Sub 1:30 Half Marathon 2021 Edition (Read 448 times)

Running Problem


Problem Child

    Hopefully it will all be over soon.  Surely, post 20 January it will all stop?

     

    Wrong thread. Don't get this one locked for talking about "that which shall not be named." Next you'll be saying "When is Lord Voldermort coming back?"

    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

    SteveChCh


    Hot Weather Complainer

      darkwave - glad you're okay and I hope it stays that way.

       

      I know this is a place where politics isn't welcome so I'll be bipartisan and say that both sides are an abomination.  It amazes me that people think their team is any better than the other - the only time this is true is Black Caps supporters.

       

      watson - My running coach is a physio and we did what we could over zoom.  He thinks it's the medial ligament and can be managed but any increase in pain and the marathon is off.  I'm doing strength exercises for my core every day along with weight training 3 times a week.  Unfortunately, this is the worst time of year to try and see a physio in person - I have an appointment in 2 weeks but I hope it clears up in time not to need it.

       

      flavio - Yep, I'm doing strength training, although probably not to levels you'd approve of!  I think you're right about any planned volume increase and if I'm honest with myself, that reduces the marathon to 10-90 rather than 50-50.

       

      Might need to hold my breath and take my chances in Wellington.

       

      Also, great effort on the time trial.  Even if you didn't get the time you want, what you've learned is very valuable.  And you didn't give up at 3km when you knew it was a tough day so that might get you out of the Gaga challenge.

      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

      Marky_Mark_17


        Coming from simple little NZ, the 'post-truth' manner in which certain parties have chosen to respond to the US election is deeply disappointing, and the way it's incited violence is worrying and sad.  Particularly when the results were unambiguous and over 50 court cases challenging them have all been thrown out.  I mean, politicians from all sides try all sorts of dirty tricks to hold on to power but this is a new low for a so-called democracy.  What's that old quote - "power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely" or something like that?

         

        Anyway.

         

        DW - glad to hear you're safe.  Must have been a fairly unnerving experience though.

         

        Steve - I'll confess I'm giving some thought to running Wellington myself (the half, though, not the full).  Even in these Covid-disrupted times my tendency to plan races for the next 12 months is hard to overcome and it's probably the biggest race in the country that I haven't run.  The timing works quite well for a mid-winter race.  Nothing happening for me between 1 May and August, unless I decide to run the club XC season this year.

         

        Flavio - nice commitment, I would bet you were still a little bit drained from the earlier effort even though you may not have physically been feeling it.

         

        James - sounds like great progress on that extended treadmill effort.  Long may it continue!

        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: Maraetai HM, 10 Mar, DNF

        Up next: Waterfront HM, 7 Apr

        "CONSISTENCY IS KING"

        Mikkey


        Mmmm Bop

          Hopefully it will all be over soon.  Surely, post 20 January it will all stop?

           

          LOL

          5k - 17:53 (4/19)   10k - 37:53 (11/18)   Half - 1:23:18 (4/19)   Full - 2:50:43 (4/19)

          darkwave


          Mother of Cats

            So...(note that I am staying away from explicit discussions of the merits of political positions)....I do not suspect that things will return to calm on January 20.  I suspect that things will remain touchy for some time - possibly years.  The American people as a whole are divided and touchy, and DC is the logical place to go to express your anger.  I do suspect that the 18th-20th will be volatile, and I'll probably stock up on groceries the weekend before that as well.

             

            Semi-running related - they just put up a big fence around the Capitol.  Which is upsetting to some who used that area to meet up with other runners.  I used to do hill repeats on the north side of that hill - not sure if that would be allowed any more.

             

            A long time ago, one used to be able to jog up the Capitol stairs.  That all ended after September 11.

            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.

            SteveChCh


            Hot Weather Complainer

              Social media and mainstream media have been a big part of the extreme division we now see.  It's sad when in reality, I think 95% of people could interact positively in real life.  Also sad is Strava now contains political posts when it used to be the one place immune from it.

               

              Anyway back to RUNNING.  Slight step up to 7 x 2 mins jog with 1 min walk today and again negligible pain.  Even if I can't do a marathon in April, I feel very positive about this being a much shorter lay off than I originally feared.

               

              darkwave - I went for a run around DC in 2013 and was like a kid in a candy store, being a HUGE fan of the West Wing.  Running through and around some of the memorials and landmarks was a dream come true.  Very sad that some of that is being temporarily lost.

              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

                Steve good to hear you had some improvement. Just got back from putting my daughter on a plane to Christchurch. Wife was bawling her eyes out 

                 

                Darkwave thats some scary stuff. USA is such a huge place. Do you think it would be better if split into different countries like the USSR or would that be a bad idea ?

                Mikkey are you running much ? I'm not seeing much on Strava. My nephew in London got Covid but not too bad.

                 

                Just watched a Joe Rogan podcast on sleep and his guest Mathew Walker who is a scientist, said that there was a big correlation between sleep and injury in athletes.

                Athletes they studied who had 9 hours sleep versus those who got 5 hours sleep showed a linear increase in injuries to 60% more likely for the 5 hour sleepers.

                Something to do with lack of recovery of stabilizer muscles.

                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 "      

                 

                Marky_Mark_17


                  Piwi - that's really interesting and I can't say I'm surprised.  Your body can't recover properly if you're not getting enough sleep!

                   

                  Steve - if you don't hold your breath, the Wellington wind will knock it out of you anyway.

                   

                  I had a nice sleep in again this morning.  Looking forward to hitting the track hard tomorrow and a quality long run on Sunday.

                  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: Maraetai HM, 10 Mar, DNF

                  Up next: Waterfront HM, 7 Apr

                  "CONSISTENCY IS KING"

                  darkwave


                  Mother of Cats

                    Sleep: My understanding is that sleep is when your body heals.  In order to stay injury free, your body's healing has to keep pace with the stresses you place on it.  So makes total sense that sleep volume is coordinated with injury.

                     

                    Piwi - I have thought for a while that the US might have reached a point of unstability in terms of being just too large and diverse and not having enough in common.  When I travelled out to what is truly the middle of nowhere in Kansas (a ghost town called Collyer), I was struck by my conversations with others there.  Literally our lives were so different that they couldn't really understand all aspects of mine, nor I theirs.

                     

                    The problem, of course, is that there is no clear east/west or north/south way to split the country.  My life in DC has a lot more in common with someone in LA than with someone in central California.

                     

                    Our system where states have a great deal of independent governing power has given us the flexibility to survive this long.  But as history moves forward, there is more and more pressure for greater federal involvement (see our Covid response as an example) which may ultimately be what drives us apart.

                     

                    Steve - thanks for your comments about DC.  I'm a native Washingtonian (we're relatively rare, since it's so transient) and I've always loved my city - both the Federal parts and the nitty gritty parts (we were actually one of the country's hotbeds for electronic music in the early 2000s, for example, and it's impossible to listen to our native "Go-Go" music without dancing in place)  I'll take it for granted many times, and then I'll step out of the bathroom at the Lincoln Monument, get a glimpse of the sun rising over the National Mall, and fall in love all over again.

                    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.

                    flavio80


                    Intl. correspondent

                      James - You’re ready for a half marathon then, just make sure you run it under 90 minutes Big grin

                       

                      Mick - simple is beautiful.

                      Step 1 - run a 5k time trial. Don’t worry about the time, whatever it is. It’s a baseline so you know which pace to run the workouts.

                      Over the next 6 weeks on Tuesdays alternate either 6x800 at 5k pace, or run incrementally longer hill sprints. Start with 10x30s and make your way to 10x60s. These are much harder than they sound.

                      On Thursdays run some tempos at projected HM pace. To calculate HM pace use 5K pace per km + 24 seconds. If you run the 5k in 22 minutes (4:24/km) then run the tempos around 4:50.

                      On Sunday a shortish long run 14 to 18 km. Fill the rest of the week as you can.

                      After 6 weeks of training, you will have run a tempo run on Thursday, then on Sunday a shorter long run like 12km.

                      On Tuesday instead of the 5k paced normal workout, do a race sharpening workout like 4x400 at 5k pace.

                      On Thursday another race sharpening workout like 4x200 at 5k pace.

                      Take the Saturday off.

                      On Sunday turn on the jets, start at the same pace as the last 5k time trial, if feeling good at 3k up the pace.

                       

                      Take the next week easy to recover.

                       

                      Rinse and repeat.

                       

                      Darkwave - Mobs are scary stuff. I once got on the bus with a blue t-shirt near a local soccer stadium. On the next stop a gang of 30 supporters came onboard, all o them drunk, all of them for the “Red” team.

                      And I had a blue t-shirt. I think I didn’t get beat up because there was a pregnant woman next to me who was sort of a “social” shield as they’d have to hit her to get to me. But I did hear all sorts of abuse and they hit my window with stones and spits as they left the bus.

                      In the end I had to wait until the end of the line, then pay another ticket and wait for the bus to come back to where I wanted to drop off.

                       

                      Steve - No I'm on the same level, 3 times a week 20-30 minutes tops. Mark is the one who's deadlifting 150kg for fun.

                      PRs: 1500 4:54.1 2019 - 5K 17:53 2023 - 10K 37:55 2023 - HM 1:21:59 2021

                      Up next: no idea

                      Tool to generate Strava weekly

                      zebano


                        Wow this thread got busy!

                         

                         

                        Mick  That whole era was pretty bad with steroids. One of my first big memories of baseball was the '87 Twins winning the World Series. Apparently that team (as well as Puckett and Hrbek) went from basically the bottom of the league in HR / year to tops. Oh well. I kind of just expect pro athletes these days to be juicing. Do you do any XC skiing or just downhill? I've been considering picking up some skiis for crosstraining but my effective window for that is usually only 7 or 8 weeks tops which makes it a questionable investment.

                         

                        Sleeping - I love my sleep but I'm a morning person. I wake up between 5 and 5:30 pretty naturally unless I'm exhausted. If I didn't have kids and a wife I'd be asleep at 8:30 which some fancy actuarial math will tell you is 8.5-9.0 hours of sleep/night. I'm a much more simple guy with only a BA in mathematics and a BS in Comp Sci. FWIW I love my mornings but not for running. Take it easy, have some coffee, check email. clean the house and relax (shrug).

                         

                         

                        Flavio  Wow, you're a crazy man with another 5k attempt! Question for the board because you felt "light and bouncy" how often does good feeling legs translate to a good race (and vice versa)? A couple of my best 5ks I've had legs that felt awful during warmups.  I hadn't realized how long you've been bumping up against that 18 minute barrier although it does help explain how you went from no running during quarantine to super fast really quickly. Have you met any fast local runners that could pace you? You're close enough that I think just slightly better conditions (and following someone qualifies) might push you through. That breakfast sounds amazing!

                         

                        James  great news on the hammy!

                         

                        DW  Glad you're safe. The treadmill is probably a really good investment.

                         

                        Steve tough break, push the strength training to Flavio approved levels. As a guy who has seen 5 different physios, what amazes me is that while they make think the source of the injury is different than another PT, they all seem to recommend  similar exercises.

                         

                        Piwi  Awesome info about the sleep study, thanks. Now I don't have to listen to Rogan (who has interesting guests but his podcasts are usually 50% too long)

                        1600 - 5:23 (2018), 5k - 19:33 (2018), 10k - 41:20 (2021), half - 1:38:57 (2018), Marathon - 3:37:17 (2018)

                          Zebano I ended up watching the whole podcast on sleep. It was about 2 hours but very interesting. Apparently 1 in 2 Americans don't get enough sleep. I know I don't sleep well when I have a work stress situation or any stress for that matter.

                          I watch alot of sports but haven't got addicted to baseball or NFL yet. If they had Kiwis playing at top level I probably would like I do with Steven Adam's and the NBA.

                          The fights in baseball seem alot more legit than the light pushing in the NBA. Although back in the 80s and 90s the NBA fights were more authentic 

                           

                          Flavio I might have to copy paste your 5k training advice 

                          The 5k pace plus 24 secs sounds very accurate and would put my half pace at 4.04/km which i ran a tempo in last week. I sometimes run them faster but they are more like a 10k effort.

                          That bus story is very scary. Humans always divide themselves. Its like some primitive tribe thing they have to do. Let's face it, its men that behave like this. I see it even in surfing. Shortboard versus longboard  versus stand up paddle etc.

                          Even when my son used to play soccer it got nasty between parents of opposing teams.

                          When I was about 18 I had to drive our workvan through an angry mob of Timber mill workers on strike. This is when Unions held alot of power. We were installing a security system at the site. They were bashing against the van and yelling. It was pretty scary.

                          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 "      

                           

                          Marky_Mark_17


                            Steve - No I'm on the same level, 3 times a week 20-30 minutes tops. Mark is the one who's deadlifting 150kg for fun.

                             

                            Not any more!  I haven't lifted heavy like that in a long time as it smashed my legs for running the next day.  I normally do about a third of that now.

                            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: Maraetai HM, 10 Mar, DNF

                            Up next: Waterfront HM, 7 Apr

                            "CONSISTENCY IS KING"

                              some good weeks around here! I have been trying to get back running 5 times a week. Flavio, I like your suggestion of shorter sharper tests. I might take the opportunity since there is no real race around here. Normally I would do a marathon in may and a half in September. This year the half is in may and the full is in September, so I have some hope.

                               

                              Piwi, my diet is not great. I am not going everyday to http://www.thisismikeys.com/ as flavio seems to suggest. But since in lockdown I am cooking everyday, baking bread or pizza twice a week (with a sourdough we sstarted in March) and mostly, I am super busy at work and don't sleep enough hours.

                               

                              I guess the combination of stress, little sleep, and less running had the impact on my weight. I am not surprised, I know this is my achilles heel, it has always been. Hopefully I will manage to get back on track and will have a few good runs in my tank. For now, today I managed to get a 10 miles in the books, and I am feeling ok.

                               

                              I may try Flavio's simple plan for 5K trials Wink

                               

                              have a great weekend

                              PRs since re-started in 2013:

                              5km: 19:43 (Belfast park run Sep-16) | 10km: 40:16 (Belfast Lagan side 10K Sep-18) 

                              HM: 1:30:09 (Belfast city Half Marathon, September-18) | FM: 3:25:05 (official chip time Belfast city Marathon, May-19, marathon was 0.3/4 longer, original time 3:27:20 for 26.5/6...)

                               

                              Upcoming races:  

                              ???

                                Zebano I was surprised how long steroids played a role in Baseball. I have played a little myself; and our star pitcher was invited to a try out in Miami, at the tender age of 18. He said he got there and all guys his age were bulls, so obviously pumped up. He had no chance. Played a few years in the German National Team and in Canada and then returned - he had no chance to make it in a big team being clean.

                                 

                                Flavio: did a 5k test run - I was pumping hard - roughly 4:30min/km average. Will follow your 5k work out plan!

                                 

                                I don't recall who asked on the cross-country - I do cross country, touring and simple down hill. My week is actually done, 6 runs, mostly slow jogs, 50km. I will go skiing tomorrow!

                                HM: 1:47 (9/20) I FM: 3:53:11 (9/23)

                                 

                                2024 Goals: run a FM & HM + stay healthy!