davemunger Member

Try and do a long run as soon as possible. You need to assess fitness. Take it very slowly, and don't be afraid to take walk breaks. Run small loops, staying close enough to home to bail out if you need to. If you are unable to run 8 or 9 miles comfortably, I think you should cancel the half marathon.

Body glide is okay but compression shorts, tights, or compression underwear is what really works for me. I've done the bug thing too. What's really fun is when the tiny little gnats get plastered all over your face, drowning in your sweat. Good times!

Great story! Meb ran an amazing race, but glad to see that the other Americans were willing to help out in whatever small way they could.

One thing I have found is that when I am well-trained for a half, it is simply amazing to me that I can sustain the HM pace as long as I can. I feel like I'm working hard every mile of the race, but somehow I manage to keep it up. It doesn't seem like it should be possible! You have put in the training miles, you should be…

Somehow the bibs don't do it for me. I know some runners keep notebooks of them and write down their time / place on them, but I figure I have all that on Garmin so I don't need it. I do keep all my marathon and half marathon finish medals, plus any awards from shorter races (until I run out of room that is). [also…

I was just like you a few years ago, but then I just started getting so many! Then I started replacing the old ones with newer ones and now I kind of regret not saving some of the older shirts. So now I'm trying to be picky and only getting rid of shirts that aren't as nice. I do keep all of my marathon shirts, though!

Never done one but a lot of folks really like them. Most ultras are such lonely, isolated affairs, and by contrast, 24-hour races are much more social. You can stop and rest after each lap, socialize with other runners, take a nap even, then hop back in. Also, no matter what distance you complete, you are always a…

Well, it is in the "long distance runners" group. We are definitely a fickle lot ;) re: MPrunning.com: Coach Hadley is a bit of a controversial figure around here. His daughter is one of the top young runners in the country but folks seem to question whether he is pushing her too hard, too young (she qualified for the US…

I use Garmin Connect but I may be switching soon because I'd like to start tracking shoes. Otherwise it works fine. I've also been playing a bit with Strava, which is fun since you can compare times on segments and courses.

I'd say run your own race. If you feel comfortable hitting it hard on the downhill, go for it. Don't be rude and not let people pass you on the uphill if they want to, but you have every right to run the race you want. If the uphill is that steep, others will be walking it too. Good luck!

Yeah, turning 45 helped a bunch for me. You can actually qualify when you are 44 as long as you turn 45 by the marathon date. I qualified on my third try, after about 2 years of serious training. When I started I could barely run a 9:00 mile. To give you a sense of how random it is, I've run 7 marathons since I qualified…

Do you want to qualify for the 2015 marathon? That would be pretty tough. You would be training hard all summer, then trying to qualify in a late-summer marathon for the September registration -- maybe the Santa Rosa? You would have to be prepared to postpone if anything goes wrong with your training or if the race…

You know you are in shape to run 10K, so it's really just about race strategy. Although I usually tell people to go out faster than their goal pace for a 10K, given what you have said here and that your strength is longer distances I'd suggest going about 10 seconds slower than your goal pace for the first mile, then…

Yep, 48 seconds for your 200s sounds just about perfect given your 25:45 5k PR. The whole idea is to condition yourself to running faster than your "comfort zone." Eventually, this will *be* your comfort zone! Maybe not for this upcoming race, but some time soon.

Congratulations! Did you look up your chip time? For a race that large they adjust your time to account for when you actually crossed the start line. You can check out the official results here: https://www.nolimitstiming.com/RESULTS/default.aspx?event=27179

I'm not quite sure what you mean by this -- if you can hold 10 minute miles for a 5-mile tempo run then it seems likely you could do it for 10k in a race. That would put you at 62 minutes, which is faster than your 1 hour 4 minute goal. Most 10ks will have markers every mile so it's easy to figure out if you are on pace as…

I know I've been posting this everywhere wanted to get my 10K PR and 1st overall in the "official" thread: 39:01, first place at the Lake Norman Rotary 10k. Very happy with this!

Per SDM80's suggestion, I added a box indicating how much of the month is left. This gives you a good point of comparison to the percentage of miles remaining. Keep it up, everyone!

Knowing the course should make a HUGE difference. You will be ready for it. It's always motivating if you know the hill will end -- you can think about pushing through to the top and getting a bit of a rest on the flat or downhill that follows. Good luck!

Here is the recap of the 10K: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/davemunger/view/race-recap-the-lake-norman-rotary-10k-651297 Going out fast made Mile 6 really tough, but I think it was the right call.

So I finished the 10K -- pretty much nailed the pace. Was shooting for 6:15/mile, ended up with 6:15 mile average pace. Ran a little faster in the first 5K. Second half was very tough, but I still came in right at my target time, 39:01 PR. I'm writing up a full recap and will post a link here when it is done.

Sure, that's easy to do. But we don't actually need a whole column -- it would be the same for everyone.

Downhill! That would be kind of cool -- like this world-famous race in New Zealand: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMQy824gvv0

I would say it's not important to worry about that percentage until you are doing long runs of ~10 miles or more. At that point, yes, you should be doing more than 3 runs per week. But it's fine to run, say, 3, 4, and 5 miles as your three runs for the week. Technically that 5-miler is 42 percent of your weekly running,…

I've noticed most of this elevation correction stuff can introduce errors. Not a huge deal but it's nice to be able to compare to the barometric elevation. Bridges really throw off the elevation correction because maps measure the elevation of the river underneath, not the elevation of the bridge.

Keep it up, folks! 13 days left, let's make them count! I just updated the spreadsheet and looks like about half of us are over halfway done -- other folks may just need to update the sheet. Stay strong!

If you don't normally wear clean underwear, I wouldn't suggest changing that on race day either!

Yep. I always get two pairs of my primary training shoe and rotate them for each run. And yes to getting two different colors. Seriously thinking about pre-buying two more pairs in case the shoe manufacture decides to "upgrade" them.

That's a big problem with this data. Individual units have tremendous variance. I know people with 620s that work great, and I've heard similar issues with 910xts. Mine works great, and I have several friends who love their 910s. The one unit that I've heard *very* few complaints about (and appears to be one of the best in…

He is an ultrarunner and does a lot of 100-mile or 24-hour runs. Very few running-only watches last that long.