Sub 1:30 Half Marathon in 2020 (Read 618 times)

Piwi - Yeah, I had heard about Kibiwott Kandie because I watched this race live and it had an incredible finish between Kandie and Kiplimo.

When I read about the race in Letsrun I was stoked because some loaded dude decide to throw 6 million dollars in prize for the half and marathons that day.

The result was that we got to watch 3 super promising studs.

Kiplimo was 2nd on world’s cross country just behind Joshua Cheptegei, current WR holder for 5k and 10k (beating Kamworor, Rhonex Kipruto).

He then proceeded to become world half champion beating Kandie and Cheptegei earlier this year.

Kandie is a super stud and beat Kiplimo at that race I mentioned above, was second on the world’s half marathon championship this year and now has just run 30 seconds under the previous WR.

And Rhonex is another super stud with tons of road records and a bronze medal at worlds in the 10000 last year.

These guys plus Cheptegei like to front run their races which is something that I greatly admire.

If these 4 are in shape by the Olympics next year, poor Sir Mo will have a tough day out there.

DW - nice race report as always. I’ve copied your idea of storing the race reports somewhere else, though in my case I keep them in a google drive.

It sounds like it was a tough course and you had a super fast time even though you say you’re not in top shape.

I've done some "surgeries" on my shoes in the past as well. In my case it always involves using a scissor to cut the upper material a bit in that part that is just above the beginning of the toes, to relieve pressure. Even though most Altras are high at that point, sometimes they're not as high to fit my feet which have a ridiculously high arch.

Mark - never heard of the HRV, got me interested but then I found out my watch only measures it with an external HRM, so I forgot about it again haha.

darkwave - Great race and nice RR.  No doubt you are in shape for a very fast time on a fast course.

I saw on Strava that CK has broken his record for yearly mileage, so I had a look at mine.  I suspected this was my best run of consistency but was still surprised that I passed my record a month ago.  Obviously I'm nowhere near CK but I'm on track to set my highest yearly volume by about 700km.  It does have me thinking though....WHERE ARE THE RESULTS

I saw on Strava that CK has broken his record for yearly mileage, so I had a look at mine.  I suspected this was my best run of consistency but was still surprised that I passed my record a month ago.  Obviously I'm nowhere near CK but I'm on track to set my highest yearly volume by about 700km.  It does have me thinking though....WHERE ARE THE RESULTS

I do think this is a timely reminder that it's not just about mileage, and slavishly chasing mileage targets is not necessarily going to make you a better runner.  Even with high volume in the legs from marathon training, I'm entirely unconvinced that if I'd run a HM in mid-late September it would've been a PB.  Slightly lower volume and higher intensity definitely worked better for me.

Amusingly, I passed my record annual mileage midway through the Mt. Maunganui HM 2 weeks ago - with over a month to spare.  Even with a week off I'd expect to be probably close to 300km up for the year if I get back into it OK, starting tomorrow.  It's highly likely this will end up being an all time record for me.

Our work Xmas party is this afternoon so tomorrow morning's run is likely to be very easy!  Hopefully it goes OK.

Flavio oh yeah of course Kiplimo won that half marathon champs. I forgot. He's the other Ugandan beast.

Steve/James/Mark nice job on your yearly totals.

I'm a little over 3000kms. I think that's about average for me since I dropped back in 2015.

Unfortunately my best years 2013 and 2014 were pre strava.

Mark enjoy the work party. You must be pushing 80kgs after a week off 

I've changed this week by running at 3.30pm each day which is the hottest time of day. Towards the end of the run I've been jumping in the sea for a cool off and then running the last 500m home barefoot.

I'm normally an early morning runner.

Sam Tanner cruised past me today. He's a sub 4 miler.

Wow, lots of people hitting new mileage marks! Congrats.

Mark regarding your assertion about running a little less and adding intensity.... isn't the ideal answer "both"? To paraphrase my reading of Hudson, and a few random online bits and pieces:

Base Phase: A true base phase wasn't just building up to X miles per week  but then you would also hold that mileage for a month or two (I think Lydiard took this to an extreme with 150 mile weeks).

Running Fitness Phase: Introduce quality and mileage may come down (10-20% depending on high you're starting). Phase 2 is all about  maximizing your LT and your VO2, maybe some running economy focused stuff as well if you want to be well rounded, this may take up to 16 weeks.

Race specific phase where you try to maintain your LT & VO2 but you do your hardest workouts of all and they're focused on holding a certain pace for basically race distance with minimal recoveries. 6xmile on 120 -> 90 -> 60 seconds rest for a 10k or 3x3mi for a half. This phase may take 4-8 weeks.

Peak / Race Phase - taper, reduced mileage, but maintain a little intensity so you arrive sharp and ready to race.

So after all that unnecessary typing I'm basically wondering, what if you had take the marathon mileage, for a couple months, then backed off and added intensity. Is that better than just going straight to whatever mileage + intensity you think is appropriate for your Half.

James how has the hammy been lately? Have you made any progress?

Piwi  it's not on strava, I'm afraid it didn't happen

Steve  - I'm with Piwi, we often plateau for long periods of time. Keep at it and you'll bust through.

Flavio I went to have a look at HR data and the cold has really made it unreliable lately so I had to look back further. My recollection is that a 20 min tempo definitely pushes the upper bounds of Threshold 166-181 for me but it looks like that happens my first quality run after injury or illness and then I settle down and subsequent Tempos are more under control (i.e. they start in the easy zone, quickly push to 155 or so and then take 5-10 minutes just to get to threshold and by the end I've average 162 or so but I haven't overrun the zone. The other way to look at that is that I maybe ran mine too easy, I'm just not sure. FWIW the only time I really nailed the pace zones was when I essentially did cruise intervals uphill, with float down recovery.

I'll just add that I love the RA shows HR min & max for each interval, that is much more useful than the average that strava displays.

Flavio - what sort of pace tempo?  That sounds a bit on the high side.  5K HR for me tends to start in the low 170's and get up to the mid-180's.  Marathon pace tempo's are generally in the low-160's, HMP high 160's.  I'd say if you were just nudging into your 5k zone at the end of a long-ish 20 min HMP tempo that's OK but you probably wouldn't want to go any higher than that.

Piwi - the work Xmas party was pretty cool.  We had a boat cruise out on the Hauraki gulf and got right up close to some of the America's cup boats practising.  They are pretty incredible to watch at speed.  The run this morning was a bit of a struggle after a week off and nursing a slight hangover, the fact we started at midday and finished around 8pm probably mitigated the worst of the damage though.  I was reminded why I avoid big nights these days though!

Zebano - I have never structured my training like that, have literally never had a specific base phase.  It's always tended to be shorter, more intense blocks of 6-10 weeks with a lot of quality.  That's generally worked well for me tbh but I'm weird like that.

flavio, zebano - That's how I'm feeling, like I am on the cusp of some great results.  I'm impatient though and now I have to wait...

Mark - I don't think the extra volume for me is the cause of my less than ideal results (not that you were necessarily saying that), but over training definitely has a huge impact, more than under training.  I've gradually built up though so I've never felt like I've been over-extending.

Also, great work on cashing in on the work Christmas Party in your second week!

10x400m was a stupid idea. Walked the 400m recovery because it made doing it in the section of walking path I had easier. Ended up about a 3 minute recovery between each 400m. The stupid part was aiming for the goal pace based off recent 5k PR Effort. Foolish me keeps taking JMac's advice and mixing it in with darkwave's pointers. I am glad they're over now, and with the weather sticking around 50F it's better than wishing I'd have taken advantage of weather.  It is a little odd to think CIM was SUPPOSED to be last weekend (classical great weather  year just like Boston 2020) and it's amazing to think Boston 2021 training should start in just a few weeks in a normal year.

Looking forward to 2021 at this point. I'm way off base from normal. I actually feel sore after workouts. Guess I'm going to need a fancy schmancy "ray gun" massage thing. Bought one on a Black Friday sale and it should be here by 2021.