Forums >Racing>Sub 1:30 Half Marathon in 2018
RIP Milkman
Weird, I replied to Flavio earlier but don't see it posted.
Anyway, Flavio, when are you going to race again? Your race reports are my favorite by far on this board!
Also, has anyone heard from Watson?
5K: 16:37 (11/20) | 10K: 34:49 (10/19) | HM: 1:14:57 (5/22) | FM: 2:36:31 (12/19)
Flavio as you know im an expert on strava segments that are for the taking 😁
Jmac I asked of Watson recently and he did reply that life had got in the way to some extent.
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 "
Congrats to Mark for his half marathon this morning and 2nd place.
Jmac good luck in the 10 miler.
Posting my week for once as i hit 50 miles.
Weekly SummaryMonday, Sep 24, 2018 thru Sunday, Sep 30, 2018
Keen and Steve - sorry for your loss(es).
Piwi - nice week.
Sorry for being AWOL. Life's been pretty busy. I'm 3-4 weeks from the house build being finished, so there's been LOTS of decisions plus a few challenges to work through. Am aiming to get into reasonable training in November. Ran three times this week, on Saturday I surprisingly managed to get 3km in at tempo pace, so I haven't gone too far backwards.
PRs: 5km 18:43 (Dec 2015), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:26:16 (Sep 2016), full 3:09:28 (Jun 2015)
40+ PRs: 5km 19:31 (Oct 2020), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:29:39 (Jun 2018), full 3:13:55 (Sep 2022)
2023 PRs (hope to beat in 2024): 5km 20:34, 10km 41:37, half 1:32:32, full 3:21:05
2024 PRs: 5km 20:25
Mark: great race. Nice finish. I would have tumbled over running the downhill that fast. Hard to believe but thats still not Kipchogue's pace
I didnt avoid your question - I was just not too sure about the exact race date. So the hm I plan to run is called Hallwilersee and is on Oct 13. Two weeks out. Good reason to chill from now on (or: really tapering).
I wont run sub 100 this year I think. So here the goals for that:
A. 100min.
B. Sub 105min (I think this is the most likely outcome).
C. Sub 110min (even if I bonk and have to walk - I have to beat at least that )
My current pb is 113 from last year and I had 4 months off due to injury since. If I remain injury free I hope to get reasonably close to 90 min next year in fall.
Piwi: yeah you are running up and down the beach like baywatch and then suddenly you logg 50 miles. What are you up to?
Rune/Keen/Jmac: very inspiring work you are all doing.
Me: started a new job so havent had a chance to do much. 3 runs and 40k total. i did watch a lot of western states 100 documentaries on youtube though; somehow found time for that! Very inspiring people. Cool stuff. In 2016 the leader took the wrong turn at mile 90 and got lost. He had like a 20 min lead and ran 3 miles in the wrong direction because of missing turn marks. Heartbreaking.
HM: 1:47 (9/20) I FM: 3:53:11 (9/23)
2024 Goals: run a FM & HM + stay healthy!
Intl. correspondent
Jmac - No idea, I managed to gain even more weight at 88kg now. It’s like I just took 3 knees to the Netherlands.
Piwi - awesome week!
Mark - Superb race as always, laying down the hammer on that 20th km.
MJ - surf was stale last week, that's why Piwi ran a lot.
me - a bit under 60km in 5h20 + 3 hours of functional training. The axe battle against the weight continues, despite my having lost the previous 11 rounds.
PRs: 1500 4:54.1 2019 - 5K 17:53 2023 - 10K 37:55 2023 - HM 1:21:59 2021
Up next: some 800m race (or time trials) / Also place in the top 20% in a trail race
Tool to generate Strava weekly
Anxiously awaiting race reports from Mark and JmacFlavio - You are not alone. I bounce around with my weight quite a bit. This year I've seen myself bounce back and forth between 159 and 170lbs (yikes). Diet is everything, and I've out-ate my running on many occasions. I'm 6-2, so people don't notice it much, I but can definitely feel the difference, at least around my waist.My week:Monday: OffTuesday: 5 miles (8:42 pace)
Wednesday: 2 miles easy + 2 x 3 miles at MP (7:34 pace) + 1 mile easy
Thursday: Off
Friday: 7.5 (8:27 pace)
Saturday: 10 miles (8:26 pace)
Sunday: 10 miles (8:11 pace)Total: 41.5 milesChicago Marathon next week. Short runs with some strides at the end all week until Sunday's race.
Bronx 10 Mile
Pre-Race
The goal going into this race was to break 1 hour. It’s a cool barrier to break, sort of like sub 3 in a marathon or sub 90 in a half. I had some great workouts two weeks ago that indicated it would be possible, but my legs didn’t feel too great this week after running 22 on Sunday. My LT pace was around 6:10 on Wednesday, which should be exactly what my 10 mile pace is (Daniels always describes it as the pace you could sustain for an hour). However, I had a good mini-taper into this race and my legs felt pretty good the day before. Anyway, the additional benefit of breaking 60 was that I would feel much more confident going for sub 2:50 at NYC if I could get it done.
Weather for the race was just about perfect. 59 degrees, slight breeze, low humidity. My arms were actually a bit chilly at the start of the race! I haven’t felt that in months. Got super lucky as no morning in the previous week or for the next week will be this cool. Just praying I get the same thing for the marathon.
I haven’t really practice my true pre-race nutrition all year, which is a bagel with peanut butter. The major problem with NYC is that you’re awake about 4.5 hours before the race starts. I’ve never tried eating a big breakfast, but I don’t plan on starting. I’m usually pretty goo with just waiting until about 2 hours before the start and then eating.
I get to the race about 1:15 early just in case the port-a-potty lines are crazy, which they can get at NYRR. Lines weren’t too bad, so actually used them twice. I find the port-a-potty situation at races to be a microcosm of society. Everyone is calm an hour before the race, but if you’re in one of those lines with 10 minutes to go, people get very angry at even the slightest infraction they think someone else committed. Amazing how stress levels can change people’s attitudes.
Anyway, started to warm up and really felt slow. I think my first warm up mile was over 9 minutes, when I’m usually warming up around 8:15. I decided to extend it beyond my original 1 mile plan just to try to get things going, but never felt truly great.
I get into my corral 10 minutes before the plan start. The clock hits 8 am, and they’re still chatting about random things on the microphone. I hear some chatter that they won’t be starting on time because the NYC subway system is delayed (shocking) and they want to give people time to get to the start. They sing the national anthem 5 minutes late, which usually signifies the race is going to start. But we wait...and wait...and wait. It’s now 8:15 and we still haven’t started. At this point, I start feeling tense because I’ve been standing in one spot for 25 minutes. Finally, they signal we’re about to start, and off we go
Miles 1-3: 5:57 / 3:41 Pace
The first few miles felt terrible. I don’t know if any of you experience this, but the only way to describe it is that my legs felt like they had too much adrenaline in them (even though I was completely calm before the race). It’s almost this dead feeling. The last time I felt like this, I didn’t have a great race. I was hoping it would shake itself out after the first couple of miles, but it didn’t, which set the demons off in my head. I was sure this was going to be a blow up type of race. But just focused on remaining calm.
Miles 4-6: 5:50 / 3:37 Pace
Still felt terrible by the 5K point, but something really inspiring hit me. I came across the 5K mark in something like 18:30. I started to think back about how I was stuck at exactly the 6:00 pace for 5Ks for so long, which is 18:45. It reminded me how far my running had come. I first set a goal of breaking 6:00 in a 5K, then I set the goal of breaking 6:00 in a 10 (which I did this June), and now I was trying to break 6:00 in a 10 miler. It was a good reminder of how far I’ve come.
Around the 4 mile mark, you start a good slight downhill segment. For some reason, this slight downhill all of a sudden made everything start clicking. I realized too that there was a slight breeze at our back at this point. I went from feeling like complete garbage to just the normal rubbish feeling you have during any race. There is a major uphill though within mile 6 that I knew would be a major turning point. If I got over it in once peace and felt okay, I was going to be able to hold on for sub 60. Once I got over the hill and hit the 6 mile mark well ahead of 6:00 pace and feeling pretty good, I knew that I had overcome that dead leg feeling. Maybe I just needed an even longer warmup? My body has been so used to doing 6-8 miles before any sort of LT work as part of the 2Q plan, so it’s possible it just wasn’t ready to run after 1.5 miles of warm up.
Miles 7-9: 5:47 / 3:36 Pace
Miles 7-9 felt WAY better than miles 1-3. Of course I was getting tired, but the one thing that gets me through tiredness late in race is focusing on turnover. I don’t think about pushing, or holding back. It’s just “keep your legs turning over, don’t lower your cadence or lengthen the stride.” That feeling of turnover helped me significantly and I felt like I was just cruising along. I saw at the 10K mark that I was at 36:50, which was a new PR at the 10K distance. That made me smile.
Mile 10: 5:27 / 3:23 Pace
Once we got to about 1200 meters to go, I picked it up. At this stage of any race, I like to think about some workouts I’ve done that are similar to this. What popped into my head was 1200 meter repeats. Although they’re a bitch to get through, getting through ONE repeat is not difficult, so this really motivated me. I also had some guy that was trying to catch up to me that helped push me through. This race also has my favorite feature of any race I run: a big downhill for the last 200 meters or so. It’s a lot of fun flying down a hill at around 5:15 pace into the finish line, much better than the NYC marathon which is uphill for the last 200 meters.
Finish: 58:30 (5:51 / 3:38 official pace)
So many positive things about this race. First thing was that I was able to overcome that horrible feeling in the first few miles. Second, I really felt good throughout the entire second half of the race. Sure, the last mile was hard, but I was able to pick it up. I have negative split every single one of my PRs and this will be added to the list. Third, I secured a 10K PR in the process (36:21 if I assume the official pace, which probably means I actually hit closer to 36 flat during the last 10K of the race). Finally, I have a lot of confidence in going for sub 2:50 at NYC now. This summer was rough with the heat and humidity (as you all know from my constant bitching about it) and I had lost confidence throughout it. However, chugging away at 60-70 MPW has really paid dividends.
I have 5 weeks left to my marathon. I have one more 22 miler planned, and a half marathon at MP. If I can hit that half in under 1:25 (assuming decent weather conditions), I’ll be ready to go!
Thanks for reading this long RR. You know the drill: you PR, you need to write one
JMac - congratulations.
Piwi - nice week!!
JMac - great RR and well done on the race, that is a really good performance especially with that fast finish. I guess all that suffering through high Kiwi Points is paying off. As much as NYC is the goal, it'd be worth thinking about a HM after that as I reckon you have a big PB in you at that distance.
I had a similar 'meh' at the start feeling with Coatesville HM this year. Funnily enough it was the first hill climb on that course that kicked me into action and ended up running a PB that day.
Flavio, Bro - nice weeks
MJ- I'll add the race to the front page!
Me - man what a week. Definitely some sort of stomach bug but interspersed with long patches of actually not feeling terrible (hence the run on Thursday). Started to feel better Saturday morning, went for a run to see if it was even worth bothering lining up on Sunday and figured it would be survivable, but sub-par. I was OK yesterday for the race but still not quite 100%. I haven't had a stomach bug since I had campylobacter in 2005 (fun fact: it was misdiagnosed as appendicitis and they took my appendix out... you can imagine my surprise when I got sick again the day after getting out of hospital!) and I sure hope it's AT LEAST 13 years before I have another one.
M: weights
T: 11.4km incl. short fast efforts
W: -
T: 11km easy
F: -
S: 7.4km incl. short fast efforts
S: 23km incl. Devonport HM (see below)
Total: 53km
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: Runway5 / National 5k Champs, 16:22, National Masters AG Champ!
Up next: Still working on that...
"CONSISTENCY IS KING"
Bro - thanks man, yeah it’s really a battle against the weight. If I deviate from my clean diet (no alcohol, sweets or bread) I immediately start gaining weight. The only exception was when I was running over 60 miles a week.
jmac - phenomenal job! I told you so many times that effort matters more than pace. I hope you understand now how the heat didn’t slow you down one bit, it actually let you train at a higher level with lower intensity, which is great to avoid injury. Though off course as you approach your last 99 percentile, your lifetime best race, training in conditions that are exactly like the race might be required.
Also, no pressure, but 2h50 in NYC marathon has to be 2h45 in Berlin. So many soul crushing hills!
Jmac wow. When I saw your Strava today. You have moved up another level, sub 1.20 half and 35:XX 10k territory now. Totally deserved with the consistent training you do. I think every race you feel like shit at times and great at times. Those 5k and 10k splits were very motivating for you.
Watson yay you are back !
Flavio nice 60kms. My 14 yr old daughter just started a job at a bakery, Im screwed now with free stuff coming home....
Bro solid taper week.
Mick like Flavio said no surf to distract me although I went kayakfishing friday. Baywatch similar although no Pamela Anderson or the HOFF good luck on the new job.
Race report - Devonport Half Marathon
I wasn't planning on doing a RR but this was kind of a memorable race for its own set of reasons. Devonport is a notoriously hilly course with 9 big hills and a couple of smaller rises. Unfortunately the worst hills are the first one, and the last one. I wasn't planning on hitting the race hard - with it being the first race (of 5) in the Auckland Half Marathon Series, I needed to put in a solid effort to get some series points on the board, but the focus is more on NZ Road Relays coming up the following weekend and I'll most likely target races 2, 4 and 5 in the series.
After having food poisoning I wasn't that optimistic about how this was going to go, but felt almost back to normal on race morning. On the start line I didn't see a lot of familiar faces, other than Gene Rand who was pacing the 1:30 group, and a guy Robert who I recognised from Waterfront (he passed me around 12k then I passed him back around 15k). Sometimes this race gets quite a deep field and sometimes the opposite and this year it looks quite shallow.
The plan is just to go out at moderate effort and hang around there and see how it feels. I'm actually in the lead off the line and then Robert and another guy wearing headphones (is it wrong that I always think people who race in headphones are n00bs?) go past me. I feel pretty good up Huia St (the first hill) and then pass headphones guy around Ngataringa Park. 3:45-ish/km pace on the flat is feeling very comfortable although there isn't a lot of flat in this race!
Regent St. Hill is also surprisingly OK, and then it's on to the excellent Green Route trail (which is mostly actually concrete). Cemetery Hill is fine too (although this is the easy side of it), although Francis St is suckage (expectedly so - it is a nasty one). I can still see Robert and figure he has probably 30 seconds or so. I took a gel at the top here figuring I'll need the energy.
Back along the Green Route and there's a few cheers from fellow runners including some familiar faces. Again, no issues with Cemetery Hill, Plymouth Reserve is a bit niggly as it gets congested with runners in both directions on a relatively narrow path (great way to UNfix one of last year's course improvements, guys...). Regent St sucks a bit though, but I expected that. I hate the Regent St hill from that direction.
Coming back down past the golf course, I realise I've lost sight of Robert before he pops out of the trees - must've taken a wrong turn into the reserve. It's not a bad course error and probably only cost him a few seconds. I almost thought about trying to catch him here but I'm glad I didn't.
Up Lake Road and that's fine too, mentally I count off the hills left... I think it's just North Head, right? Ah CRAP - forgot Vauxhall Road! I can hear from a few cheers that there's someone probably around 20-30 seconds behind me.
Coming around the back of the golf course with around 5km to go I take a sneaky glance back and realise I'll need to motor a bit to hold off third, so I try and kick it up and... legs say no. It was like I'd literally run out of gas, which wasn't surprising really given I'd been pretty light on food intake during the week. Went from feeling very comfortable and locked in to... suckage in the space of around 1km. I take a second gel on the way up Vauxhall Road figuring I'm gonna need it up North Head, where I could really crash and burn. It's funny how sometimes competitive instincts kick in and despite knowing there's no real difference between 2nd and 3rd here for the series (and I don't even know if 3rd place guy is EVEN doing the whole series) - I do kiiiiinda want the 2nd place trophy.
Coming through Cheltenham I figure third has gained slightly but not massively. North Head (roughly the 18km mark) is gonna be make or break territory. Punisher of a hill too, it's steep, it's long, it's grass, just when you think it's flattened out there's another steep. I passed Chris Trent going up here last year, but this time it's just survival - clearly my brain diverted energy to my legs as I made a slight wrong turn half way up (not really an issue - cost me a couple seconds at most as the paths reconverge very quickly).
OH MY GOD I DIDN'T DIE (or get passed, which would've been almost as bad).
I'm actually too stuffed to even enjoy the views from the top of North Head, on what was a stunner of a day with really good running conditions. The focus is on maximising speed on the downhill and hoping I can ride that home to hold 2nd. This went pretty well and at the bottom I figured I had still probably 10-15 seconds on 3rd.
1km to go along the waterfront and I think I'm OK. The legs are really sluggish but I can hang in there OK. Turning into the finish chute I realise 3rd has closed the gap but not by quite enough. Apparently he was only 4 seconds behind on the line!!
I actually recovered really fast afterwards and felt pretty good the rest of the day so I'm putting the crash down to a lack of calories/energy in the body and should be fine for road relays this weekend. Phew. Interesting to see who the competition will be for the series this year, it was weird doing one of these races without Brad and Chris there.
At 1:20:49 this ended up being a course PB for me too by almost 30 seconds. First was around 30 seconds ahead in the end.
Anyway this race has a bit of history for me now, in 2016, I managed to sneak a surprise third place despite torrential rain (I actually quite enjoyed it). In 2017 I had a really solid race, ran a course PB and had a big confidence build after a pretty crap race at North Shore 3 weeks earlier. So I think this has become an unmissable race for me that I'll try and do every year!
Note to young players - this was also a great example of gun time v. net time. The 4 seconds I beat him by was gun time. If you look at net time - he must've started a little way back - he actually was 20 seconds ahead of me. But, the trophies work on gun time, so 2nd place it is. Always start near the front if you're aiming for placings! This was exacerbated here by a slightly narrow start chute.
I just realised something that was really weird about that race.
You may remember me talking about Bob, who did the half marathon series last season, and always went out silly fast for the first 1-2km before crashing? Not once, not twice, but Every. Single. Race.
He wasn't there! Kind of missed him, in hindsight. It was always a fun bit of entertainment early in the race (how long is Bob gonna persist with this?).
Mark bring back Bob
Great job after a nasty stomach bug, on a hilly course, and in the middle of a hectic race schedule.