October (2016) Running Challenge
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kristinegift wrote: »1) When you want to pace "anything sub-7:30" DO NOT START OUT AT A 7:03 PACE, DUMMY.
Sounds like you did exactly the same thing I did last year at the Huntsville Half. I ended up 12 seconds slower than my PR which was set 7 months previous. Hopefully I will not make that mistake this year. (must learn to start out slow) I have practiced that this year and was a bit successful.
Last year's splits:
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After thinking about it, having food and some rest, enabled the clearer thinking!, I've decided that the problem had to be with maymyrun. There is absolutely NO WAY I did an extra 2+ miles. If that was the case there would have been a riot. AND, I remembered the 3 hr pacer passing me at about the 10 mile marker (for the second time). So as much as I want to believe that I reduced my time by 27 minutes (without training and WITH a migraine), the truth wins. I still beat my Colfax time by a tiny bit, and it's still a PR, it's just not nearly as impressive as my oxygen and food deprived brain wanted to believe! But Colfax is 7 months from now and major improvements ARE possible!
Oh and did I mention that if something COULD hurt, it probably does? Yeah. Just ouch. All over!1 -
@skippygirlsmom Thanks for the insight. I always run alone because everyone is much faster than me. That would be great to have someone to run and chat with. Good advice. I'll be on the lookout.
@katharmonic That is truly awful. My son (19) has suffered with major depression since puberty and has been suicidal some of that time. My heart goes out to her and her family.
Starting out slow will be the largest challenge. I used to run by feel. Then, after some heart problems (arrhythmia and a viral infection of my heart that almost killed me), my doctor advised me to consult a kinesiologist. He tested my max, lactate, and gave me zones. I have collected my heart rate data for years before that; this is the first time I've run by heart rate in order to build my aerobic base, which was pretty much nil after the infection and not great before the infection because I always ran too hard. It's been over two years now, a slow recovery process; I have made progress by staying 80% or more of my time below my aerobic threshold. It seems difficult to think about ignoring my heart rate for the race. I'm going to try. Thanks for all the advice, different methods, and encouragement!2 -
katharmonic wrote: »In shocking news though, a body was found in the lake yesterday in the very state park that I walked in today and almost every day as there is a trial right from my neighborhood. I'm thinking it must have been a clear accident or suicide as there was no police presence this afternoon and there is no word about being on the lookout for anyone. It's scary and sad, though. Across town in another park we frequently run in, a guy was exposing himself to women on one of the trails yesterday. He was found and given basically a warning which is ridiculous. I hate that we have to be so concerned about safety running in the day time in a public park.
A group of runners with my wife's Fleet Feet NoBo group were flashed during that incident on the West Shore Trail - it is a more isolated area which is why my wife doesn't like to run there.
Green lakes looks beautiful - I tried to run through there yesterday but ended up in the campground area instead of the lake - I'll try again next week to find the lake
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I'm back baby. I avoided anything running related during my week off. It was pain but I pulled through.
Date.......Distance.......Type........How my legs are feeling
October 1 - 5.9 km - Easy - Niggle in left IT band
October 2 - 11.9km - Easy - Calves a little tight, fine after warm-up
October 3 - rest
October 4 - 6.7 km - Tempo - Fine, no pains
October 5 - 6.2 km - Easy - Fine, taper fine, wanna go fast
October 6 - 7.0 km - Easy - Very fine
October 7 - 5.0 km - Easy - Springy, rested legs
October 8 - 5.0 km - Easy - Ready to race
October 9 - 21.1km - Race - Dead legs are dead
October 10- rest
October 11- rest
October 12- rest
October 13- rest
October 14- rest
October 15- rest
October 16- rest
October 17- 6.1 km - Easy - Tight calves
03/04: Bucharest 10k and Family run 48:28
16/04: Color Run Bucharest
17/04: Forest Run 5k 22:05
04/06: Happy Run 5k 21:57
22/07: Bucharest After9Cross 9.5k 49:03
28/08: Fox Trail Half Marathon (10k) 48:28
18/09: Baneasa Trail Run (10.5k) 49:12
09/10: Bucharest International Marathon (Half Debut) 1:31:532 -
@katiejane83 I'm sorry about the boyfriend, I hate that his family caused this. Can't we as parents learn to be happy for our kids. I pray that no matter who Skip brings home that I'm good enough of a person to be happy if she is happy. I think all we can ask (and want) for our children is for them to find someone who loves them, respects them and helps them to be all they can be. BTW been there done that with my EX hubby, his mom would actually try to fix him up with other people while we were married.
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RunRachelleRun wrote: »Thanks @Naija82 . Sorry to read about your knee. Hope it's nothing serious.
Thanks seems to be okay today, I think I need new shoes, mine are a bit worn0 -
@katharmonic That is truly heartbreaking! My heart goes out to her family and the poor girl I can't imagine the pain she must have been in. I've had some dark days and when you are there everything feels hopeless.0
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My post is waiting approval but I ran 2 5ks this weekend. Boy, i got out of shape. but I only have 3 min to make up to get back to my best pace. Seems doable2
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Just a mile today, knee was much better but it's high time I bought some new shows
1/Oct - 8.82 miles
2/Oct - 1.58 miles
3/Oct - 5.01 miles
4/Oct - 7.18 miles
5/Oct - 5.02 miles
6/Oct - 3.30 miles
7/Oct - 1.27 miles
8/Oct - 2.05 miles
9/Oct - Oxford Half Marathon
10/Oct - 1.64 miles
11/Oct - 5.05 miles
12/Oct - 8.06 miles
13/Oct - 4.04 miles
14/Oct - 5.14 miles
15/Oct - 13.16 miles
16/Oct - 2.99 miles
17/Oct - 1.68 miles
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Totally did not want to get up to run this morning. So I didn't :-p I don't remember if I mentioned I was awake half the night Saturday night with asthma? Then I had a long day taking a group of kids to a corn maze/pumpkin patch Sunday. A nap would've been nice.
So I get off work a little early today and I'm gonna try for a 3pm run but goodness, it's 81 degrees outside (and climbing) and crazy windy! This oughta be fun :-/ Our next cool front hits Thursday - hallelujah! I hope this is summer's last hoorah. I suppose I should have a little mercy on myself and skip the hills today with the 20mph wind.
@AdrianChr92 Welcome back to running. I know a week can be an eternity to a runner who's not running :-D
@mmteixeira Lovely pic! This is my favorite season (although summer won't seem to leave us here).
@RespectTheKitty Hang in there and don't give up. Just do what you can.
@KatieJane83 Sorry for your situation4 -
_nikkiwolf_ wrote: »Just so that you know why I couldn't resist, this is the nice trail leading up the mountain:
And this is the view from above the treeline (full panorama here):
Insanely jealous!!
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kristinegift wrote: »Ate some humble pie at my race today... I should have looked at the elevation chart with a more critical eye before I decided this was my fall goal race for the half.
@kristinegift I feel your pain - my first 10k two weeks ago was almost all hills - I did learn a great deal about what I could do though so worth it in the end - but I still wish I had scouted it first
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skippygirlsmom wrote: »@katiejane83 I'm sorry about the boyfriend, I hate that his family caused this. Can't we as parents learn to be happy for our kids. I pray that no matter who Skip brings home that I'm good enough of a person to be happy if she is happy. I think all we can ask (and want) for our children is for them to find someone who loves them, respects them and helps them to be all they can be. BTW been there done that with my EX hubby, his mom would actually try to fix him up with other people while we were married.
Thank you! Yeah, I feel like when I have children, as long as they're happy and not hurting themselves/others I'll be happy. But what can you do. I have an ex hubby too, but ending that was a very good decision on my part, lol, considering how I was treated. And I learned one of life's most important lessons from that experience - know your own worth!3 -
Coming back to this thread after the weekend is tough. So many comments I want to make, but by the time I get through everything, I forget what they were! Old age, I guess. A few that I remember noting:
@RunRachelRunnn - I agree whole heartedly with the advice that @5512bf gave you on page 34. Also want to add that determining a race pace/strategy is one of the most difficult parts of racing. At some point, you just have to trust your instincts and go by feel, as many others have said. You know what type of runner you are, so only you know what strategy is going to suit you.
@RespectTheKitty - That is one awesome friend you have there! Enjoy!
@_nikkiwolf_ and others- Fabulous photos!
@kristinegift - I understand your disappointment, but still a really solid time! Those 7:05 starts always come back to haunt you!
So, here is the quick recap of my weekend at the Columbus half marathon:
My goal for this fall was to focus on half marathon training and set a new PR. My previous PR had been set in Dayton in October of 2014 and all of my focus had turned to marathon training after that, so it had been some time since I raced a HM. I had two races on my mind, Dayton, my first ever half marathon and current PR, and Columbus, my full marathon PR and Boston Qualifier in 2015. The events fell on back to back weekends (October 9th and 16th). Since they both had their advantages and I could not decide between the two, I decided to do both. My main goal was to PR at least one of the races and my "I don't really know if I can do this" goal was to break 1:40 (previous PR was 1:43:56).
As I mentioned, last week in Dayton, despite having huge concerns going into the race, I managed to exceed my expectations and not only PR, but also achieve my pipe-dream goal of sub 1:40 by two whole seconds with a 1:39:58. Having accomplished that, I felt very satisfied and decided to head into Columbus without any expectations. I would go out and give it my best shot, but if I fell short of 1:40 I was not going to let it get me down. I have had a number of things putting a damper on my training lately and I was afraid that all of these things might come into play here.
Despite forecasts of rain for most of the week, the weather predictions took a favorable change on Friday: Sunny and 59F around start time. Temps were expected to warm into the high 70s by noon, but with a 7:30 start time, I was not concerned with that being an issue. Race day morning did not disappoint. Clear and cool with plenty of beautiful moonlight.
When I registered for the race, I was asked to give an expected finish time that would determine my corral assignment. This race is both a full and half marathon, run simultaneously, with close to 18,000 total participants. There was a wave start with five corrals, A-E. I had entered an expected finishing time of 1:40, which placed me in the A corral. The corral was very crowded, as expected, but once the race started it became very apparent that a lot of people had fudged their finishing times in order to obtain the A corral assignment (total jerk thing to do, BTW). As a result, I (and a lot of other folks) spent about the first half mile dodging slower runners and even a number of walkers! My first mile ended up being my slowest overall and 20 seconds slower than my average.
After settling into my groove with some open space around mile number 1, I tried to find my "comfortable" pace. I was trying to go somewhere between 7:30 and 7:40 and figure out how long I could hang on, which is my usual HM strategy. The course is nice (also pretty flat), there is plenty of crowd support and scenery as well as frequent aid stations. I avoided most of the aid stations since I had my 10 oz hand-held filled with Propel. I would hit them later if I needed. Miles 2-10 pace averages ranged from 7:24-7:38, but I was still unsure if I could hang on at this rate for three more miles. Around mile 10, they were handing out Gus, so I took one because I was feeling like I was starting to fade. In the end, I'm not sure that it made much difference and I slowed my pace slightly to around 7:45 for miles 11 and 12 due to fatigue. Just after the mile 12 mark and right before the HM split, I saw my husband and our friend (whose wife was running the full). I motioned to them that I was dragging and they cheered me on. I picked the pace back up slightly for the final mile, but the final 0.4 miles down the chute to the finished seemed way longer than I remembered (even from the full last year). It was a struggle to the finish, but I crossed the line and hit my Garmin: 1:40:03. It was going to be close. I would need to find the results tent to get my official results.
It took me a minute or two to recompose myself after crossing the finish line. I grabbed a bottle of water and a goody bag and headed out of the Athlete's Area to find my hubby and my official results. Both of these tasks turned out to be more difficult than expected. There was no typical results tent, only monitors displaying the race results. However, at that time, the monitors were only displaying the top three finishers in each age group so far and they were very difficult to read without my glasses. Finding my hubby was another chore because I do not carry my phone during races and with the added complication of having a friend running the full and starting in a different corral, we were happy enough to get to the starting line okay and had failed to make post-race plans. So I decided to head back out on the course where I had seen them where I figured they would still be waiting on my friend. This was another difficult task, but I finally caught up with them about 45 minutes later. They had been tracking me via the live tracking feature, so they actually knew my finishing time before I did: 1:39:57. I had beaten my previous week's time by one second! A one second PR is still a PR and I was happy to take it!
Overall, I was 11/741 in my age group (top 1.5%), 111/6367 Female (top 1.7%) and 493/10159 overall (top 5%). I was very pleased with these results for a race this size. Another little anecdote I forgot to mention: As I was beginning to fade somewhere around mile 10-11, I noticed a somewhat elderly lady come cruising by. She was kind of hobbling along, but at a pretty good pace. She was passing me, so it must have been around 7:30 pace. I did not remember passing her again, so I looked for older finishers ahead of me. The winner of the 65-70 female age group was 67 years old and finished in 1:38:01. I think that must have been her. Very inspiring, especially since I have been questioning lately whether I am still capable of making any more significant gains at my age!
Oh yeah, forgot to mention. On the subject of geeky science types: I am an analytical chemist. I like numbers and spreed sheets and stuff (e.g. the Danial's table), but I am very impatient with technology.7 -
Date Miles Total 10/01 3.1 3.1 + Strength 10/02 6.4 9.5 10/03 Rest 10/04 Strength 10/05 4.0 13.5 10/06 3.2 16.7 10/07 Strength 10/08 3.3 20.0 10/09 7.0 27.0 10/10 Rest 10/11 3.2 30.2 + Strength 10/12 Rest 10/13 5.0 35.2 10/14 Rest (Forgot to do the strength training...) 10/15 4.3 39.5 10/16 8.3 47.8 <- Total So Far
The church youth group had a lock-in Friday night and I was staying with them. I thought I would have to sacrifice my Saturday group run. But 2 of the girls had set their minds to run on Saturday morning and so, I didn't need to miss my run, yay! We took a long way to get donuts to the group and we run walk the way back.
Then, I had my long run on Sunday afternoon. My kids took their bikes. DH ran with the youngest in the first 5 miles while I ran with my own pace way behind everyone else. At one point, I was thinking "wow, this feels comfortable" but that didn't last long. DH had to leave for an event and I ran the last 3 miles trying to keep up with my 7-year-old biking. She kept talking to me and I was like "I can't hear you when you are in front of me" when I was actually thinking "this is NOT my conversational pace!" My splits pace don't seem to be different much comparing the first 5 miles and the last 3 tho. Perhaps, I just did a lot more of chasing and slowing down in those last 3 miles.
Thank you, @7lenny7, for the information and the link to that table several pages back. The spreadsheet didn't work on my Mac but I could get the data online from other sites. With my 5k race PR, I should be able to run a HM in approximately 2 hours. But I could not even break 2:20 yet. Perhaps, I still need a lot more training for my legs like you said... Or, I really should have run the race faster but didn't have the experience to run in the right effort level. Also, HRmax still confuses me: I started C25k about 2 years ago and my age based HRmax estimate was around 177 but I remember the treadmill was showing 180+. It was higher than my HRmax. I don't have a HRM now so, I don't know what kind of zone I have been running in even though I do try to keep it easy. I would very much like to get a HRM or a GPS watch with that function soon so I have an idea. I feel like perceived effort could be so deceiving.
@shanaber I also have a degree in Math/Stat field. I had 2/3 of my college credits in Math and the majority of the rest was Computer Science. Before I throw in the towel claiming that the Excel spreadsheet wouldn't work on my Mac, I did try and tweak the formulas and make it work. Mac does not interpret duration as a number. I was able make the changes so it calculated my VDOT and VO2Max. But I could not yet get the pace and decided not to waste my time any more because I can get those numbers online else where. I guess I have become less of a number geek after these years of being a stay home mom
A few more pages to catch up...1 -
Ended up walking about 10 miles yesterday (in addition to a relatively intense solo 70 mile bike ride) so I postponed my longer run until this AM. Did the first 7 outside, then finished up on the treadmill as it was getting a bit too hot and sticky. Looking forward to a nice long swim this afternoon to help with the recovery.
10/1 - 5 miles (w. 5x800s @ 6:00 pace)
10/2 - 8 miles (finished at MP)
10/3 - 4 miles
10/4 - 4 miles
10/5 - 4 mile
10/8 - 3 miles
10/9 - 26.2 miles (3:04:57 - Chicago marathon)
10/13 - 4 miles
10/15 - 6 miles
10/17 - 12 miles
Total: 76 miles
Goal: 140 miles
Remaining: 64 miles
2016 Race Schedule:
Disney Marathon - Jan 6 - 3:29:09
Gasparilla 15K - Feb 20 - 1:01:59
Ironman 70.3 Florida - Apr 10 - 5:07:51
Pittsburgh Marathon - May 1 - 3:08:25
Ironman 70.3 Augusta - Sep 25 - 4:43:56
Chicago Marathon - Oct 9 - 3:04:57
Ironman Florida - Nov 5
Rock 'n Roll Las Vegas 10K - Nov 13
@virkati - Usually in bigger races through urban environments, GPS watches brutally fail. Short of a pacer route mistake (see portland/santa rosa), course setup mistake (Vancouver), it probably is 13.1 as too many folks use races like those to qualify for the Olympic trials. Chicago for me registered at 27.02 (vs. definitely 26.2) and 28.5 for another friend. Although my garmin gave me a marathon PR of 2:59 for it (vs. my actual 3:05), I'm more likely to just believe the course (as it is a world major).
@kristinegift - Sorry to hear about the 1/2, still, good to learn some lessons about pacing/etc.. in your setup races. For me, as my GPS wasn't happy in Chicago, just sticking with the 3:05 pacers seemed to do the trick early on with keeping me on track and way from early mile mistakes.
@ddmom0811 - Haven't tried the horse route near Gainsville. Have a bunch of friends who ride Clarmont every few weekends, which has some nice hills as well. My Ironman 70.3 course in Haines City had some nice rollers too.
@mobycarp - Given your outcome at Boston last year, I think you've done pretty well at the marathon distance, but definitely understand how pacing mistakes in marathons can make the races pretty miserable experiences.0 -
@kristinegift I feel you. my first half they said there were some hills, they should have said some minimountains.
and my 5k on saturday, even trail runners were humbled by the hills.0 -
@lporter229 great race report and fantastic job!!! Can you imagine your time if you weren't playing dodge with stupid people! Congrats!!!!!1
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Non-running daily check in: After yesterday's intervals, I was still able to jog the hallway while my eggs cooked this morning. I didn't hurt as much as the day after the previous set of intervals, so that's progress. But it still seems prudent not to run today. PT tomorrow, and I'll see how that goes.2
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