Half Marathon Training – Week 7 – Half on Sunday
This week I did my usual pre-race taper of one five, four and three miler.
| 19/04 | - | Rest day |
| 20/04 | 4.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:17 min/mile |
| 21/04 | 5.0 mi | Tempo Run: 3mi @ 8:32/8:32/8:23 min/mile |
| 22/04 | 3.0 mi | Easy run: avg 9:58 min/mile |
| 23/04 | - | Rest day |
| 24/04 | - | Rest day |
| 25/04 | 13.1 mi | Half marathon race day |
| Total | 25.1 mi | YTD: 383.9 miles |
I have decided to take a fairly low key approach to Sunday’s half marathon. My main goal will be in finish in under 2:00. On a good day I think I could get closer to 1:55 but I’m not fussed about it. I want to save something for the Sporting Life 10K I’m running next weekend because I’m definitely going to make a PB attempt there. My 10K PB of 54:02 is from 2006 and is the weakest of my PBs so its just asking to be broken. The other issue is that I’ve actually never seen 80% of the Waterloo course and I know there are some hills. The race director sent out an elevation chart (below). There’s a total of 109m (358 ft) of climbing which isn’t too bad but it’s definitely not flat.
So my plan is to start slow and try and settle into a groove somewhere between 5:27 min/km and 5:42 min/km. Tune back in on Sunday or Monday for a race report!
Half Marathon Training – Week 6 – Run with Alice
I had a rough start to the week. It was a busier than average work week which left me pretty drained. By Thursday’s run I was really dragging. In fact, I decided to cut the run short by a mile because my legs just were not feeling up to it. I don’t think it’s an injury; my legs were just super tight and sore. I’ll admit I haven’t been great about stretching over the past few months so I may be paying the price now.
On Saturday I did an easy run with my friend Alice. Alice has taken up running this year after giving birth to her beautiful daughter Lillian last October. She’s been kicking some serious butt and will also be doing the Waterloo half marathon next weekend. You can read all about her running (and mothering) journey on her blog. So on Saturday I biked out to Alice’s house and then we did a 10.6km run from there. We had a great time chatting about family, nutrition, work and everything in between. Oh and it snowed/hailed during our run! We ran on country roads which is a real treat. One of the things I like about living in Waterloo is how quickly you can be out of town and in the countryside.
The Waterloo Half Marathon is now 7 days away. Currently the forecast is for rain, a low of 9 overnight and a high of 16 for Sunday. I’m not too bothered by this. Of course I would prefer 10C and sunny but I’ll run in any weather. I think the biggest problem would be wind not rain anyway. I’m going to spend the next few days reflecting on my current fitness and coming up with a plan for the race. Of course, I’ve been known to race the best when I have no plan so maybe I shouldn’t bother!
| 05/04 | - | Rest day |
| 06/04 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 9:55 min/mile |
| 07/04 | 6.5 mi | Speedwork: 3x1mi in 7:59/8:03/8:01 min |
| 08/04 | 4.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:18 min/mile |
| 09/04 | - | Rest day |
| 10/04 | 6.6 mi XT |
Easy run: avg 13:33 min/mile Cycling: 17.9km to and from Alice’s house |
| 11/04 | 8.0 mi | Long run: avg 10:13 min/mile |
| Total | 30.1 mi | YTD: 358.8 miles |
.
Half Marathon Training – Week 5 – Typical
Hmm, it’s Sunday night and I’m trying to remember how training went this week. I’m pretty sure it was the usual story: tough tempo run on Wednesday, a decent long run on the weekend and a few other easy runs thrown in. Yes, it was just a typical training week.
| 05/04 | - | Rest day |
| 06/04 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:10 min/mile |
| 07/04 | 6.0 mi | Tempo run: 4mi @ 8:47/8:46/8:37/8:30 min/mile |
| 08/04 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 9:53 min/mile |
| 09/04 | - | Rest day |
| 10/04 | 4.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:06 min/mile |
| 11/04 | 10.0 mi | Long run: avg 9:51 min/mile |
| Total | 30.0 mi | YTD: 328.7 miles |
In other news, on Wednesday I found out that I did not get into the NYC marathon via the lottery this year. Although I can’t find any data to support this I had estimated the chance of getting in to be approximately 25%. I plan to enter the lottery again next year. At the very latest I’d be able to run NYC in 2013 as long as they let you in during year four if you’ve been rejected through the lottery for three consecutive years. My current tentative plan is now to run the Road2Hope Hamilton Marathon in November as my fall marathon. It’s fast, small, close and late in the fall allowing for maximal training. Then in January 2011 a few friends and I have signed up to do the Walt Disney World Goofy’s Race and a Half Challenge. That’s a half marathon on Saturday followed by a full marathon on Sunday. Crazy.
Half Marathon Training – Week 4 – Recovery
I took last week pretty easy: just a couple of mid week five milers. I went up to Toronto for Easter so I did Friday’s 9 miler with my friend Laura. We did the run in the late morning and got caught by surprise with how warm and sunny it was outside. We ended up walking the last 5km because although we were doing OK neither of us wanted to get heat stroke. We both got a bit of a sunburn on our arms but we had enough water with us to avoid any major heat troubles. It will take a few weeks to get acclimatized to running in temperatures above 20C. On Sunday we did a double workout because we’re awesome. I did 3 miles on the treadmill followed (a couple hours later) by a 30km bike ride. This was my first trip out on my new bike and it was great. I’m definitely looking forward to incorporating more cycling as cross training into my schedule this spring and summer!
| 29/03 | - | Rest day |
| 30/03 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 9:29 min/mile |
| 31/03 | - | Rest day |
| 01/04 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 9:57 min/mile |
| 02/04 | 9.4 mi | Long run: avg 14:39 min/mile (walked last 5km) |
| 03/04 | - | Rest day |
| 04/04 | 3.0 mi XT |
Easy run: avg 9:40 min/mile Cycling: 30km avg ~20 km/h |
| Total | 22.4 mi | YTD: 298.7 miles |
Half Marathon Training – Weeks 1-3 – Turning a corner
I just might have turned a corner in the last three weeks.
First, let me summarize February. I ran a total of 82.0 miles (132.0 km) during the month of February. This is a fairly low number for me but actually it was composed of three fairly solid weeks of 25+27+30 miles and then one week totally off while I was on vacation in Whistler (at the Olympics!).
I had intended to jump right into Half Marathon training with the Ryan Hall program during the first week of March but it just didn’t happen. The combination of jet lag and poor weather conditions meant I couldn’t get the speed work and tempo run sessions in during the work week. Frankly, the program just seemed overwhelming. I’d been feeling a bit lethargic and I was having some pain and tightness on my right side. Not really the best place to be starting into a hard core training program.
So moved on to Plan B. I’m now doing a more conservative Smart Coach training program for the Waterloo Half Marathon at the end of April. I’m not making any big goals for this race but three weeks in to the program I can say that while I’m far from PB shape I’m feeling a lot better than I did in February.
Week 1
Wednesday’s tempo run was the first hard run I’d done in months. In the past I’ve done tempo runs at around 8:30 pace. Given I was coming off months of slow running I was just happy that all the tempo miles came in under 9:00. Over the next few months I’d like to see my tempo pace drop but I’m going to be patient and trust it will happen eventually.
During January and February I did most of my runs on the same stretch of bike path and sidewalks that were cleared of snow. By Saturday warm temperatures had gotten rid of most of the snow around here I decided to revisit some local paths/trails that I hadn’t run on since the fall. There were some very muddy sections and also some icy sections so I walked when I needed to. I didn’t look at my watch once during the run because I wanted to run by feel. I felt really good until about the last 1.5 miles at which point I started to tire. I probably should have taken a gel or something to keep my energy up.
| 08/03 | - | Rest day |
| 09/03 | 4.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:22 min/mile |
| 10/03 | 5.0 mi | Tempo run: 3mi @ 8:54/8:56/8:37 min/mile |
| 11/03 | 4.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:16 min/mile |
| 12/03 | - | Rest day |
| 13/03 | 9.0 mi | Long run: avg 10:47 min/mile |
| 14/03 | 4.0 mi | Recovery run: avg 10:47 min/mile |
| Total | 26.0 mi | YTD: 218.3 miles |
Week 2
We had glorious spring like weather during this week. We also went onto Daylight Savings Time which meant I moved my runs from early morning to late afternoon to avoid running in the dark. On Tuesday it was 15C and sunny so I ran in shorts for the first time this year! I might have been a bit overexcited for my speedwork on Wednesday because I went out way too hard during the first mile. I have no business running sub 8:00 quite yet! I was in Ottawa for the weekend so I did my long run on one of my favorite all time running routes along the Rideau Canal. Once again I avoided looking at my watch and took a few walk breaks. This time I consumed about 100 calories during the run which I think helped me finish much stronger than the previous week’s nine miler.
| 15/03 | - | Rest day |
| 16/03 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 9:55 min/mile |
| 17/03 | 5.0 mi | Speedwork: 2x1mi in 7:46/8:10 min |
| 18/03 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:06 min/mile |
| 19/03 | - | Rest day |
| 20/03 | 4.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:17 min/mile (treadmill) |
| 21/03 | 9.0 mi | Long run: avg 10:28 min/mile |
| Total | 28.0 mi | YTD: 246.3 miles |
Week 3
By this week I was starting to feel like I was definitely back in a groove. Wednesday’s tempo run was a good challenge. I managed to average an 8:33 min/mile pace over the four miles which is faster than I expected to be able to pull off. There was a fair bit of variation in my splits because I ran two laps of a two mile course which meant some miles had a headwind and some had a tailwind. Saturday’s long run was tough. I just didn’t feel like myself for the first half of the run. I think it was a combination of and indulgent dinner on friday night and a lack of sleep. Things improved eventually and I got the 10 miles done. My hip flexors were tight on Sunday so I took things easy for my recovery run.
| 22/03 | - | Rest day |
| 23/03 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:11 min/mile |
| 24/03 | 6.0 mi | Tempo run: 4mi @ 8:28/8:42/8:24/8:38 min/mile |
| 25/03 | 5.0 mi | Easy run: avg 10:01 min/mile |
| 26/03 | - | Rest day |
| 27/03 | 10.0 mi | Long run: avg 10:24 min/mile |
| 28/03 | 4.0 mi | Recovery run: avg 10:44 min/mile |
| Total | 30.0 mi | YTD: 276.3 miles |
I’m feeling much more positive about the Waterloo half now that I’m through these first three weeks of training. Next week will be a recovery week and after that there will only be three more weeks of training before the taper week and the race!
January Update
I ran 88.0 miles / 141.6 km during the month of January. This is less than I’ve done in previous years but this year I’ve had to run through a “real” winter. Seattle winters had their share of challenges (dark, windy, wet, wet and wet) but they didn’t have -20C temperatures and killer windchills. I’ve now managed to accumulate the necessary winter running gear and feel like I know have the winter thing sorted out. The funniest thing is that I’ve been running in my downhill ski mitts. This makes me look like a boxer.
I’ve mapped out my running plans and goals for the first half of 2010 below.
- January: Base training, get long run distance up to 10 miles (check)
- February: Two more weeks of base training, one week off while in Whistler, then start spring training program
- March: Work through the Ryan Hall half marathon training plan
- April: Continue training plan, run Waterloo half marathon (race-simulation long run)
- May: Sporting Life 10K (go for a PB if recovered from Waterloo half), Toronto Women’s half marathon (going for a PB and sub 1:50:00)
- June: Recover recover recover, possibly run a half in NOTL at the end of the month for fun
That’s the plan.
2009: Running Year in Review
While 2009 was very much a year of change for me, running was a reassuring constant in my life. I ran a total of 1255.3 miles or 2020.2 km last year which just a bit more than I ran in 2008. Part of me wishes I’d taken a break in December and hit 2009 km right on the dot!
Highlights of the year included bidding farewell to Seattle with a personal best in the Rock n Roll half marathon and then showing Ontario I was back by running a personal best in the Toronto Marathon alongside my good friend Douglas. All told I set four personal bests and won my first ever age group award. That will be a record that’s hard to repeat.
As for 2010, I’ve already committed to two half marathons and a 10K in the spring. I’m also looking forward to another fall marathon where I hope to finally come in on the short side of four hours. Finally I’m toying with the idea of running a 25K trail race in the fall. There’s lots to look forward to and many miles more to run!
Fun Run Report: 2009 Santa Shuffle KW 5K
Last Saturday morning I ran the local Santa Shuffle 5K. It was an untimed “fun run” so everything was pretty free and loose. There was no official start or finish line and Santa counted down the start. I’d say there were about 150-200 runners at the event. Looking around, I really couldn’t gauge how fast the crowd was. There was a lot of technical gear being worn but it was cold so the cotton t-shirt metric wasn’t really useful.
The course was two loops around and through Waterloo Park. The loop was sort of funny because it actually crossed itself at one point. I’m glad I wasn’t in charge of directing traffic there! As soon as Santa said GO! a group of really fast runners broke away. I could see at least two women in the group and probably six to eight others. My goal was to run sub 25:00 so I set my Garmin to lap each km and focused on keeping my pace just below the 5:00 min/km mark.
My first km came in a 4:39 which was a big quick so I focused on holding a steady hard pace. I was passed by a women in the first km but I never let her get more than 20m ahead of me and eventually reeled her in about 5 minutes later. The course was quite twisty in parts and after the second km I was running alone although I could see two men about 40 and 80 m ahead of me.
During the second loop I started to really feel the effort. I made a turn just after the 3km mark and the volunteer there told me I was the something-th female. I really couldn’t tell what number she had said. I was just excited to hear a comment like that. I’ve never run a race where I’ve been in a position to hear a ranking! I figured I was probably running in fourth or fifth and just keep chugging along. My main goal was not to get caught from behind by the woman I’d passed. I had no idea how much of a lead I had on her but I wanted to trick myself into thinking she was close.
I tried to turn on the jets in the fifth km, hold off any one that was behind me and push to the finish. My Garmin hit 5km as I crested a hill about 200m before the course actually ended. I ran down the hill past some spectators and someone holding a clipboard, figured I’d crossed the invisible finish line and hit my Garmin. My km splits were:
4:39/4:52/4:49/4:40/4:53/0:56
My Garmin mapped the course at 5.2km with a finish time of 24:49. My cumulative time at my 5km split was 23:53 which would make this my third fastest 5km (out of ten). I have decided not to record this among my official finish times though since the course wasn’t certified.
After the race the runners went back to the Waterloo Rec Complex for snacks. I passed the volunteer who had told me my placing and she asked me if I’d held onto my spot. I told her I had. Of course I didn’t know what place that was but I was starting to suspect that maybe I’d come in third because (1) why would she ask me if I’d held onto fourth or fifth? and (2) one of the women who I thought had been in front of me had actually finished in a few minutes after me.
Back at the Rec Complex there was hot chocolate, coffee, fruit and granola bars. At the awards ceremony I was announced as the third place woman! I now am the proud owner of a Running Room bronze medal! I know it was just a fun run and it was a small race but I’m still quite pleased with myself.
Race Report: 2009 Toronto Marathon
Pre Race
I went into Toronto on Friday after work and spent Friday evening and Saturday hanging out with my friends Laura and Douglas. On race morning I woke up at 6:45 am, ate breakfast and got myself organized. The forecast was calling for clear conditions with a low around 0C and a high of about 10C. I had made the decision to wear shorts with a long sleeved technical t-shirt, gloves and a baseball hat. I was slightly concerned that I was going to be too cold at the start of the race but decided to risk it because being too hot later in the race would be worse.
At about 7:40am four of us racing the marathon climbed into a cab for the drive to the start line at Mel Lastman Square. We heard the 8am half marathon start and then ducked in to a municipal building that was open to runners. It was certainly nice to get to wait for the start indoors since it was chilly out. After some nervous chatter and a pre race gel we made out way out to the corrals about 15 minutes before the start and lined up between the “sub 4:00” and “4:00+” signs.
The gun went off and the race was underway!
Part 1: Down and Up Yonge Street, 0-10km in 57:46 (average 5:47 min/km)
There were only about 2200 marathoners so the start wasn’t too crowded and I was able to settle into my pace fairly quickly without wasting energy weaving around people. At some point during the second kilometer Douglas pulled up next to me and we started running together. We hadn’t planned to run the race together but we were both happy to have the company so we stuck together. I really didn’t want to go out too fast so I was monitoring our pace trying to keep our splits somewhere around 5:45-5:50. There were a few rolling hills in this first section including a fairly long uphill during the fifth kilometer which lead to the slowest km of the day at 6:08. It actually wasn’t that bad of a hill but it was daunting because we could see it coming from a ways off.
We kept rolling down (an occasionally up) Yonge street checking off subway stops until south of Eglington when we turned off into a lovely neighbourhood with tree lined streets and big houses. I took a gel somewhere in the ninth kilometer. I carried four gels with me (all of which I would take) and a plastic water bottle that I threw away after the first water station. After that I just went with what they had on course and it worked out fine.
Part 2: Rosedale and into Downtown, 10-21.1km in1:03:09 (average 5:41 min/km)
We continued moving along at a comfortable pace running past Upper Canada College and Casa Loma. This was exciting for me because I used to run past Casa Loma during the summer of 2000 when I lived in downtown Toronto. This section had a lot of downhills including one during our fastest kilometer of the day: 5:23 for kilometer 12. We did a lovely set of about four kilometers on Rosedale Valley Road. This was my favourite section of the course. The trees were in full autumn colours and it was quiet and peaceful. In other words there were no angry motorists honking because the marathon was blocking traffic!
We came out of the valley onto Bayview Ave and then onto Front St. This was probably my least favourite section of the course. The road was a little uneven and mixed with asphalt, concrete and street car tracks. We were passing half marathon walkers at this point so I had to be a bit more aware of my surrondings. Also the CN tower was looming in the distance and I knew that not only did I have to run to it but I also had to go way past it and then back again!
Douglas and I were holding a strong pace. We went through the half in 2:00:55 (chip time). I was very happy that we weren’t sub 2:00. We made our target pace 5:41 min/km and figured that with a few occasional faster kilometers a sub 4:00 finish was possible.
Part 3: Queen’s Quay and the Lakeshore Pathway, 21.1-30km in 50:35 (average 5:41 min/km)
As we were running out of downtown we saw the marathon leader go by us heading towards the finish line. We were still a long way away from finishing so I just focused on making it to the turn around at the Humber Bay Arch Bridge. We maintained a strong pace but it was definitely getting harder to sustain. My legs were making their presence known and the wind picked up making things a bit more difficult. Somewhere around 25 km I finally took off my throw away gloves and made the joke that I was taking off the gloves and getting serious.
Part 3: Lakeshore to Queen’s Park, 30-42.2km in1:10:51 (average 5:48 min/km)
As Douglas and I headed back towards downtown we were consistently picking off runners ahead of us. In the end we would pass 203 runners in this section while only being passed by six. Yes, we were that awesome.
I should mention that there was a marathon relay being run concurrently with the marathon. There were eight legs so each relay runner ran about 5km. Needless to say they went flying by us. Fortunately most of them had a bib on their back that read RELAY so you could at least justify their speed as they bounded past you.
Douglas was definitely pulling me along in this section. He seemed to have just a tiny bit more in his legs than I did. At first he was a step ahead of me, then it was 5 meters and by the time we hit the turn up York street it was about 20 meters. We’d already had the discussion that when we got close to the end we each had to run our own races so I was happy to see him pushing the pace. The funny thing was that we were both passing everyone on the course but the distance between us was staying fairly consistent.
The last three km up York and University Ave were very very hard. For about the last two km I could see Queen’s Park in the distance and I just knew I needed to make it there. I took a few very short walk breaks but I kept pushing whatever pace I could squeeze out of my legs. Just after the 41 km mark I caught up to Douglas and told him that we were going to finish this thing together. We saw Laura cheering us on along the bend behind Queen’s Park and then matched each other stride for stride as we sprinted for the finish.
Finish: 4:02:21 (average 5:45 min/km)
My chip finish time was 4:02:21 which is a 7:58 improvement over my previous personal best from 2008 in Seattle. I didn’t break 4 hours but I left everything I had out on the course so there’s no way I can be disappointed with my result. I’m also thrilled that my half marathon splits of 2:00:55 and 2:01:26 were so close. A 31 second positive split is some very consistent pacing and I firmly believe that this is the most efficient way for me to run a marathon.
Lessons Learnt
- Consistent pacing is the way to go
- On a cool day I do not need to carry my own water/Gatorade.
- Next time around I think I should include more marathon pace sections into my long runs.
- It’s really nice to have a running partner. Thanks for racing with me Douglas!
- After a marathon it helps to have someone around who can think straight. Thanks for taking care of us Laura
Finally here is the “Achievement Statistics” report generated by the marathon for me (you can click to get a bigger view).
