Forums >Racing>Sub 1:30 Half Marathon in 2019
Marco - really nice week.
Flavio, CFarr and Keen - nice weeks.
Mick - 40-50km is way better than zero.
James - six weeks is too far out to settle on what pace to aim for.
DJ - nice race, you did win it! Can you post the Strava link? Sometimes you get terrible conditions and you just have to deal with it, and you still managed sub 4 minutes per km. My only ever race win was a tiny race in huge winds (ran 1:38/1:39 for the half).
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
RIP Milkman
Mark,Watson,Flavio,James - All good weeks
Corey - not a hernia right?
Paces - Agreed that slower people often run faster. All my friends who are casual runners do 3 miles runs near race pace all the time. It's hard to convince them that it's not helping. They always say they hate running and I tell them I would hate it too if I was running race pace all the time!
DJ - Sorry about your race! Guess that's what we get for trying to race in the winter.
Weather - If you Kiwis couldn't tell, weather this past weekend was ridiculous in the US. Saturday was a big storm in the northeast, and then Sunday was the worst running conditions in a long time - 15F with winds over 40 mph here. Life threatening type conditions if you weren't covered up properly.
5K: 16:37 (11/20) | 10K: 34:49 (10/19) | HM: 1:14:57 (5/22) | FM: 2:36:31 (12/19)
Mmmm Bop
I wanted to throw a bit more salt on the discussion regarding Mark's paces. The running group has a Whatsapp group (as does every possible group around these parts) and yesterday everybody was posting their long runs (pictures of garmin watches, etc). Well, guess what, 100% of the guys as fast as Mark also run fast paces (from our point of view) throughout the week, just like him.
I wanted to throw a bit more salt on the discussion regarding Mark's paces.
The running group has a Whatsapp group (as does every possible group around these parts) and yesterday everybody was posting their long runs (pictures of garmin watches, etc). Well, guess what, 100% of the guys as fast as Mark also run fast paces (from our point of view) throughout the week, just like him.
Are these guys training for a marathon or shorter distances like Marky? I’m no expert on 5/10ks, but I was surprised that I got under 38min on a short cycle of low mileage and mostly moderate/fast paces...but there’s no way I could’ve run a Sub 3 marathon. OTOH when I’m in marathon training I would struggle to break 38min in a 10k tune-up race...but would comfortable run a Sub 3 marathon.
Marky - Are you familiar with Renato Canova’s principles? I was re-reading this link that I’d saved a while back and thought of you! I’m tempted to go down that road this cycle. https://www.runnersworld.com/advanced/a20838198/canova-101/
5k - 17:53 (4/19) 10k - 37:53 (11/18) Half - 1:23:18 (4/19) Full - 2:50:43 (4/19)
Mikkey - I wasn't familiar, that was an interesting read, thanks. Judging from some of the Robertson twins posts, they are following something pretty similar (they're a couple of Kiwi distance runners who moved to Kenya to train) as they do some brutally long tempo runs. I can see the logic behind it but I'm a little surprised by the (relatively slow) track workouts. I guess if you're running long tempo blocks maybe you just don't need to boost around the track for 400m at a time.
Ironically, my coach has thrown in a pretty tough workout on Sunday (3 x 15 min @ HMP / 5 min easy) so maybe she's working to a similar theory?
JMac - yeah as much as we joke / complain about weather, it's pretty rare to get life-threatening storms here. Seems like you average at least one each winter over there lately, if not more.
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"
Are these guys training for a marathon or shorter distances like Marky? I’m no expert on 5/10ks, but I was surprised that I got under 38min on a short cycle of low mileage and mostly moderate/fast paces...but there’s no way I could’ve run a Sub 3 marathon. OTOH when I’m in marathon training I would struggle to break 38min in a 10k tune-up race...but would comfortable run a Sub 3 marathon. Marky - Are you familiar with Renato Canova’s principles? I was re-reading this link that I’d saved a while back and thought of you! I’m tempted to go down that road this cycle. https://www.runnersworld.com/advanced/a20838198/canova-101/
Sorry to barge in here, but I've been waiting to see where Mikkey went (found him!). I didn't go too far back to see what was said re: Mark's paces, but I thought I'd chime in based on Flavio's quote and what Mikkey was saying, even though my input is likely not worth much. I'm convinced that running your easy days faster can make you faster. And conversely, slowing those easy days down won't, by itself, make you faster. But the positive effect of running easy days faster on your overall speed is minimum, when compared to your workouts, overall mileage, and consistency. Running your easy days slower usually allows you to run your workouts harder, run more mileage, and remain injury free, which has a much greater chance of enhancing your speed when compared to running easy days faster. And that's why it makes sense to run slower on non-workout days.
Mark already runs hard workouts, good mileage year after year, and has remained relatively injury free. He also continues to progress with how he's doing things. Maybe if he plateaus and wants to continue to improve he'll want to explore other routes. He may need to run harder workouts/more mileage.At that point it might make sense to slow down a bit. But until then, it seems to be doing fine. I also wouldn't suggest to most others to speed up their easy days, since that will have a relatively small overall impact on your speed, and greatly increase the odds of sustaining injury.
Also, regarding the whatsapp group, I also run with a few guys that run almost everything fast. They're way faster at 5k's/10k's, considerably faster at halves, and only slightly faster at full marathons. And my half and under times are faster than what you would expect based on my full (1:19/2:57). So their's are really out of whack. Like Mikkey says, it would be interesting to see what those guys are training for.
Mikkey, thanks for the article. I've never really understood the idea of jogging a log run. Whether I'm training for a half or a full, I prefer to try to do the bulk of the miles at around race pace plus 10s or so (or if the weather sucks, just under race pace effort). At the same time, most of my other days are quite a bit slower except for another day that's a workout. Nice to know there's some support for parts of that method.
Upcoming races: Boston
Andres/Marky - I thought Canova principles was well known in the marathon world and I’m glad you both liked the link. 👍
Andres - Great half on Sunday btw. 👍
Jogger
I HAVE BEEN SUMMONED. HERE I AM.
Mile 5:24 3k 11:01 5k 19:01 10k 38:34 hm 1:26:57 fm 3:02:33
Mark I follow Aaron Pulford on strava. He is currently in Kenya training with the Robertsons. Im seeing some runs of 4.45/km to 5.15/km but they are also part of double days. He also ran a 40km run at 3.40/km. The MacDonald twins Kyle and Iain who live here and are about your age train at similar paces to you around 4.15/km on easy days. They are both pretty fast.
Jmac speaking of failed forum encounters, Jason Lufkin came to NZ and to my town and ran to within 2kms of my house but we failed to get together for a run
Mikkey your training is looking good. Your MP run was excellent for so early in the cycle. In all honesty Im going to struggle to get near 3 hours. I know what base I need and Im well short. Just have that beer waiting for me at the finish
My training paces are so slow right now due to increase in mileage and legs that are achy in many different areas. My daily runs start at near 6 mins/km and it takes about 5kms before I start to warm up. It should feel like Im barely running at that pace but it actually still feels like effort. Next week I have a tempo run so will try and smash out some sub 4 min/kms to prove the train slow theory still works.
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 "
Sam that was fast good to hear from you. We got Brent here and DJW. How is the running going ?
Mikkey - I'm sure the Canova principles are well known, I'm still just a relative newbie when it comes to some of the more structured training programmes!
Andres - Hey good to see you over here as well! I've progressively increased the mileage over the last year (my 365-day rolling mileage, as of today, is actually at an all-time high) and I think the next thing for me will be to really start hammering some of the workouts. There's been a few workouts over the last little while where I'll realise on the last interval that I probably left a bit on the table earlier in the workout, and I think mentally I just need to be prepared to suffer a bit more on some of those workouts.
Sam - welcome back!! Piwi's recruitment drive has been pretty impressive.
Piwi - I'm not sure about you, but I reckon summer slows me down a bit too. The legs just always seem to feel fresher in winter. That might just be because I am a crazy person who prefers running on dark, cold, winter mornings.
Thanks for taking over the thread for 2018 JMac! And thanks for prodding me on Strava to check in again.
I'm Rune, 45, married and with two kids, 17 and 12, and I work as a marine/structural engineer. I live in Berkeley, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area, and it sounds like I got similar weather conditions to Kiwi-land with mostly temperate conditions, although we don't have much humidity here. We can get 30C/85F+ temperatures here but it's pretty rare as long as you stay by the bay or the coast.
I did some running in my younger years and somehow managed to squeeze out my 5k PR of 19:44.4 back in HS, and I still can't fathom I was able to do that with the completely unorganized training I was doing back then. Pretty much exactly 8 years ago (December 20, 2010) I was in really bad shape and decided to go for a run. I ran 1.6 miles in about 18 minutes, and had to stop several times because I felt like I couldn't breathe. After several years of on and off short runs (less than 100 miles per year in 2012-2014) I finally got on a program late summer 2015.
I ran my first HM in November 2015, at the tail end of a cold, and it was a complete disaster. Followed up with the Paris Marathon in April 2016 and that kicked things into gear for me. I would probably consider 2016 to be a better year for me than 2017, but that might just be me. I set my HM PR of 1:36:07 about a month ago, but I don't feel like that was a particularly well run race for me, and I feel like I was in better shape than that at the time.
I have Crohn's disease and although I am extremely lucky with how little it affects me compared to some other people, it still affects me some. If I don't take iron supplements I will slowly become anemic, and I feel like I have more issues than most with having to find a bathroom during my training runs (it's never happened in a race though!). I've had about 4 feet of my small intestines removed in two different surgeries so that probably affects everything somewhat.
For the reason I haven't been checking in much over the last couple of months, I'm injured. Left proximal hamstring tendinosis is the verdict, and I'm closing in on 3 months with no running now. And I can't really run at all until it's healed. I'm doing exercises to help healing and strengthen muscles around the area, but 3 weeks ago I got a bit carried away in my strength training and made things worse again. I think now I'm back to about where I was at the end of December and hope things will progress nicely from here. After a few weeks of a pretty sedentary lifestyle I started going to the gym and started swimming again, and I will probably figure out if it's ok to ride my bike now as the weather is supposed to get nicer over the next coupe of weeks. One potential issue is if the bike seat will press on the injured area so I might not be able to do that either.
As such, I have no races planned so far this year. I actually got a spot in Chicago, but I have no idea if I will be in good enough shape to run it when October comes around.
5k: 20:32 (1/17) | HM: 1:34:37 (2/18) | FM: 3:31:37 (3/18)
Getting back into it
I've never really understood the idea of jogging a log run. Whether I'm training for a half or a full, I prefer to try to do the bulk of the miles at around race pace plus 10s or so (or if the weather sucks, just under race pace effort). At the same time, most of my other days are quite a bit slower except for another day that's a workout. Nice to know there's some support for parts of that method.
How do you structure your long runs for a half? Are they loong intervals or a long tempo?
Rune - welcome back.
Sam - ditto.
JMac is turning out a fine threadmaster, so many posters. I ran 2016 on RWOL and I must have driven people away - Sam, Brent and DJ all disappeared that year, and now they are back!
The other possible explanation is that Piwi is secretly planning to wage an uprising against our new overlord and is recruiting allies to help him in the fight.
Rune - welcome back! I was wondering how that injury was tracking. Hope to see you running again in the not-too-distant future.
Watson doesnt like me getting the credit but I contacted them on Strava.
I much prefer that explanation, to nobody likes me!