over 12 again til race day.
Cfarr, great news on the high mileage week
Flavio, sorry about the back, good to see you're still making progress.
Fred, awesome race! That's a huge improvement and so great about the pacing.
My week went very well. Friday's run was my highlight and still doesn't feel real. Today's run was way more of a struggle than I expected. Nothing specific hurts just general stiffness and aches. I'm going to significantly reduce the mileage this week and really give myself time to recover.
5k 24:53 (2020) |10k 52:24 (2021) |HM 1:57:14 (2019) |FM 4:24 (2007) |50k 5:57 (2022)
Piwi - I did get a bit of FOMO watching the race yesterday. But the hot slog up the Wairau Rd hill coming home knocked that out of me quite quickly.
Corey - congrats on getting a big week in!
Steve - good week... hope I'll see you at Southern Lakes but honestly I genuinely hope you get to do Christchurch Marathon.
Darkwave - I think Dan ran a 2:16 two or three years ago. I think that was at Gold Coast on a humid, windy day, so I daresay he's got quicker than that in him based on his performance at the weekend. Anyways it's good to hear that your running felt better, and it sounds like you're getting closer to the cause (even if the one person that should know wants another person's opinion!!).
Caitlin - saw your long run on Strava... WOW! Great training.
Races - well the good news is that Running Events have re-affirmed that they have an approved plan to run events at red. Not sure what it is but I'm assuming wave starts. Means I should get the rest of the 10k series in over summer hopefully, and possibly even Omaha HM in late March which is also one of their events and is generally pretty capacity limited anyways.
3,000m: 9:07.7 (Nov-21) | 5,000m: 15:39 (Dec-19) | 10,000m: 32:34 (Mar-20)
10km: 33:15 (Sep-19) | HM: 1:09:41 (May-21)* | FM: 2:41:41 (Oct-20)
* Net downhill course
Last race: Maraetai HM, 10 Mar, DNF
Up next: Waterfront HM, 7 Apr
"CONSISTENCY IS KING"
Corey Great week, I'm a huge fan of swimming as crosstraining because it really works all the kinks out of my back.
DW/Fred I'll add that at higher temps a vest is annoying but the windbreaking feature is crucial when you get to the point where the wind just makes you bitterly cold rather than taking away heat and feeling refreshing. As Fred said, you can still shed heat via the arms.
Fred Congrats on the PR! I've never run a race with a partner, do you guys do a lot of those as tune ups?
Flavio yeah taking pull up/lifting advice from a runner like me is always suspect .. Congrats on putting up more miles than last week.
DW Excellent week and I'm glad the tape/chair of death is doing good things for you. I'm curious how long it took before you could run marathon effort at the end of those progressions? I've thought about stuff like that before (JD 2Q plans in particular) and my hips tend to get really tight after an hour or so of running which makes the idea of going fast really hard to imagine.
CCOakley Good work, how hilly is the 12 hour course?
My week was solid. Due to my son having Covid I couldn't go to the gym so no lifting and no swimming but I made up for it with cycling (all the 0 mi activities are bike on a trainer, just tracking time and HR). I also got my replacement watch at the end of the week so I don't have to remember to use the Correct Elevation feature on Strava anymore.
Running 48.4 miles / 7 hours
Cycling 3h 10m
Lifting 0h 0m
Swimming 0h 0m
Goal by end of January is 7h run, 2 cycle, 1 swim, 1 lift so I'm getting really close in overall volume. Surprisingly the 2 hour run didn't leave me feeling very rough today so that's a good sign. I wish I had a way to evaluate if the cross training helps my running at all, oh well.
1600 - 5:23 (2018), 5k - 19:33 (2018), 10k - 41:20 (2021), half - 1:38:57 (2018), Marathon - 3:37:17 (2018)
Corey awesome on the best mileage since July. The swimming will be a great fitness addition.
Fred congrats on gthe Central Park PB and way to take down your mate
Flavio Im like you in that I dont know my max deadlift or squat and I dont have total confidence in my back. I deadlift 2 x sets of 10 at 40kgs but they are not to exhaustion.
CCoakley 31 miles !! Damn nice work.
Steve Im in Christchurch in early feb for a couple of days. Might be my last trip as my daughter is moving back home. Hopefully we can get a jog in.
Zeb I like how casually you guys mention covid. I wish it was like that here instead of every single case making headline news.
55+ PBs 5k 18:36 June 3rd TT
" If you don't use it you lose it, but if you use it, it wears out.
Somewhere in between is about right "
This just in, someone with Covid went to a restaurant in Auckland 10 days ago lol. Seriously, this is actually the sort of crap our media is reporting.
. I'm curious how long it took before you could run marathon effort at the end of those progressions? I've thought about stuff like that before (JD 2Q plans in particular) and my hips tend to get really tight after an hour or so of running which makes the idea of going fast really hard to imagine.
I've been doing them that way for years - with the group I run with, the long runs are ALWAYS progressions (unless I'm doing a specific marathon workout like 2x5 at marathon effort). If I'm feeling rough, I may only go down to moderate effort. Normally the progression is split into 3rds, but if you need an easier day you can also change the proportions - i.e. do 14 miles split as 6 easy/6 moderate/2 marathon.
Remember that I run marathon effort, not goal marathon pace - there can be a big differential between the two.
I'm so used to doing progressions that I think 15 miles all at easy pace would be excruciating.
Please tell me this is "breaking news."
But the thing is, my arms get much colder than my torso - different thermostats. In that situation, I prefer a jacket that is unzipped enough to let in some air to my torso - that way the arms stay warm.
Yes. Yes it is.
Hot Weather Complainer
It is real
https://www.1news.co.nz/2022/01/24/indian-eatery-in-auckland-new-covid-19-location-of-interest/?fbclid=IwAR0tfvE8MejoGounKlbHN8rQzqskpZB7RJZR46AvapSoCIOdfgSL1p20LMk
5km: 18:34 11/23 │ 10km: 39:10 8/23 │ HM: 1:26:48 9/23 │ M: 3:34:49 6/23
2024 Races:
Motorway Half Marathon February 25, 2024 1:29:55
Christchurch Half-Marathon April 21, 2024
Selwyn Marathon June 2, 2024
Dunedin Half Marathon September 15, 2024
When it gets really cold here I put on long sleeves, maybe some thin gloves. But really cold in the Bay Area means maybe low 40s (6-7C). Ran the farthest I’ve run this week since February last year 😑. Good swims though.
5k: 20:32 (1/17) | HM: 1:34:37 (2/18) | FM: 3:31:37 (3/18)
Getting back into it