Forums >Racing>Sub 1:30 Half Marathon in 2020
Darkwave - totally agree. I think 200m is a great distance for those - longer than 100m but not quite as brutal as a 400m effort.
James - I ran a 400m recovery for the mile repeats, and 200m recovery for the 200's. The sprint efforts tend to need more like a 1:1 recovery whereas the longer efforts need a bit less. Depending on the workout, sometimes I'll throw a longer recovery (say 1k) in between sets. Hope those sinuses are OK- that's never fun. The one thing that knocked me out for a bit last year was a sinus infection, and Keen has similar stories.
Flavio - I'm hoping that cold was inconsequential and you go out there and nail it!!
Me - a good week and the first 100km+ week of the year. Legs felt strong but still a little sluggish to start the week, but I finished the week with a good track session that I already mentioned, and a fun 29km long run this morning with a good group including Mark Boyce and Karen Donaldson-Barron who is one of the top female half-marathoners around Auckland. It was nice to have some company and a bit of running banter, makes the miles go by a lot quicker.
M: 15.4km easy
T: 16.8km with progressive intervals
W: day off due to work travel
T: 21km incl. 4 x 8 min @MP
F: weights, 5km recovery
S: 13.2km track session (2 x 1600, 4 x 200, 2 x 1600)
S: 29.1km long run
Total: 100.5km
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"
Intl. correspondent
Thanks all for the well wishes.
James - the race was pretty much the same experience as racing in Brazil. Same level of organization and same entry fee as well.
Extra work put into registration though as we need a medical certificate here.
Here's the full report from today's race.
SCANDICCI HALF MARATHON RACE REPORT
Final time: 1:23:30 new Half Marathon PR (previous 1:24:25)
39th OA
Training for the race has gone well with a few weeks disturbed with the move to Italy. I could see the coach decided to go with a few lighter workouts in the last few weeks as he was trying to in his words "It's better you get to race day undertrained than overtrained".
I did have a bout of a nasty cold back in December that put me on ice for 10 days, but otherwise the training went well.
I think I've done enough to claim the title of king of taper madness.
In my madness I thought it was a great idea to cut out bread and pizzas on the last week before the race to try to arrive a bit lighter. My body reacted violently but putting me in bed with a nasty cold that gave me chills and fever and had me looking at race calendars cause I was almost certain I would DNS.
Especially since I was putting so much effort into not catching a cold.
Without going into too much detail, in my personal life there's been a lot of loss recently, and also a lot of scares with both mom and dad being ill for a long time.
It all starts piling up on you and you try to find that small window of something that you can latch on and have hope. In my case it was this stubborn PR that was nearly 5 years old.
There was a lot of anxiety and pressure on myself riding on this one and I really needed a good showing today.
I was feeling really bad on Friday and started getting a little better on Saturday.
I tried to stay very hydrated and took cold medication.
Also, on Saturday evening instead of the traditional pasta I had the very excellent pizza napoletana. That was god sent and it sat very well on my stomach and gave me much needed energy.
I know in the US folks like to debate whether to go New York or Chicago style, guys, you don't know what you're talking about. Pizza Napoletana is where it's at.
There were pacers for 1h24. I figured if I tucked in I would work a lot less and have extra energy in the last kms and indeed that's exactly what happened.
It took me roughly 1km to reach them due to the chaos during the start but once I did I latched on the group and tried to avoid hitting others. The pacers had Swiss precision crossing half way in exactly 42 minutes and I think they crossed the line in exactly 84 minutes.
At one point I moved slightly to the left to catch a cup of water at the water station and unintentionally clipped the lead female who was running just behind me. Oops!
A few minutes later someone else clipped her I think cause she got mad and she and her personal pacer rushed ahead to get rid of the group.
I kept running with the group even if sometimes not running the perfect tangent as I figured it was worth it.
Running in the pack proved a good strategy as they had perfect cadence and also my GPS watch was going crazy.
I was feeling good up to about 16km when I started to go through a rough patch and losing concentration. At that point I said to myself: "do not dare drop from this pack". And I kept running behind the pacers like glue.
There was a big group initially which trimmed down to maybe 10 guys around km 19.
At that point I figured I was feeling too good and I would not leave the race leaving anything in the tank. I turned the jets on and suddenly I was running 3:45/km and passing a lot of people, including the lead female who was looking very strong.
And that is why we train so much. That feeling of invincibility will be with me and motivate me until the next race. I was sprinting to the finish line.
My younger brother recently did a series of blood tests and found out he had a low level of testosterone, which is one cause of slow recovery from exercise.
The doc prescribed some testosterone pills for him.
I think I might need one of those testosterone pills cause I felt like crying after crossing the finish line LOL
That was one good feeling, I even thanked the 3 pacers profusely and shook their hands.
After the race the organizers set up tables with fruits, tea, water and bread with Nutella. I was a happy camper going around that table.
The rest of the day was lunch and the train ride back.
I obviously had pizza again for lunch and once we arrived home I got to ingesting as many calories as I could. I even had a gel that came in the race bag and I couldn't risk having it during the race. 207 calories baby!
Lessons learned:
Pizza napoletana is the secret sauce to great half marathoning.
Taper madness causes real issues. I now understand Jmac, the previous king of taper madness.
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
Hot Weather Complainer
Congrats flavio! Outstanding race, and great job not letting the cold hold you back. Sounds like you may have a bit more gas in the tank...sub 1:20?
Sorry to hear about the struggles in your personal life. Running has kept me sane through a lot of things.
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
Dunedin Half Marathon September 15, 2024
Flavio - excellent. I thought you'd do well, but more like 1:25-1:28. I was not expecting a PR. All that strength / rehab work for your injuries has worked.
Mark - very nice week.
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
Flavio - YES!!!!!!!!!!!
Congratulations man. That is a lot to take off your PR especially given your race week dramas. Hard-earned with everything else that has been going on for you but that will just make it even more meaningful. Awesome finish too!
It's funny you talk about pizza as your new pre-race dinner. For me it's a burger and fries (I'll save the story for another time).
JamesD
Great, race, Flavio! Now you get to change your signature line. That feeling when you're finishing strong but exhausted is one to remember.
Don't think I 've ever heard of a half with pacers for 1:24. Only one of the ones around here has them for as fast as 1:30, and 1:40-1:45 is more common, but ours are smaller than the 4,000+ runners you had.
If I'm reading the race's website correctly, the race is shut down after 2-1/2 hours. The ones DW ran in Spain were like that too. It's not that way here - at my last half, 1/3 of the finishers were above 2:30, and the slowest people took close to 5 hours.
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
1:24 is an unusual pacer. I've had a couple of races with 1:25 pacers, but most have the quickest at 1:30. And the pacers are always divisible by 5 minutes.
A pretty solid week for me. I've been doing a lot of tempo work since mid-November and thought I was ahead of the game...not much Vo2 Max, so I'm now going to build that up a bit. Last Wednesday I did 3x(1,2,3) mins with 1 minute rest and suffered big time. Maybe I'm just getting used to the pain, or maybe I'm not in the shape I want to be yet. I usually find when autumn arrives everything seems much easier and that isn't far away now. Another warm week this week though with temps around 30C - glorious weather for everything except running.
Monday 70 mins easy pace - 14.32km @ 4:55 mins/km
Tuesday Weights
Wednesday 70 mins incl. 3x(1,2,3) Vo2 Max - 15.88km @ 4:41 mins/km
Thursday 70 mins recovery pace - 13.49km @ 5:21 mins/km
Friday Weights
Saturday 2 hours easy pace - 24.05km @ 5:02 mins/km
Sunday Weights + 30 mins recovery - 5.09km @ 6:10 mins/km
Total 72.83km (45.51 miles)
I feel like we need a sub 1:30 and PR celebration when they occur in this thread. Today is a double celebration thanks to flavio - I think today that may have to involve having pizza for lunch.
3 months til Masters
James-I'm pretty jealous of those temps. Hope the sinuses clear up.
Mark-I was looking in my logs (my paper copies that fill in many of the gaps RA). It was 2011 was the last time i ran a 200m interval. I think this is why i truely lack a 5k or mile gear. might have to bring them back after this marathon cycle as i try to ratchet up my speeds.
Flavio-Nice race report and great PR. I still can't get over the amount of stuff you need to do just to enter a race as a non elite in Italy. I wonder if a 1:24 half is a qualifier for something. Like the boston qualifiers in the US, i wonder if has some significance over there as it seems like an odd time as it has been pointed out above.
Steve-Flavio gets the pizza...you get another VO2 workout. :-)
My week. Happy with my Tempo on thurs which was pretty easy (relatively speaking). Had fun running a course preview for the Get in Gear Half I'll run in April since it is near my house. The elevation will be not great for times however. It goes up and down the two biggest hills within 5 miles of my house in the first 2/3 of the race.
83.5 on the week
2023 Goals
Marathon Sub 2:37 (CIM) 2:41:18
10k Sub 35:00 (Victory 10k 34:19)
5k Sub 16:00 (Hot Dash 5k in March (16:48), Brian Kraft in May (16:20), Twilight 5000 in July and August (16:20/16:25 Both heat index 102-103F)
Sub 1:16 Half Marathon City of Lakes Half Marathon 1:15:47)
Sub 56:30 in 10 mile (Twin Cities 10 mile, Canceled due to weather, 56:35 as a workout)
2024 Goals
Sub 2:37 Marathon
Sub 1:15 Half
Sub 34 10k
Sub 16 5k
DPS - at least you'll know what to expect with those hills!
Flavio/Watson - 1:24 is an unusual pacer. I've never seen anything below 1:30 (and generally they are in 5 or 10 minute blocks above that). But I can see some logic for it given that it's 4:00/km.
Steve - there's a lot to be said for short, hard intervals over summer. It's gotten humid again here the last few days and I'm kinda dreading the MP tempo I've got lined up for Thursday. Anyway another very solid week to add to your collection.
Mother of Cats
My week:
71 miles, 15 "miles" of pool-running, and 2000 yards of swimmingM: 6 miles very easy (9:17), upper body weights/core, 2 miles very easy (8:53), drills and four strides, and 6 "miles" pool-running. T: 12 miles, including track workout of 1600, 4x800 in 6:08, 2:57, 2:56, 2:56, 2:52. Recovery of about 5 minutes after the 1600, and around 2:30 between each 800. Followed with leg strengthwork and 750 yards recovery swimming.W: 8 miles very easy (9:12), yoga, 4 miles very easy (8:57), plus drills and four strides.Th: Upperbody weights, core, and 9 "miles" pool-running.F: 12 miles, including a track tempo of 6400m in 25:18 (6:24/6:19/6:22/6:13). Followed with leg strengthwork and 750 yards recovery swimming.Sa: 10 miles very easy (8:57), followed by drills/strides, upper body weights and core.Su: 16 miles progressive, split as first 5 averaging 8:44, next 5 averaging 7:19, last 6 averaging 6:38. Followed with lower body injury prevention work and 500 yards recovery swimming.
Two weeks out from the marathon; time to start pulling back on the volume.
***
Flavio - congrats - that has to feel good. I find myself intrigued by the fact there was 84 minute pacer - I don't think I've ever heard of such before. I would assume that would mean this was a very large competitive race. And then you said the lead female was running around that pace, which would point to it being a small race. So I am confused.
I hope your personal life stresses ease soon.
Marky_Mark - that is a LOT of intensity crammed into that week. Clearly it works for you; I'd be broken.
Steve - I think 1 minute recoveries can be ridiculously short in hot weather.
DPS - perhaps you could lobby for a change in courses ? Nice week; I'd be very happy with that tempo workout.
Pre-race meals. I always go with Chipotle - for those of you outside the US, it's a chain of fast casual restaurants serving a variation on tex-mex using minimally processed foods. Because of my GI/autoimmune issues, I have to be very careful what I eat before races so I don't have major issues; Chipotle is reliably safe for me, and found nearly everywhere in the US. They also have a few restaurants in London and Frankfurt, making those marathons options for me as well
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.
Congrats Flavio that was a stunning race and report. To feel so strong in the last 1/4 is a great feeling and then the emotion after the finish is hard to hold back. It doesn't make you less of a man you big cry baby
1.24 is a good barrier like sub 20 5k and sub 40 10k.
I just ordered another pair of the New Balance Zante pursuits $100 delivered from New Balance direct. I have no idea how much mileage is on my others but one pair is getting a bit flat.
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 "
Maybe 1:24 was the woman's course record?
The NB Zante Pursuit is a good shoe. I find the 6mm drop to be on the lower end of what I like.
dpschumacher - ha, I suppose that is fair.
Mark, darkwave: Yeah I find the intense intervals to be really hard work - I guess it's as close as I get to racing in the heat. I did consider lengthening the recovery intervals but I read a comment a month or 2 ago that you're better off keeping the same recovery and if the pace slips, so be it? It seems like a good way to learn how to take the pain.
flavio - Had another look at your stats on Strava, you've absolutely smashed that race. Heart rate well under control and getting faster and faster the longer it went on. Soak in the feeling! My last PR, some 4 years ago, felt magnificent for months.
watson - good to see improvements in your hamstring. Do you have a plan for returning to running?
Piwi- I'm running in the new balance propels if you want something light and responsive with lots of cushion. I am a zante fan too and have some I'll bust out when the weather improves.