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

Mark - Great win, and way to negative split it (and crush the final hill)

mrakers - running with kids is the best. My 12 y.o. signed up for a triathlon with me and I think we've chatted more in the 3 two mile runs he's done than we have sitting in the car commuting (no cell phone distraction is wonderful). Now my twins are begging to run too, it's wonderful.

Elizabeth, that's crazy that you only hurl after halves. I only hurl after 5ks but when I start redlining at any distance my stomach starts getting really queasy.

I've had a couple of disappointing weeks volume wise due to a combination of parenting, job, and sickness. This actually ended up giving me a taper for what was supposed to be a C-race but two ~twenty mile weeks is ultimately a bit disappointing. Thankfully the race was a blast.

Psycho Wyco 10 mile Trail Race --

First off this is was in Kansas City and you may think there are no hills there but I've seen watches with Barometric Altimeters give it anything from 1100 feet to 1400 feet of gain per loop. It's also 95% trail to the point where you're either watching your feet, changing directions or trying to convince yourself that yes, it's safe to fly down this embankment, no you won't die as you can grab hold of that tree and swing around to stay on the trail =). It's simply a blast.

Lining up at the start I had absolutely no idea where my fitness was as I've not had any true long runs since December.  Mostly I've just been cross training a lot, capping runs at an hour and doing 20 minute tempos once a week. My mantra was "mile 1 under control". Frankly I was both shocked and dissapointed at the start, there was the usual crew of people going out too fast who I knew wouldn't last but trail conditions were superb this year so the initial 2.5 miles of (uphill) bridle trail which is full of rocks was still wide enough to pass people. I had exactly 2 people pass me and probably passed 12-15. After the first aid station we hit my favorite section of the course which is singletrac with tons of switchbacks that descends the hill and then comes back up to the other side of the aid station. I did my best to lean into the turns and stay light on my feet but there are exactly two places on this course where you can open up your stride for any length of time and one of them was the .25 miles at the very start.

I exited the triangle with my legs feeling really strong and a slight tingle in my right calf and told myself it was important to keep the effort up. I ran some more bridle trail and exited onto some grass by the damn where unfortunately the wind was rough and when you get off the grass, you ascend for the better part of a mile with not one but two false summits. Thankfully I'd run this before and was prepared for that. Once you're back on the trails, you get about .2 miles of slight downhill which is your last opportunity to open up your stride and go. There's a also a photographer there and thankfully my race face wasn't too horrendous. From there there's a couple downhill segments that are notorious for having broken people's legs in the past so while I didn't go slow, I was a bit cautious descending. I do recall that last year I slid down on my butt because it was so incredibly muddy that my shoe screws were useless. After that more singletrac... but much much steeper uphills than earlier in the course. Thankfully the 50k leader came flying by on his second loop as he obliterated the course record and I latched on to get my effort back up to where it needed to be. As he pulled away despite my efforts, I started chasing down the two guys that had passed me early in the course and one of the young guns in my club!

After reeling in all three I kept getting glimpes of one more club mate and got about 10 steps behind him, yelled "I'm coming for you!" and promptly my calf began cramping. I did just enough to keep moving at a reasonable speed after that but I was unable to catch him and had to power hike two of the final hills known as the 3 sisters. I finished 11th overall, 10:30 faster than last year and really pleased with how strong I felt despite a rough couple of months.

I think the combination of heavy deadlifts, squats, tempo runs and lots of aerobic cross training buoyed me through my foot injury. Now I have to decide how aggressively to rebuild weekly mileage but I signed up for a mile road race in April so I'm going to play the recovery by ear, then start doing introducing some quality work. I really want to keep doing my 20 minute tempo runs because I think they've helped a ton but I've totally neglected VO2 work, mile paced work and hill sprints since November.

I'm going to make a bunch of process goals as I find those are much more useful than just saying "I want to PR in the mile" or I want to run sub 5. My only question is will I continue to train like a triathlete or will I dive back into running 100% of the time.

Brewing I can confirm pro surfers do now take fitness seriously with lots of cross training and diet scrutiny. The old days of just turning up to surf are long gone. Kelly Slater at 48 is living proof of healthy living enabling him to still compete at the highest level.

Steve I may fire up a bit in winter when I have nothing else to do 

We have a City to surf here too. It's about a 11k. It was my first ever race in 2010. I averaged about 4.30/km and my 12 yr old beat me.

Mark I haven't met Wilde yet but hes part of Kirkwoods crew. I've heard he loves racing and pushing hard in races. Hes won some of the shorter world tri events the ones with short legs of 2 x swim/bike/runs.

For those that don't know Christchurch - the Ferrymead is the start of the Christchurch Estuary.  Not many waves there, although you can windsuft.

 

I hope you enjoyed my 2e+4E+2E run the other day.

 

You know, 90% of trolls are bad trolls, but you're a good troll.

Brew - you couldn't run at T pace because there were people on the path??? I know 2019 was the BOTT year, but come on!

Elizabeth - definitely make sure to taper properly into this thing, you have a great shot at a PR so don't go running some silly workout on Wednesday just because you recover well!

Steve - I gotta be honest: I think this is a bad plan. First, you've been putting all of your eggs in this one basket for about 6 months at this point. When it comes to racing anything shorter than a marathon, you want to be able to take multiple cracks at it. Maybe you feel you can't run multiple half marathons, but you should try to grab a 5K or 10K PR along the way. Mark does that a lot, and so do I.

Second, for your only race to be a "fun run" gives you an excuse just to start bailing when the going gets tough 75% of the way in. Yes, there may be some fast people in it, but if you go in with a different mindset, you're setting yourself up for failure.

Third, remember what Darkwave said about learning how to race, especially knowing how to answer those difficult questions that pop up mid race. If you don't really race multiple times, you just don't know how to do that.

For a race that is 12 weeks away, I would race a minimum of twice before then, if not three times. You are not sacrificing your training by doing so: in fact, consider practicing racing a key component of your training. It's a mistake I made for a couple of years by thinking that running races was going to hurt training (since you taper in/out of the race), but the fact of the matter is you both learn how to race AND still stimulate key systems while racing. It's not a waste of a day fitness wise.

Zebano - nice little trolling of your club mate. Thank you for the report!

Piwi - although I love you being here, it does increase the risk of this returning this thread to the reality show known as "Keeping up with the (Steve) Joneses"

 

You know, 90% of trolls are bad trolls, but you're a good troll.

 

Brew - you couldn't run at T pace because there were people on the path??? I know 2019 was the BOTT year, but come on!

 

Imagine the whole family (mom, dad, dog, grandma and grandpa, plus the baby in the stroller) out for a walk on a multi use path and someone needs to tie their shoe so they block the whole path ignoring me coming from behind (even when part of their party looks directly at me and does nothing) and the family riding bikes from the other direction. Add in dog walkers with the stupid "extendo retracato" leashes (that aren't EVER locked) and the the old married couple just out for their usual walk and make it happen every 1,000m on a 3 mile loop all because "it's such a nice day out we should go for a walk." Now tell me you want to do some 6x1T in it, or just do T work the next day when everyone is back at work and things are back to normal. You East Coast people have it easy with your designated areas of recreation, and public 1 mile races on unclosed roads. It's wild out West. Also, I REALLY had to poop, and again didn't have the workout scheduled, or thought of, and I already did TWO workouts incorrectly I figured I should know what I'm doing before I do it.

You actually said to start doing more Interval work, correct? For the April half I'm thinking1:26x could be possible if the last 6x5 min T wasn't too bad. VO2 Max, aerobic power, VDOT 54 so 4:25 for the 1,200 with a 3 minute rest. Sounds like a workout to do on a day that doesn't suck. oh and you were spot on with your comment on the marathon thread. Less training, more finger pointing.

Flavio 7-8 minutes after the race isn't a big deal. I once (twice) suffered for over an hour IN a race. Chicago 2017 I pulled the plug at half, and Mt. Charleston April 2019 brought the suck for at LEAST the last hour trying for a BQ at 7:00/mi pace and coming home with a 3:05:22...plus walking after that specific race made me reevaluate how racing a marathon should feel.

Brew - You suffered for an hour in two separate marathons? Oh, the horror! I can match that in just a single marathon - please see Dallas 2019!

JMac - You're certainly right about the marathon thread. I miss sub-3:20.

I'm doing much better overall. My legs didn't feel too tight for my final workout this morning, and my back/neck was doing better as well - perhaps 75% after going to the chiro yesterday. I just got back from another appointment and feel even better now. Might do one more Thursday just for good measure. 
The only thing I'm not feeling good about now is the forecast - it's now supposed to be low 50's (11C) at the start to mid-60s by finish (17.7C) and the wind is now supposed to start at 14mph (22.5 km/h) and go up from there. That last part is really what I'm not happy about given about the middle half will be into the wind.
Aside from drafting there's nothing I can really do about the wind, so it is what it is. I'm freakin' pumped to race again - especially since I'm feeling really good overall right now.

 

Piwi - although I love you being here, it does increase the risk of this returning this thread to the reality show known as "Keeping up with the (Steve) Joneses"

Is that Nathan Jones’ cousin?

+1 to JMac re Steve racing some 5 and 10ks - it helps.