Forums >Racing>2023 The Waltons: Racing & Training Thread
Hot Weather Complainer
Slight slowdown at 32km, now on track for 3:17
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 1:27:34
Selwyn Marathon June 2, 2024 DNF
Dunedin Half Marathon September 15, 2024
Slowing down a bit more but hanging in there. 3:19 is expected finish and if he keeps it around 3:20 given the pain he must be in would be amazing from here. If Watson did Keen’s mileage he’s sub 3.
5km to go
Woops, I was reading that wrong, assuming a 7:50 start for some reason. Actually on track for 3:19. Hanging on for dear life!
Edit: I've gone back and adjusted those expected finish times.
Finished in 3:21.05. Brilliant effort to hold it together in that last 10km. I think this is a trail course too so probably not the fastest.
Waltons ThreadLord
Watson - congrats on the race!
Steve - thanks for posting the updates.
5k 23:48.45 (3/22); 4M 31:26 (2/22); 5M 38:55 (11/23); 10k 49:24 (10/22); 10M 1:29:33 (2/24); Half 1:48:32 (10/22); Marathon 4:29:58 (11/23)Upcoming races: Scotch Plains 5k, 6/12; Firecracker 4-miler, 7/4
Nice work Watson. There is a lot of trail on that course and it is not the fastest.
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"
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It was a tough day from about 25km. It was a mix of road and trail, roughly 50/50, the trail was slower than expected. But what was worse was the wind which about 80% of the time was into the wind.
Hardest marathon course I have run.
A few people did very well, but a lot struggled.
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
Great effort watson. That sounds like a very tough day and you hung in there really well.
Watson - guessing it was a southerly? That would've been rough.
Steve - commented on the other thread but it is great to see you finally get a decent reward for all that hard work!
I had a pretty decent training week, helped by good weather. Tuesday was a big progression run, I haven't done one of those in a while. Started around MP and finished up around 5k effort. Final Xterra event of the series coming up next weekend and it looks to be the muddiest of the lot.
I'll post my race report here as I know some don't venture over to the other thread.
Canterbury Road Running Championships 10km
This is a build up race looking towards the Run Prix half marathon on September 24, but I'm still way more prepared than I've ever been for a 10km before, so I wanted to go for a PB + a sub 40. My 5km time of 18:52 points towards low 39s being possible but after a 30 minute LT test a month ago where I averaged 3:56/km, I thought it would be very close to 40. The course is fast, albeit with 8 180 degree turns. The out section of each lap has a slight false flat with a slight headwind but the course is on a road in a pretty thick forest so it's nicely sheltered. The race started at 3:30pm which meant a quiet day and long time to think but I did some study and the day went quite fast.
It's a 40 minute drive to the coast and I arrive at 2:30pm, head to the start/finish to enter then back to the car for a 20 minute warm up, then shoe change. I see my coach just before the start - he'll be in the front pack targeting 30:30. His training partner Oska is using it as a build up for the World Half marathon champs in Riga.
With 5 minutes to go I hit the button on my watch. With 2 minutes to go I notice it still hasn't connected, then with 15 seconds left I realise it's not going to. This is a spanner in the works, as I'm a notorious watch watcher. The gun goes and we're off and the first km my head is all over the place. Am I too fast, too slow? My effort feels solid and I feel comfortable so I'm mostly worried I'm too slow. I'm thinking that if I get my goal I won't have a record of it, and other similarly stupid thoughts. I go around the first turn and notice for the first time the return part of the leg is very slightly downhill. I'm behind a pack of old guys who may be doing the 5km or 7.5km (no idea why there's a 7.5km). Heading to the bottom turnaround we go past the start/finish and I see 8:50 on the clock and then on the way back past it says 9:42 for a pace of 3:53/km. I'm feeling it more than I think I should be and work out I'm on sub 39 pace. It feels like I've gone out too fast so I ease off just a touch. The pack has moved about 10 metres ahead now and I try to get into a rhythm. My watch is still trying to connect and beeping at me. I figure if/when it does I'll just use it to confirm pacing. Back down to the end of the lap and go through in 19:31 for a lap time of 9:49. I've dropped back to 3:54/km and I'm still close to 39 pace. I'm hurting a bit and my brain doesn't help by working out I can drop to 4:06/km and still break 40.
I feel like the third lap is the key lap - if I can hold on until the last lap, I can hopefully see it home. I start passing people during this lap, the group has splintered but I gradually pass all of them and a couple of women. Back through the start/finish, the clock says 29:24 for a lap of 9:53. Even though each lap is slightly slower, I'm happy with how I'm holding on and still putting a significant gap between me and 40 minute pace. My watch comes online at about 6km and shows me holding steady at around 3:55/km, although it drops to 4:10 for 20 metres or so at each turnaround. I'm in a good headspace now, telling myself I'm in a position to get my goal but I still need to finish the job. The last time around the the top turnaround is a boost, I'm heading for home with the breeze behind me. I hold steady until I get around the bend and can see the start/finish in the distance. I'm next to a guy for around a km and with 1km to go I decide to lift it and really empty the tank. I'm breathing really hard, legs are hurting a bit but I'm giving it 100% to the finish line. Around the bottom turnaround then there's about 100 metres to go. "Oh my god, I've got it" goes through my head but I'm not easing off now. I go through the finish in 39:10 for a final lap of 9:46. Second in my age category.
It feels amazing, I'm still on such a high. It's nice to overcome the GPS issues which definitely impacted my race. I definitely didn't want my first lap to be the fastest but I didn't crash and it actually may have pushed me to a better time. If I'd hit 10 minutes as planned, would I have had enough to get those 18 seconds back later in the race? Who knows, who cares...
My coach (Andy) got dropped by Oska and Chris Dryden then got passed late to come in 4th. Oska was outkicked by Chris who won in 30:31. To be fair to both Andy and Oska, it was just a tune up race for them and they've been doing some epic training. Andy said afterwards he thinks low 1:27 or even 1:26.xx is possible in Melbourne. I'm not so sure about that but this is a big confidence boost and great reward after so much training for little reward.
The race forecast was a westerly, but it was definitely a factor so it was likely SWW or SW.
Steve - do you think no GPS really was a factor? I am terrible at watch looking, I have recently replaced lap pace with are pace for that reason.
The race forecast was a westerly, but it was definitely a factor so it was likely SWW or SW. Steve - do you think no GPS really was a factor? I am terrible at watch looking, I have recently replaced lap pace with are pace for that reason.
In the end, probably not. I think the only thing it would have changed is a slightly slower first lap, but I think I got the effort right. The main impact was in my head on the first lap.
Steve - Congratulations on the solid sub-40 and AG podium! Thanks for the race report.
Mark - Nice week of work. How do you prep for an extra muddy race?
Another good week for me. After a slow first 1,600, I hit the second two just fine on Tuesday. My RP and I nailed the pace run on Thursday (a bit too fast in mile 2, when he got me talking politics). Saturday was tough - very humid, and after my morning 8-miler I tied my record for slowest ParkRun. Today's run was good though; with lower humidity the hill climbing wasn't too bad. 50.3 miles / 80.9km / 9:00:30 for a bit of a step-back from last week.
This upcoming Sunday could be a landmark day for me. If all goes well, I'll complete my quest of running all the half marathons in NJ (excluding trail races and courses that cover the same ground more than twice). That will be 27 different and distinct races run over a period of 8 years, many of them no longer in existence (and no, if any new ones appear, I won't feel obligated to run them as I'm declaring the quest done). Since I'm in marathon training and because conditions aren't likely to be good (still summer and a late, 9:00am start), I'm going to treat it as a training run, but it will still be something of a celebration for me.
Steve, congratulations on a great race!
Mother of Cats
Watson - good job hanging on during a tough day and a very hard course. I would not want to run a marathon that was both road and trails.
Fredford - what a neat goal - good luck pulling it off this upcoming weekend.
****
54 miles, 1000 yards swimming, and 4 hours pool-running.M: 90 minutes pool-running and streaming yogaT: 12 miles, including a track workout of 8x800 in 3:35, 3:30, 3:31, 3:29, 3:26, 3:25, 3:26, 3:26, all with about 3 minutes recovery. Followed with leg strengthwork.W: 8 miles (9:54) including some grass running, drills, and strides, upper body weights/core, and then 3 miles (9:42) home.Th: 90 minutes pool-running and streaming yogaF: 12 miles, including an 8K tempo in 36:35 (7:18/7:19/7:18/7:23/7:17) and 500 yards recovery swimming.Sa: 19 miles, mostly very easy but with a fartlek of 10x2 minutes on/5 minutes jog in the second hour. Followed with 500 yards recovery swimming.Su: 1 hour pool-running.
It was fairly warm and humid this week, which affected my workouts, especially the Saturday long run, which I cut short by a mile when it got too hot for me (82 degrees with a dewpoint of 74 when I bailed - my fault for not starting the run earlier).
I'm six weeks out from Chicago at this point, and I'm feeling like I could run forever. At the same time, my legs are also feeling heavy. So I'm going to be pulling back on the mileage for the next few weeks (which really means pulling back on the average distance per run, as my weekly mileage can vary depending on when I do my pool-running days) to freshen up my legs so I can do some faster running.
I know that my strength takes a long time to go away once I have it, so I'm not that worried about maintaining mileage the last few weeks. But I do need to get my legs fresher and moving faster to be able to run the marathon faster, so that will be my focus for the balance of the cycle.
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.