Weather check at T-4 days

Things are looking good for race day …

The wind might not be great but if it’s coming from the WNW then it would be a tailwind toward the end of the race.

Half marathon training – Week 11 – Tough Tempo

This last week of half marathon training had some ups and some downs. All the easy runs went fine but Wednesday’s tempo run wasn’t really a confidence builder. My training program gave a target of 8:30 min/mile for the 4 tempo miles. I was looking to do between 8:23 (pace for a 1:50:00 half marathon) and 8:30. I just could not get sub 8:30. I came close but I felt sluggish and slow the whole time and I felt like I was working way harder than should have been necessary. Then I of course fell into the trap of “if I can’t run 8:23 for 4 miles how am I ever going to be able to do it for 13.1 miles?” I’ve managed to talk myself out of that one. I know that a taper week, rest and race day adrenaline can work wonders.

Saturday’s long run was great. It was about 8C and sunny which is ideal running weather. I figured I’d do 10-12 miles but decided to cut it off at 10 because I didn’t want to risk running my legs into the ground one week before the race. I decided to try and run by feel instead of obsessively tracking my heart rate. As a consequence I ended with a slightly higher average heart rate than my previous long runs but it was nice to just go out and run easy.

This upcoming week is my taper week. I went back and looked what I did before last year’s big races (Ottawa, Victoria and Fall Classic) and it was always some combination of a 3 miler, a 4 miler and a 5 miler (with 3 miles at tempo). My current plan calls for slightly more mileage but I’m tempted to go with what I know. Honestly, what’s another few miles going to do for me at this point?

Now onto race day weather. Until this morning things were still looking good for Sunday. Then out of nowhere the word SNOW appeared in the long range forecast.

I’m not freaking out yet because I fully expect this to change. And if it doesn’t it’s not like I haven’t run in the snow before! We’re still a few days away before Sunday’s weather shows up on some other forecasts. Until then I’m working on a comprehensive packing list that prepares me for any race day weather!

Weather check at T-10 days

I just sat down at my desk with 20 minutes to kill in between returning from department seminar and going off to play intramural softball. A few clicks of the mouse later I discovered a 15 day forecast for Vancouver. That means I could have started obsessively checking the race day weather forecast 4 days ago!

Currently things are looking really good.

The high of 18 doesn’t really scare me given I’ll be racing from 7am-9am. Of course the forecast will probably change daily between now and race day. I’ll keep you posted!

Half marathon training – Week 10 – Snow. In April.

Last Saturday I did my long run in 13C sunshine. This Saturday it was 3C but felt like -1C and it snowed. So much for spring being here!

There were three periods of hail/snow during my run 12 mile long run. I say hail/snow because I’m not exactly sure what to call it. It was like mini snow balls falling from the sky (about 3mm in diameter) but they weren’t ice balls like hail. When they hit me they would bounce off! It was cold and wet but I got 12 miles done. My legs held up better than expected and I was pleased with the effort.

One more week of hard training and then it’s time for the taper!

Half marathon training – Weeks 7,8,9 – A long rest but I’m back at it now

Here’s an update on my last three weeks of half marathon training.

Week 7

I had less than three days in Seattle between coming back from Whistler and leaving for England and Scotland. I would have liked to have squeezed both a tempo and a long run in here but decided that wasn’t realistic. Instead I focused on putting a good effort into my long run.

Week 8

I did not run at all while I was in Scotland. I brought my running gear with me but just couldn’t quite bring myself to wake up early enough to go running. Honestly I didn’t put much pressure on myself to get out running and I don’t feel at all guilty about having a zero mileage week!

Week 9

I gave myself one “jet lag” day after flying back to Seattle and then dove head first back into training. Tuesday’s run was my slowest run ever. Sigh. I think that’s partly because I was afraid to push things too hard after coming off 11 days of not running. I got things back in gear on Tuesday for my tempo run. I’m pleased with my tempo splits (I was aiming for 8:30′s) but not so pleased with the effort it took to achieve them. If I’m going to run a 1:49:49 half marathon in 3 weeks I need to average 8:22 min/mile and right now stringing 13 of those back to back seems impossible! My legs were pretty dead after Thursday’s easy run so by the time I played softball later in the day I was quite sore.

Saturday was the best day weather-wise we’ve had in Seattle all year. It was sunny and 13C while I was out running. I believe we hit a high of 23C later in the day. Both the Olympic and the Cascade mountain ranges were out and Mt Rainier was visible too. The cherry blossoms are in full bloom. Glorious. Oh and I was pretty happy with my run. My legs held up pretty well and my average HR was good although it was definitely creeping up significantly towards the end.

The Vancouver Half Marathon is now three weeks away. That means I have two more weeks to get some solid training in and then one week of taper. I’m sticking with the goals I set back in February but I’m reserving the right to add a less ambitious time goal in. If all else fails I definitely want to still beat 2 hours!