Tim Norris ran the Marquette Half Marathon and finished with a time of 1:56:04.
My hope for this race (A goal) was 1:50; B was PR (under 1:54); C was under 2 hours. So spoiler alert it ended up C. My plan to accomplish any of these goals was to go out miles 1-4 around 8:30+ but not worry too much about it as long as I was under 9. Then miles 5-10 which happened to be the major down hill of the race, I would try to be under 8:23, maybe 8 to 8:15. Then at 10 its a 5k and just do what I can do which would hopefully be something good that would look like me running sub 8s, passing a bunch of people, and winning Olympic gold. Ok that last part was never a part of my race plan. So the good news is that parts 1 and 2 went pretty much to plan, although I did feel in the first 4 miles that I was having a harder time than I would have liked and not quite staying in the pace range I was hoping for, but I went with it knowing I would benefit from some good downhill running starting mile 5. 5 to 9 was pretty good, but in mile 10 I knew I was slowing down a bit, and by mile 11, I was having a few cramps in the lower leg that just got worse through the end of the race. So part 3 actually looked me getting passed by a bunch of people and dragging across the finish with a 1:56, which was good enough for 5/24 in my advanced age group and 181/527 overall. So given the training cycle I had, a fairly representative result.
Slawomir Wojcik ran the Sydney Marathon and finished this race in the time of 2:55:04.
As I dreamed of attacking my PR of 2:51, my preparation for this race had to be really solid. I can honestly say that for the last few months, I did +98% of my prescribed workouts. I even did most of the strength work. I felt well prepared, but nevertheless, the goal was ambitious (I’m not getting any younger after all) so I knew everything had to line up perfectly, which made me really happy about the weather on the race day (~50F = 10C). The start was decent and I just run more on the conservative side, planning to accelerate later but felt pretty good overall. At the midpoint, I realized I was 1min10s behind my plan so switched to a higher gear and caught up within the next 3-4 miles without getting too exhausted – so far so good. However, starting at mile 19th a series of hills exposed my muscular weakness. I started feeling “micropulls” (as if a cramp was about to develop) in my hamstrings and hip adductors, especially on downhill segments. I just couldn’t keep the pace being afraid that a single misstep caused by a pre-cramp will cause a fall. Luckily it never happened, but breaking on downills further punished my muscles so the last 5 miles were extremely painful and frustrating because I knew that aerobically I could go faster. 2:55 is not a bad result (actually my 2nd best) and I suspect that if someone dropped me in these conditions on a start line in Chicago I would have a serious chance to break that PR. Another lesson is that I should probably shift my focus towards strength training.
