Forums >Racing>Sub 1:30 Half Marathon 2021 Edition
I guess I may have to go in this one then 😃
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 "
Problem Child
Sweet shakka bruh.
Many of us aren't sure what the hell point you are trying to make and no matter how we guess, it always seems to be something else. Which usually means a person is doing it on purpose.
VDOT 53.37
5k18:xx | Marathon 2:55:22
JamesD
Flavio - Glad you’re feeling a bit better. I have short periods of lightheadedness a couple of times a month, but it’s not serious & usually just means I stood up too quickly after being horizontal and/or need something with sugar.
Piwi - I suppose you signed away the rights to your picture when you registered for that race, but you should at least see if you can get a poster from the organizers.
Olympic women’s marathon - Delighted to see Seidel get a bronze to reward her gutsy run. Before our trials, she was probably considered somewhere between 10th & 20th most likely to make our team, as she had never even run a full and was off the radar because of injuries. Having attended our trials races last year made this year’s marathons much more interesting for me.
Me - Took another step up in my cautious speedwork, doing 3x1200 after 3x800 last week. Pace was slightly less slow as well, though my glutes were hurting some. Temperatures were a lot lower this week, which may be why my tempo run was a little faster than last week, but still not where I’d like it to be.
Sun - off
Mon - 6.6 miles including 3x1200 @ 4:37 w/2:50 rest, TDP 149
Tues - 8.5 miles very slow (1:39) on treadmill
Weds - 7.3 in park @ 8:35, TDP 146
Thurs - off
Fri - 7.2 in park including 3 @ 6:57, TDP 146
Sat - 8.5 very slow (1:39) on treadmill
Total - 38.2 miles
YTD average - 46.9 mpw
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
I saw the last 3km of the woman's race.
I checked out Mollies Strava, yikes the elites do big mileage. Her race week incl.the race was 128km / 80 miles.
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
Piwi - awesome shot, promo boy!
James - I didn't see the Olympic women's marathon as it coincided with my race, sounds like a great effort by Seidel though.
Me - trail half yesterday was good fun. I came 2nd overall, guy who was first looked to be a pretty experienced trail runner. I stuck with him for the first 3km or so but then dialled back a bit as the pace was a bit hot. The trails were mostly in very good nick, although there were a couple of km where it was a bit muddy and greasy, and some long climbs in there too. The thing about climbs on trails is that, just when you think the hill ends at that corner you can see coming up... it doesn't. I realised with a couple of km to go I was catching up on first place, he had around 30 seconds on me and I caught him looking over his shoulder a couple times, but I left myself too much work to do and didn't have enough runway to catch him.
Anyway, I got what I wanted out of it, really had to dig it in at points on the longer climbs, and had to work to find a rhythm on the twisty and undulating sections too. I was getting a stitch around the 6-7km mark that I managed to successfully battle through, and also had to battle that sort of fatigue in the legs that you don't get wearing Vaporflies on the road. So hopefully that sets me up well for road races coming up.
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"
Mark awesome job. I had a stalk of that guys strava. Didn't look like much mileage ? I watched some of the cross-country nationals from Dunedin on TV.
James nice work on the speedwork. Solid mileage too.
Mens marathon shortly. I will be glued to the TV.
I had a good week. A 1km on/off workout Wed where I ran 10kms in about 39.30. The off kms were about 4.10/km and on about 3.45/km. The off bits felt relatively slow and allowed good recovery. Lower legs however had lots of DOMS on Friday and Saturday but I forced them straight into an average paced run of 4.10/km for 15k on Saturday which was probably stupid and then a fast 21kms today as I ended up joining a guy of about Mark's pace 😳
Piwi - yeah I had a look too and I just came to the conclusion that he doesn’t log all his runs on Strava obsessively like normal runners. Anyways good week, looking forward to the marathon, great to see two Kiwis there, I struggle to remember the last time we had one!
Wow, how good was Kipchoge?! That 30-35k split was nuts.
There's a video here of the event yesterday which includes some footage of the trails (mostly the easier bits). I popped up in a couple of places, look for the blue and yellow Takapuna singlet with black gloves.
Nice Mark, almost as famous as me 😃. Great footage and beautiful course. I screenshotted your dias cheque shot blew it up and saw $200. That's at least $140 US
Mark and Piwi - looking good guys! Mark was the trail technical at all? That looked beautiful. Glad the race went well.
I had a solid week with no cross-training. I'll add a little bit back in next week, still trying to find the balance where I'm it's benefitting the running and not detracting.
M - easy 50 min
T - easy 40 min + strides
W - 800m race, 4x400m race + WU/CD
Th - 12.5 mi super easy
F - off
S- easy hour + strides (return of the dreaded humidity)
S - 6x4min progression around threshold, 2 min rec.
46.2 miles
I loved watching Cheruiyot (1500) and Gidey (10,000) push from the front. A real shame neither won a gold but they were great races.
1600 - 5:23 (2018), 5k - 19:33 (2018), 10k - 41:20 (2021), half - 1:38:57 (2018), Marathon - 3:37:17 (2018)
Intl. correspondent
Piwi - Looking good Mr top model!
RP - It’s scary how much smoke those fires cause. Isn’t a bit of it that Smog from Eastern Asia flying over the ocean ?
Steve - That Molly chick is a brave woman and she had a high cadence very much in contrast with the top 2 Kenyans, especially Jepchirchir. I was also impressed by Jepchirchir, she made her move and looked so resolute and fearless.
Mark - It sounds like you had fun at the race, the most important thing. That video is excellent.
I saw all those maskless people and thought “Is that Texas?” But then remembered that New Zealand is still living in 2019.
Beautiful landscapes and I dig that back ground song in the video.
Olympics - I was very entertained by all the races, though perhaps now that I know a lot of the runners I guess it gets more interesting.
Kipchoge was a man on a mission yesterday, super ballsy to run 14:28 5k in that weather from 30-35k.
Coincidentally that was the same strategy he used in the Rio Olympics marathon race, only that at the time 2 runners managed to follow him for a bit.
This time he left a carnage behind.
me - I won't bother posting my weekly, suffice to say this has been a rough week.
My current leading theory on the root cause was food poisoning. I hadn't thought about it before because I didn't have diarrhoea, but honestly that is a bless cause your body expels the bad spirits out. In my case it tuck in my tummy and I got blocked for 3 days. It was Thursday when I finally managed to expel it and I started feeling better a couple of hours later.
On Friday we took a 6 hour flight from Sao Paulo to Bogota in Colombia. Bogota is at 8500 feet almost 2600m above sea level.
Speaking of that, I immediately noticed on yesterday's run that my heart rate was higher for the same pace and had to slow down a bit
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
I forgot to mention, but the Brazilian media was going bonkers with the possibility of breaking the medal record and taking over 12th position from New Zealand. It's also funny to think by losing to the US in Women's Volleyball, Brazil helped the US finally take the 1st spot at the medal standings from China.
Hot Weather Complainer
Mark - Nice race and congratulations on the podium and the cheque. That race looks a lot like Queenstown. It must be pretty cold down there at the moment. It just started snowing in the CBD in Christchurch. I know it doesn't pass the JMac test, but I'm really over winter this year even though it's normally my happy place temperature wise. Maybe it's because last year I was at home most of winter and didn't run in the dark until winter was almost over. And the year before I had an injury for most of winter so it's been a while since I've had a full winter of training. Just a bit more light and slightly warmer (but not too warm) would be great.
piwi - All I can think when I look at that picture is it looks way too hot to race.
James - Nice week and good progress on the speed work.
Flavio - Hopefully you've worked out the issue now and gotten to the bottom of it, so to speak. A down week may help you in the long run (pun intended).
zebano - Solid week. Your Strava runs always suggest brutal, Tokyo type conditions.
me - Solid week mileage wise and had a good workout on Wednesday. My long run workout on Saturday was a bust. When I hit my target half marathon pace on tired legs, I'm really struggling. It was a tough workout (8km @ 4:30/km, 4km @ 4:15/km, 2km @ 4:05/km) but I should be able to handle that. 4:30 feels really easy, then 4:15 suddenly feels impossible to sustain. I looked for reasons/excuses but there aren't many. The 8km @ 4:30/km was straight into the wind which may have taken a toll but I turned around at that point so the tail wind should have made it easier. I donated blood during the week but that was way back on Tuesday and didn't impact my Wednesday workout. I exchanged messages with my coach last night and he thinks it's probably just stress related from all the recent personal trials I've had. Hopefully I can get a confidence boost this week I expect he will make it a lower volume week with a focus on quality.
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
Mother of Cats
James - are the glutes pain? Or is it that good sign of productive soreness? I've always thought that if both glutes are hurting you're doing something right....
Marky_Mark - thanks for the video. That was fun to watch also just to get a sense of what it's like to run a race in New Zealand.
Piwi - really solid week for you. And is that August 5 run your normal easy run HR? Love the picture!
Zebano - I am curious to see what you can run for an 800 with another try (and spikes).
Flavio - crazy week for you. I am so glad that your health is overall OK, but I hope things improve.
Steve - I can't believe that donating blood wouldn't affect your running. Even relatively mild blood loss from a PRP draw (about a 1/3rd of what you donate) sets me back for a week+.
Kipchoge's race was unearthly. I don't think I've ever seen anything so transcendant - not even Wanjiru in Beijing.
My week:
60 miles running, 3 hours pool-running, and 1000 yards swimming.M: 5 miles very easy on treadmill (9:51), 1 hour pool-running, and upper body weights/core.T: 12 miles, including a track workout of 2x1600, 2x800, 2x400, Splits were 6:38, 6:29, 3:04, 3:03, 88, and 86. 5:00 recoveries after the 1600s, 3:00 recovery in between the 800s; full recovery for 400s. Followed with leg strengthwork and 500 yards recovery swimming.W: 10 miles easy on treadmill (9:53) followed by streaming yoga.Th: 2 hours pool-running and upper body weights/core.Fr: 12.5 miles including a tempo workout of 4 miles, 3 miles in 29:08 (7:19 pace) and 21:58 (7:19 pace) with 1 mile easy and a water break in between. Then did leg strengthwork and 500 yards recovery swimming.Sa: 10 miles easy on treadmill (9:46) followed by streaming yoga.Su: 10.5 miles, including 7 miles very easy (9:23) and then four 60-70 second hills with full recovery, plus drills, two strides, and injury prevention work.
I was watching Olympic showjumping this week live - hence the treadmill runs.
If you're wondering about Friday's workout, a friend had a workout of 4-3-2-1 miles at her goal marathon pace on tap. So I ran the 4 and the 3 with her. The paces ended up being faster than my current marathon fitness in the weather we had that day, but since I was just doing the 4 and the 3, I didn't care too much - I just considered it an extended slightly slower tempo workout.
I also started a new med for my Ulcerative Colitis on Wednesday that should reduce inflammation in my large intestine (which should hopefully improve fatigue and help my body absorb nutrients). The medication is actually a slightly different version of a medication that I tried earlier - I had some mild weakness/fatigue issues with that first medication. However - that side effect seemed to last only about 18 hours or so, and I had to take that medication at bed time. This one I can take in the morning, so I'm taking it right after I finish running each morning, in hopes that the side effects will not affect the next morning's run.
So far, I feel pretty good on it, and even slightly better than before. So maybe this will work out.
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.