Sub 1:30 Half Marathon in 2018 (Read 704 times)

Race Report – Belfast city Half Marathon, 23 Sep 2018

The week going into the half marathon I had a work trip to North Carolina. This meant that I could only run short distances on a treadmill. From one side this was ok: it forced me to have an actually good taper, with shorter distances and a few acceleration to race pace. It was also a confidence booster as I always go to the same hotel and on the same trade mill I measured my beat per minute under effort and I always kept them under 160 bpm (while in May the same speed and training would push me to 170/175).

I flew back to Belfast on Saturday afternoon. I tried everything to relax and get rid of the 8 hours + 2 sitting on a plane. I had plenty of water and no heavy food or drinks, so overall, I think I prepared well for the race.

Sunday morning I woke up around 6:30 (with about 6 hours sleep, which is ok for me). I kept hydration going, had a couple of slices of bread and got a taxi to the starting line at 8 am. The start was at 9 am, so I had all the time to prepare, leave my kit in the tent (both start and finish line are close to it) and warm up a bit (temperature slightly on the cold side, but pretty good for the last bit of a half marathon - around 10 degree Celsius).  Thinking about it, the weather condition has been pretty good, although a bit too windy. The plan was to stay covered by the 1h30 group for as long as I could.

I forgot my gels, but I never take them anyway and they have gels energy stations towards 9 miles, which is a good point. I am in a good mental status. The atmosphere is as good as usual at the Belfast city half marathon (this is my 5^th out of 6 they did). At the starting line I see others from my runner club. I know that the two guys can run a sub 1:28 HM while the girl is around 1:33, so I decided to start with them, about 9 seconds behind the elite runners. There are about 4,000 runners we are probably in the first 300 positions. I am a bit nervous, but I am decided to trust my plan and my training.

The start goes and we're off.  I follow the other lagan valley (my club) runners for about 200 meters, then I decide to be more conservative and slow down a bit. My plan was to stick with the 1:30 pacer and so that is what I want to do... As soon as I see the 1h30 pacer I focus again and follow him. I have a quick chat and realize that there are 2 pacers and that one will be more aggressive and one more conservative (aiming for a negative split). I decide to stay with the more aggressive one. The pace is on the edge, but fairly comfortable. We pass the park 3 times in the first 3 miles, then we go off the motorway and the airport. I wanted to stay at 6:50, but the first 5 miles are more around 6:40. I decide that I will deal with it and will try to keep up. I know there are a couple of hills at the end that may slow me down.

Around mile 6 I can feel my arms starting to be heavy. I need focus and effort to keep up, and my brain start thinking about either stop and go back or slow down. I think at the last 3 months and how much I trained for this and manage to get back on the 1:30 group. There are many runners ahead and behind, but our group is the only one large and compact enough to be used against the wind. So, I decide to use it and focus on staying in the middle of it for as long as I can. I have a couple of energy gels recovered at the energy station and decide to use one (there is a hill coming at mile 9...).

We get to the 9^th miles and I realize that I am still under 6:50 pace (and I have been under constantly for the whole race). So, this is going to be my PB on a 10M as well. Then ... a crisis. It was while running up hill in the 10^th mile. I knew this could happen...I lost contact with the first 1:30 group. I start thinking (and this is usually a bad thing). But I knew there was another coming, so I focused on getting to the 10^th miles either with them or ahead of them. They got me at 10 miles and the pacer (realizing I was in crisis) told me that I was still on time for the 1:30 and that the next mile was a bit of a recovery mile (with a shorter downhill and flat). I manage to refocus and stay with him on my side for about a mile.

Around 11.5 miles I noticed I was out of gas, almost completely. I used all my mental and physical energy and I was starting to lose ground. I kept focused on any single runner who was passing me and used them to accelerate again. I managed to keep the pacer on sight, but I knew I was on the edge. In the last half a mile I tried everything to recover, kept the other runners pace, but could not sprint. I had done all I could, I decided to keep trying but accept that the time was passing. About 500 meters to the end I start hearing the speaker at the finish line calling the 2 minutes to the 1h30. And he keeps doing that. Somehow it motivated me to keep going and I enter the final .1 miles with 10 seconds to go. I know I will not make it, but I can still keep running at this point...

I cross the finish line without even looking at the gun time, I stop my watch and see that 09 at the end and I know I was seconds away from a sub 90. However, the more I analyze the race the more I am convinced I have done everything I could, and that any change could have gone either way. So, I am happy with race day.

I know I have work to do, I need to work on my upper body strength, on my mental focus and my ability to run when tired. I know I need race experience to get the mental attitude. Overall, I am happy with what I have achieved this year. About 1 year ago I run the same race (and same route) in 1 h 34’ 40’’ and I improved that to 1h 31’37’’ at the end of June. So I improved 1’30’’ in 3 months and about 4’30’’ in a year. Considering that 5 years ago I could not run in 1’50’’, I am satisfied with this year's improvement.

Now I need to plan for the future. Any suggestions on what to do now to prep for a sub 90’ next year or a good marathon?

Should I keep miles above 40? Should I increase? Start to run cycles of training without an actual aim? Should I get another race down before starting training? I will think about it this week (I’ll take it easy given that I have not taken an actual break since January.

Have a great day!

Marco

bro - but what exactly was the issue on your last marathon? Did you have cramps? lack of energy?

You need to think back what were the factors that held you back and try to work on those.

I’m listing 3 examples of things you can do to improve your times below, but there are many more:

1 - Higher mileage.

2 - Marathon pace training  (not v02max, not 100m sprints, not hill sprints) - Most training plans top out at 14 miles at MP for a reason. You will not get better at marathon running by running longer MP runs. I think that might be a carry on from your shorter distance race training.

What gives you confidence on a marathon is that you were able to run 10 miles at MP at the tail end of a long week. Quoting Hansons here, you are simulating the last 10 miles of the race (not the first).

The previous 6 days were there to get your body tired enough.

3 - Prefer under trained then over trained. If you follow these boards long enough you will quickly notice a very high percentage of people who injure themselves during training, or that spent themselves during training and have no energy on race day (feel flat).

All that said, I hope you can also enjoy the shorter races, I bet you can run a mean 1500. Marathons are bitches!

Matt - that’s a great 5K, super fast!

Marco - thanks for the race report. You mostly need to repeat the same training cycle and you will get sub 90. Anything you safely add to it will be the cherry on top.

bro - but what exactly was the issue on your last marathon? Did you have cramps? lack of energy?

You need to think back what were the factors that held you back and try to work on those.

I’m listing 3 examples of things you can do to improve your times below, but there are many more:

1 - Higher mileage.

2 - Marathon pace training  (not v02max, not 100m sprints, not hill sprints) - Most training plans top out at 14 miles at MP for a reason. You will not get better at marathon running by running longer MP runs. I think that might be a carry on from your shorter distance race training.

What gives you confidence on a marathon is that you were able to run 10 miles at MP at the tail end of a long week. Quoting Hansons here, you are simulating the last 10 miles of the race (not the first).

The previous 6 days were there to get your body tired enough.

3 - Prefer under trained then over trained. If you follow these boards long enough you will quickly notice a very high percentage of people who injure themselves during training, or that spent themselves during training and have no energy on race day (feel flat).

 

All that said, I hope you can also enjoy the shorter races, I bet you can run a mean 1500. Marathons are bitches!

 

Matt - that’s a great 5K, super fast!

 

Marco - thanks for the race report. You mostly need to repeat the same training cycle and you will get sub 90. Anything you safely add to it will be the cherry on top.

My first marathon was Chicago in 2010.  It was my first year of running or even "training" for a race and I ran 4:05 or 4:06.   I averaged 36 miles a week and I hardly did any threshold work and had two 20 mile runs the entire cycle.   I went out at 8:05 pace (I think) and I completely cramped up around my 18 and ended up walking and trotting for the remainder of the race (hitting the wall around 21).   The temperature at the 20 mile mark was close to 85 degrees.   I also just wrapped up a 70 hour work week and slept like crap the last two days leading up to the race.   I really should have not ran that race.

I've ran about 14,000 miles since that race....so I definitely have some aerobic base to pull from.

I wanted to do another Marathon again...just to finish one comfortably.  This training cycle I was able to add some threshold runs in the middle of my long runs like the JD plan has asked us to do and averaged 50 miles a week for nearly 5 or 6 months.  I've done some progressive long runs...starting at 8:10 pace and dropping to 7:05 pace.   I've also done long runs of 22, 22, 19.2, 18.7, 18, 17.7, 17.1, and 15. 

When I was running "unofficially" sub-17 and sub-5 in the mile, I rarely ran more than 10 or 12 miles for my long run, so this is absolutely unchartered waters for me.

Truthfully, I'm more concerned with my confidence of covering that distance than actual pace.  I want to run it conservatively and finish strong and I'm very excited to test things out.  That's why going out at 7:30 or 7:35 pace are wise decisions, because I could go out at 7:15 and risk everything. Things like BQ-ing and Sub-3 are things I want to think about after this race is over.   

On a side note, I rarely get injured.  For whatever reason, I've been able to handle high-volume, high intensity workouts for as long as I've been running.  I know a lot people here think I run too hard all the time, but many of my runs are in that 8:10 to 10:00 range on my non-workout days, I just don't post it.

 

Steve - have you put some thought on the root cause of why you have calf issues? Is it because they take the brunt of your weight when running due to your form?

When I did the gate analysis one of the results was that I was sort of leaning forward putting extra stress on the lower back leg muscles and tendons (calf, ankle, achilles).

Yeah I had an analysis done a few years ago by a physio who also works with elite and average runners.  He put me on a treadmill and videoed my running technique then we sat for an hour as he analysed it with his software.  Each step I take spends too long on the ground, I kind of reach out a bit and hit the ground earlier than ideal.  He gave me some exercises and did another analysis 2 years later and found some improvement but did also say it's a tough one to fix and will lead to lower leg injuries.  My stats were about 5-10% above the upper end of the good range.  What has managed it and reduced the frequency the most is increasing my percentage of easy miles - I was doing everything with intensity until I saw him, a recipe for disaster that some others in this thread might experience soon (I hope not).

I lasted about 8 years of running before running too fast started to cause injuries - starting with a painful knee injury (that has now fully recovered), then hip and calf niggles.  They're still coming obviously, but I'm getting better at recognising them early and managing them.

marco nice race report so close keep it up you will get there.

my intent is to use the Altra for my long and or slow recovery miles. I still have a few miles left on my Brooks so I will continue to wear them on some faster paced work those should last me another 2-3 weeks but will need to find a good shoe to finish up the remainder of my training as well race in.

Oh shoes, was just about to talk about these!

Steve - what kind of shoes do you wear? I'd take a look at the heel to toe drop. Something with higher drop might suit you better

Corey - What brooks do you wear? I wear the Pure Flow as my daily trainer, have been since the first version of them came out!

Me - I'm in the market for new half to full shoes. I've been wearing the Asics Hyperspeed 6 now for my entire post college running career. I'm probably on my 6th or 7th pair at this point when I bought a ton of them on clearance and stored them. I'd like to stay in the 4-6mm drop zone, so Boston's are a no go although they seem like the favorite marathoning shoe.

What does everyone run their half marathons in?

Marco - that's a big improvement even if you didn't hit the sub-1:30... I definitely agree with JMac's tip about including long runs of slightly longer than half marathon distance - it just gets your body used to the distance and then it's not so tough on the day.  Maybe try and increase the mileage a bit, but I wouldn't ramp it up too much as sometimes just getting consistency in your training is the key.

Piwi/JMac - I think 'embrace the suckage' is an excellent description!  It tends to be from about km's 16-20 for me.  By the time you hit km 21 you know there's not far to go haha.

Piwi - another runner I know from the gym was rocking a pair of the Nike Zoom Vaporfly 4%'s this morning. Weird looking shoe but he seems to like them. He is an older guy but had a 2:35 FM to his name from back in the day.

Me - well I had some mystery bug that led to me feeling like complete misery Tues afternoon and Wed - temperature and a splitting headache. Much improved this morning so went out for an easy run but still not quite 100%. Fortunately it seems to be one of those short, sharp bugs so I'm optimistic I'll be right by the weekend.