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

6 @ MP is a bit light to be honest. I don't feel like I'm ready to run at that distance until I can get at least 12 @ MP done. I'm not trying to discourage you from going for that race pace, just looking to give my honest feedback.

I believe you're heading into your race soon, so there was no way to get such a demanding workout in, but that's unfortunately how marathon training goes: once you're in the last 3 weeks, you have no great gauge of what shape you're in. I would tend to rely more on what paces I was running in weeks 4-6 to go in my training, not what I could do in the taper. Tapers leave you in two places: either feeling so fresh that your workouts paces pick up significantly, or feeling terrible that you wonder how you have any chance of coming close to goal pace. I've gone through both (sometimes in the same taper!) and they've indicated nothing of what was going to happen on race day.

For the last few halves I've done (I know, completely different beast) I've had a week in the last 6 when something has been off and I just can't hit the usual targets.  I usually take it to mean I should have had a light week in the previous or current week.  Only one race when this happened did I feel like I preferred death than continuing to run in the last 5km.

Now that you're back on track I'd ignore the bad week completely.

After my last marathon in 2014 i swore id never run another...and i havent actually i didnt think that and had a much better marathon than the first.

Rune good luck you have potential to run faster than 3.25 but your mileage is low for marathon training so a conservative approach is best.

Keen with those low heartrate results obviously taper is working well!

My van was getting signwritten this morning so a mate asked me to tag along for an 18km trail run. It was good but i rolled my left ankle and aggravated my right ongoing achilles/calf so im feeling a bit beat up now.

JMac/5Ks - I'm with you on avoiding races with slow fields, but maybe for a different reason. I run a lot faster and enjoy it a lot more when there are others around my speed.  I train on my own, so races are for running with others, especially when I only do 3 or 4 a year.  I do enjoy courses with out-and-back segments, though.  Gives me a chance to see the leaders ahead of me (and spurs me if I think I have a chance to catch any of them) and friends behind me.  I'm usually pushing hard enough that I can't do much more than smile or wave at friends, but even that seems to make the race easier.  Most of my friends who run are a little more casual, so they can yell encouragement to me, which also helps.

Intervals - I do 4x1200 @3K effort a couple of times a year, partly for the workout and partly to measure my fitness. Hope to get up to 5x1200 this year.  Do longish hills for my other VO2 max work.  Used to do 800s, and if I started running intervals more frequently, I'd probably mix them in with the 1200s.

Good luck to this weekend's racers!

I am still reeeealllly slow compared to all of ya and where I need to be to get close to 90min in October but I am noticing a slight shift in my lactate threshold.

Todays workout was torture and the really tough JD workouts are yet to come. So it was an easy 2k then 4x200/200 @ 1mile pace followed by 4x1mile at lactate threshold with 1 min recoveries and another 4x200/200 that I didnt really run at my mile pace anymore because my wheels were coming off.

Boy that glass of red wine tastes good today. I will sleep like a baby tonight!

Piwi - Signwritten? That's not a term I'm familiar with.

James - While I enjoy seeing other runners I know on out-and-back sections of a race (almost all of my runs are solo), most of those courses around here have some curves in the trail. The back-of-the-pack runners typically are really spread out through those, which usually forces me to run very non-optimal paths. Thus my dislike of out-and-backs.

12 miles on the schedule tomorrow, with 10 at MP (Daniels' MP, not mine!), plus some strides. The local running club is doing 14 for the marathoners, so I might just add on those extra two miles just for kicks. And I did notice that on the route for tomorrow there's a very short (~250m) Strava segment in the last couple miles that would be just perfect for an extended stride...

 

The 4x2 after threshold work is one thing I really love about JD. It seems stupid sometimes when you're doing them, but man, does it teach you how to run fast (and more importantly with proper form) when your legs are very tired. They do however feel like all out sprints and not mile pace.

I need to go back and see what I did wrong today but my legs were just too tired so I might have been beyond the threshold for too long. The crazy thing is the 4reps before the main workout. So it was R-I-R. This is the only workout in Phase II that kicks it off with repetitions. Good workout though and as you said its really efficient.

Hi all, stoked to say I ran 1:17:45 for 2nd place and a 35 second PB. Totally did not expect that on what is a pretty demanding and hilly course, full RR later on or tomorrow.