Forums >Racing>Sub 1:30 Half Marathon in 2018
Intl. correspondent
In other news, truck drivers are on the 4th day of a nation wide strike due to a 50% increase in diesel prices over the past few months.
Some of you might be aware Petrobras, the national oil giant was involved in the car wash scandal, arguably the largest corruption scandal in history with billions of dollars wasted in back payments to corrupt politicians. They have monopoly in gas and diesel distribution and people are pissed at them for the price hikes and at the government for the tax gouging (50% of gas price is taxes).
To be fair oil prices are going up everywhere so this should be expected.
Anyway histeria took over and now supermarkets have their shells nearly empty and gas stations are selling their last liters of gas.
Some flights have been cancelled as the airports are also running low on airplane fuel.
Politicians are dancing on fire, and already came up with a smart law that lowers the taxes charged on diesel fuel and increase taxes on payroll to compensate haha . This might be a solution though and maybe tomorrow things will be back to normal.
Day one of Mad Max!
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
Flavio only in Brazil ! .
My next 5k should be in 2 weeks. I will be aiming at 18.15 , baby steps baby steps and like Jmac hinted Im likely running my intervals too fast. Will probably do the local 10k in a week but its a slow course and a sub 40 will be tough.
Im trying to get into London Marathon for next year but it seems near impossible. The biggest Marathon tour group here says they only got 25 entries for next year and they have about 150 that want to go. Ive also applied for overseas entry through the ballot which is a less than 10% chance and find out in August.
Picked up a mild cold which is mostly a sore throat right now. I postponed my tempo untill I feel a bit more energetic.
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 "
Flavio- crazy! My sister in law is originally from Venezuela and it is very bad there now. With the oil price coming back it might rescue them but it may also be too late.
Piwi - fingers crossed but wow it is tough odds getting into some of those races.
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: Waterfront HM, 7 Apr, 1:15:48
Up next: Runway5, 4 May
"CONSISTENCY IS KING"
Thanks everyone for the encouragement. I have no real race plans for this year now and will take it slow. First things first: recover and find a good PT.
Flavio: a little bit of corruption is ok imo. I think the carsh wash guys overdid it a bit. But in general all those compliance jobs wouldnt exist if people wouldnt cross the line at time they used to say Brazil is the land of the tomorrow and will always be (sounds better in Portuguese I suppose). You will see better times I am sure. Cant have Samba, Caipirinha, good football, carneval+ naked dancing girls (or are they boys???) AND low fuel prices. Leave some on the table for us pls btw the best remedy against high fuel prices is running
Keen: I might pick your brain regarding tm & zwift. Does it only work with an internet connection? What is your go to tm brand? I will have more questions soon
HM: 1:47 (9/20) I FM: 3:53:11 (9/23)
2024 Goals: run a FM & HM + stay healthy!
hey thanks for the welcome everyone.
A little more about me
I played several sports throughout high school, but never ran cross country and only ran 1 year of track
800/1500/3000.
Fast forward 22 years laster to 2010 and I ran a 5k in 28x at that point i decided I wanted to run a marathon so I "trained" in 2010 and ran my 1st and only marathon in March of 2011 in 4:25x
Between 2011 and 2014 I ran a bit here and there not much at all, I'd train for 12-16 weeks for a specific race but running/ training has not been a year round activity.
Most mileage in a year was right at 1000 in 2016, 2017 was interupted by surgery and a foot injury so I missed 5 months but picked back up again in Aug, and have been consistently running since.
In all I have ran the 1 marathon, 7 half Marathons and a few 5k's here in there.
Future goals, run a half marathon sub 1:35:00 maybe eventually sub 1:30 and a full marathon sub 3:25:00 and a sub 20:00 5k
I have put in about 700 miles so far this year hope to continue to increase mileage and get faster.
cf
PR's
1m 5:38 (2018)
5k 19:59 (2019)
HM 1:33:56 (2018)
FM 3:23:07 (2018)
JamesD
CFarr - welcome!
Tights - I ran in them when it was around 85/30 one day last week, along with pretty much every other day this year. This is the first year I've used them when it was warmer than 50/10. I'm doing it because they seem to support the quad muscles around my troublesome knee.
Anyone have ideas for what I can do about a tight hamstring other than rest, or what I can do to keep in shape while it's tight? I had to stop in the middle of my easy run Tuesday, and I've been feeling occasional twinges since then that make me fear injury if I try to run again. Keep thinking that another day of rest will do the trick, but not so far. This is the first time in 4 or 5 years that I've had to stop a run because of a hamstring (and I don't remember if it was the same leg then). A couple of times a year, including one day last week, I'll have mild tightness in the middle of a run, but it always has gone away during the run. This time it got steadily worse, and moved down my leg from close to the butt to nearer the inside of the knee.
While I'm not running, my usual swimming (a crawl using only the arms with occasional rest laps of backstroke with easy kicking) gives me some aerobic work, but if I do it more than once every three days my Olive Oyl-sized arms are trashed and my elbows & shoulders feel like I'm risking injury. When I'm running I only have time/need/desire to swim once or twice a week, and I expect it would take a while to increase my frequency without injury. Pool running is an even better workout but seems like it would put stress on the hamstring, as would cycling. Appreciate any suggestions.
Post-1987 PRs: Half 1:30:14 (2019); 10K 39:35 (2019); 5K 19:12 (2017); Mile 5:37.3 (2020)
'24 Goals: consistency, age-graded PRs, half < 1:32
Cobra Commander Keen
Flavio - Scary stuff. Stay safe.
Piwi - Get better, and good luck on the lottery.
Mick - Zwift does need an internet connection. The app streams everything in real-time to Zwift servers, and if you lose connection the next time you log in it will ask if you want to restart where you left off. 4G cellular is more than enough connection. Just for funsies I've carried my wife's old iphone with me while actually running on roads. You do have to have a footpod such as Stryd (I use this) or a couple others to connect to the app, or a bluetooth-enabled treadmill (these are going to be really new). Without this it doesn't work, just like the biking version and no trainer.I have a really solid, but likely 10+ year old Landice L7 I lucked into at the end of last year at a local exercise equipment store. Literally like getting the treadmill version of the legendary car "that was only driven by an old lady back and forth to church on Sundays". So long as you have a Stryd or other compatible footpod the treadmill doesn't matter in the least. Right now running on Zwift is free since they're technically still testing it, but they plan on charging for it next year. At that point it's pretty certain that I'll drop it. Let me know what all questions you have.
James - It may not be an issue with the hamstring. If you quad on that leg is really tight it can cause tightness in the hamstring as a compensation, so you might try stretching both. Of course I'm not a doctor, nor did I stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night.
Tights - I'm playing a bit of a long game here, but my next marathon is in mid-November and could be below freezing at the start, so I ordered some (heavily discounted) compression tights the other day. I'll get general use out of them even if I don't use them during the race, so that's nice. Now I'll just need to find out how I'll carry all my gels since they have no pockets.
5k: 17:58 11/22 │ 10k: 37:55 9/21 │ HM: 1:23:22 4/22 │ M: 2:56:05 12/22
Upcoming Races:
OKC Memorial 5k - April 27
Bun Run 5k - May 4
Keen in my 2 marathons to date I carried 6 gels in my shorts pockets. They are quite big gels too Leppin brand ( might be a NZ only gel ? ) and the plastic packets have sharp square corners so i rounded them off with scissors. Found this out in training of course
James I had tight sore hamstrings a few months ago. I made sure after every run I stretched them out. Foam roller as well.
CFAR sounds like you are finally on a nice uninterrupted training streak which will reap huge fitness gains.
Mark yes I was pretty stupid to think London entry would be a formality.
My throat is still pretty crappy and was hacking up some greens this morning but not on my chest so did an early 10kms with 6@ tempo. Wasnt great but ok under the circumstances. Then went off to marshall at the local Parkrun where I got in a few more kms. I was stationed at the 1km/4km mark. Was alot of fun encouraging everyone and I will definitely volunteer again.
Piwi - that’s a sound plan. I cannot wrap my head around the possibility of running intervals too fast. I can never do that, if I run them too fast I pay for it on the last few laps.
I suppose it gets better after a few weeks.
Nice one volunteering at the park run.
Mark - Yeah, it’s crazy to think that it’s like this for over 10 years now in Venezuela. We have had a huge influx of refugees over the past few years.
MJ - Brazil does have the weather and amazing food going for it. When in Europe I’m always sad to see how little variety the Europeans have in terms of fruits and veggies.
James - is it the inner hamstring close to the knee? Or outer closer to the butt?
Keen - Assuming you will not have a support crew you could always carry them in a money belt.
me - it turns out the reports of empty shelves at the super markets were largely exaggerated.
I was there on the hyper market nearby half an hour ago and it was full as always. Perhaps the smaller chains are suffering more.
Anyway it looks like everything is going to go back to normal and Mad Max has been cancelled.
RIP Milkman
Flavio - just want to say I found your post hilarious. We’ve certainly got some interesting politics in the US, but nothing like that
Piwi - If you go sub 18 and beat me, I may have to go again for another 5K. We need some competitiveness on this thread, and nobody is catching Mark . However, I did do an age graded calculation, and you are by far the leader with a converted time of 16:10. So we may need to change the theme of this thread from “Consistency is King” to “Piwi is King”
James - Stretching is really key in this case, and it’s more than you think. Get in 3x of 30 second stretches, and try to do it multiple times a day. If you work a desk job, set a reminder on your phone or calendar and just stretch. It will help a lot within a week or two.
Keen - you guys over in sub 3:20 have so many things you say. I need you to explain both DD and the Botswana reference. I’m clearly a total noob.
5K: 16:37 (11/20) | 10K: 34:49 (10/19) | HM: 1:14:57 (5/22) | FM: 2:36:31 (12/19)
Re hamstrings - I've never really had injuries there. I've had many other injuries.
Re gels - I've tended to struggle with these. In my last marathon I only managed to ingest the first. But I gagged on the second, which in part was due to having a throat infection. And I didn't bother with the third. If I run a marathon again, I'll probably go for dry fruit, bars etc.
Cfarr - welcome.
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
Keen - I got an SPI Belt off Amazon which I used to carry gels for the marathon and also use for long runs depending how much I need to take. It is great and I don't even notice it's there when I'm running with it. My tights have a couple small pockets which can fit gels too. In cold temps the Nike tights (running tights, not compression tights) I wear have a couple of small pockets which will comfortably fit a gel each.
James - tight hamstring could be referred from a few different things. I've luckily had very few issues. Rolling the hamstring tendon at the very top of the hamstring/bottom of the glute might help. As Flavio says, stretching will help a lot too. Try and do the hamstring stretch where you lie on your back and put your leg up against a wall or doorframe - it's much easier on the lower back than a standing hamstring stretch.
Piwi - hope that cold clears up soon. Good one on volunteering too!
CFarr - nice, keep that mileage consistent and you will see the benefits.
JMac - wow, Piwi's AG 5k time is smoking!!
Flavio - probably better you're not in a post-apocalyptic meltdown I guess!
Flavio 5 x 1000s are obviously easier than 6 x 1000s so you can push slightly more knowing the pain is over quicker
Ive hear the term " train dont strain " but in reality the straining bit is what creates stimulus for your body to get faster at running. As you get older you do have to lessen the strain a bit but its important to keep workouts going weekly.
Jmac/Mark age grading is a nice ego boost when you get older but its not really comparable. The quality of runners competing drops off quite alot with age and there arent many Africans still running competitively at 50. I will never know what I could have run at 30
When you guys get to 40 Bernard Lagat will have pushed all your age graded results down although I think they have some formula to smoothe out the outlier results.
Jmac I have a pretty good feel for current 5k pace and it wont be sub 18 yet. If I can keep the weeks rolling along at 50 mpw then later in the year it should be possible.
The Parkrun was won in about 19.30 today. It was good to see all the runners giving it everything from the 30 min finishers to the sub 20s. They were all hurting with 1km to go.
I doubt I will be up to a long run tomorrow with my cold but luckily Im already at 75kms so I will still keep my 80km streak alive with 7 in a row.
My 16 week average is about 38 mile/week 60 kms/week.
Keen: thanks I googled the Landice L7 and came across an angry customers review: "American quality my rear end…what a waste. Buy something else, take the savings and go on a vacation."
Haha. But in general seems to be a wide spread and solid tm. I am looking to buy a preowned model too. One that I can repair myself if needed. Like exchanging the belt etc. I am currently financially tight. And dont mind doing occasional repairs when and if needed. So it needs to be a wide spread brand and model. I would also buy the footpod if the newer garmin watches are still too off. My Suunto is way too off (15% or more). What else is important in your opinion? Max speed / width / length?
Thanks in advance! Also regarding zwift!
Jmac - House of Cards producers are known for taking jabs in twitter about Brazilian politics stating they could never be as cunning haha
DD = dear daughter
DW = dear wife
DH = dear husband and so on.
Botswana is Boston marathon, someone thought it would bring bad luck to say the race name and they have since replaced it with a B-word. Botswana stuck more I guess.
Watson - maybe you had a reaction to the acidity in the gels? Maybe a more base one?
Anyway, I’m sure whatever you choose you will also try in training.
James - there’s that stretch lying down with an elastic band over your foot and your leg up.
http://www.performancehealthacademy.com/media/catalog/product/cache/16/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/d/s/dsc-454620071014__061408_084340.jpg
Mark - thanks, I’ve read a lot about preparation for catastrophes in the past few years (as a hobby) and apparently 2 things stand out.
Scarcity is usually due to economic meltdown and 2 - it comes slowly catching people off guard because they think it will improve.
Piwi - my 5x1000 predicted 5k pace quite well I suppose like I said I still have an extra gear I’m not aware of.
I did notice when I run fast that I increase cadence instead of increasing the step.
MJ - I’ll take the regular dutch girls, next door neighbour over any of the samba dancers.
I remember going to Keukenhof, the flower park, and Amsterdam, and be astonished at how incredibly beautiful all the dutch girls were. Like they were all built in a lab.
Unless you're hiding all the uggos in Leiden and Rotterdam
Brazil's melting pot of cultures does produce some beautiful people but low quality of life makes sure beauty goes down after 20.
me - taking today off due to hamstring soreness. Consistency is king. I’ll be going on vacation in a week and won’t be running as much, so less 20K won’t have such a big impact in the long run anyway.