Been quite some time since I've written a post, but that is mostly because I didn't do many races in 2014 that were really noteworthy. Most of the year was spent enjoying not having an IM to train for, doing a few races here and there with My Team Triumph, and starting to pursue the goal of qualifying for Boston. So - a few paragraphs to sum things up a bit:
With the BQ time of around 3:05 for my age group, I'd need to knock off about 1 min/mile off my MCM2013 performance. I began following the Daniels Running Formula at the beginning of December, and was pretty good about keeping up with that until around mid-May. There were a few weeks where I had to repeat a workout or had to change things up because of life schedule or work travel interruptions, but those were not common occurrences.
In mid-May I decided to switch from the Nike Free 5.0 shoes, the model I had been using for a couple years, to the Free 3.0. There were a few design things I was getting picky about with the 5.0 model line, and the 3.0 also brought the heel-toe drop from 7mm to 4mm - a minor difference, but I had wanted to start getting myself closer to a 0mm drop eventually, and it seemed like a good time to do so. I went through a period of adjustment - noticed right away that my hamstrings were tighter, and some blisters appearing in new places on my feet, for instance. I gave the quality workouts a bit of a break for that adjustment - at that time, I was well into Phase 3 Week 5 of the Daniels program, and had done some intense workouts that either had a rather large number (12) of marathon pace miles, or had significant time (40+') at threshold pace combined with just being a long (2.5+ hrs) workout.
Then, in mid-June, I started having right knee issues. It started as some suddenly developing pain, some lateral inflammation, but that went away after about a week. Then, a couple weeks later, I noticed a cyst developing. At one point it actually self-aspirated (internally), and another time I got so annoyed by it that I went downstairs and took a hammer to it. I eventually got concerned about the possibility of a lateral meniscus tear, and I was concerned I'd need to have corrective surgery. I didn't do any running for about 4 weeks, and went to yoga a lot to try and see if that would help. I eventually made an appointment with the doctor, he said to leave it be and it'd go away - but also gave me a referral to a sports ortho if I wanted a 2nd opinion. I visited that doctor, but it was after the hammer-induced self-aspiration, so he told me to come back when it reappeared so he could give me a steroid (cortisone) shot to help make it go away (he also confirmed no meniscus tear). I left with that plan in mind. By this time, it was mid-August, and I hadn't been running much at all - maybe 4-5 times, in two months time.
Then, around mid-September, it finally dawned on me - all my problems started when I got the new shoes. Up until then, they were nagging, little things that could easily otherwise be considered 'routine' and minor injuries. And one wouldn't think new shoes would result in a cyst on the knee. But it wasn't until I really thought about it that I discovered the trend. So, I got a new pair of Nike Free 5.0. My runs in the week or two leading up to that had been a noticeable improvement in terms of the knee, but that also could have been because of the large amount of rest - hard to be sure. Anyway, I got the new shoes, and my next run was the best run I had had in quite some time. I started to become convinced that I had maybe turned the corner on this thing - and just in time, because this half was only a month away, and I hadn't been running much.
My preparation for this run and the taper was quite odd, out of necessity due to the time crunch. I had to switch from the original marathon goal to the half, because I just didn't have the long runs to warrant the injury risk of a full marathon. My first 'long' run of 11 miles left me mildly sore for a couple days, but I also knew from experience that wouldn't likely happen again during subsequent long runs. In an attempt to jump start aerobic capacity, I managed to get runs of 11, 13, 15 and 16.75 miles in. I needed at least a couple long runs above and beyond the 13.1 to ensure my legs would feel OK in the last mile of the race. I also managed to squeeze in some speed work as a final crunch - usually by doing a couple miles at threshold pace, or something like 5-7 miles of tempo or something resembling marathon pace. Generally the idea was to do speedwork in such a way to get my muscles fatigued, and then crack the whips for a another 5-10 minutes (if threshold pace) or a few more miles (if tempo/MP). The goal here was not to increase top end speed (no time for that), but to build as much aerobic capacity as I possibly could in the short time before the race, and do so while not compromising recovery.
I think all runs in that 4 week period were basically prep for what I consider the two key workouts - the 16.75 mile long run for aerobic capacity, and taking part in the Hopkinton marathon relay, where I was able to get 8.5 hilly miles in at a pace of about 7:30 and half marathon intensity. The taper itself was basically only a week, and essentially followed a pattern of progressively shorter runs, but with increasing intensity. A week before the race was an 11 mile run with 2 x 3 mile progression intervals where I started out between Z1/Z2 for the first mile, Z2/Z3 for the second, and Z3/Z4 for the third mile, with one mile easy in between. The Wednesday before the race was a mile at closer to Z5, rest, and then a mile @ Z3, and the Friday before was a mile at Z5. Saturday was the 3' carbo load protocol at a 6' pace, but I ended up falling way short of the ideal number of carbs during the next 24 hours to really think that had a significant effect. Hard to say, though. What I do know is that the night before, I had severe doubts I'd be able to break 1:30 again, let alone my PR of 1:29:24. So, I went to a friends party at 10:30 at night, hung out for a drink, and got home at around 12:30 and went to bed, only to turn around and wake up at 5:45 to get to the race.
On race morning, I did manage to get in about 10-12' of easy warmup beforehand, something I've been finding I need to do if I'm going to have a chance of setting any PR in any race at this point (except maybe a full marathon). This is basically to get the fat burning metabolic pathways going before the gun goes off. Once I was warmed up, I headed to the start line, listened to the anthem, and then the race started. Oh, I also had 4 x 8 oz bottles of sports drink with me. More than most people had - but I wanted to make sure I kept as well hydrated as possible, for as long as possible.
My plan was pretty simple - stay at around MP (7:10 or so) for a few miles, and see how I would feel. I wouldn't have been surprised if I had to stay at that pace, or even slow down to 7:30's. I was mentally prepared for that possibility. But to my surprise, I was hanging closer to a 7 min/mile pace, and my HR was right around 160 - just about where it should be. So I decided to stay at that pace, and pretty much use by HR as a guide. The thinking here was that I had no workouts recently to justify using pace as a guide for a half marathon distance, so I'd go by RPE first, then HR, and then finally pace. After the first few miles ticked by, I found that I was feeling pretty good, and my HR was sticking around 165 or so. Surprisingly, my pace was also sticking around the 6:40's to 6:50's. There were a few times where I felt like I could speed up a bit, but I decided to hold off - I really had no idea how I'd feel in the later miles as it was, never mind if I went burning matches before the halfway point. I also felt, for the first time, like I was taking advantage of some drafting by being in clusters of people - it was a windy day, and once or twice I was behind/within a group of 5 or 6 people that I would normally want to just be out of the way of, but opted to stay close because I noticed I wasn't feeling much headwind in front of me.
That pace of 6:40-6:50, with a HR in the mid-160's, pretty much maintained until around the halfway mark, when it started to creep up to the high 160's. I backed off slightly - although I felt good, there was still half the race to go and I was really concerned about entering a danger zone where things could just blow up suddenly. The next few miles saw the HR stay in the high 160's or 170ish, but fortunately the pace stayed in the 6:40's.
Right around the 10 mile mark, I was starting to think that going sub-1:30 was a definite possibility. With my previous PR of 1:29:24, that was if-fy, but I would be ecstatic at breaking 1:30 again. I happened to be in a group of 4-5 other people at that spot, and someone asked if anyone knew our pace. It pretty much went like this:
Someone: Anyone know what our pace is?
No-tech dude: No idea, I have no technology on me.
Me: Do you really wanna know, or not?
(sometimes, too much information can be a bad thing)
Someone: Yeah
Me: We are at about a 6;45-6:50 pace.
No-tech dude: Is that for this mile, or the whole thing?
Me: Whole thing. If we keep this up, we could break 1:30
At that point, I started chatting a bit with no-tech dude, who informed me that he had no goals, couldn't run for 7 months due to injury, only started again in September, yadda yadda. After a bit of the 'wow, thats impressive. Good on you' type of exchange, we came up on another person who asked if he could run with us. I said sure, and that we'd all finish this thing out and go sub-1:30 together. I started getting a little concerned about the new member of our group, because he was huffing and puffing quite noisily, and it sounded like his lungs and legs were on fire.
While no-tech dude gradually pulled ahead a bit, I stayed with huffer puffer to help pace him - making sure he slowed down just a touch on the uphill, staying just ahead of him to keep him pushing, but not allowing him to give up. We were still on pace, so I didn't mind. Plus, it served as a nice distraction.
I pulled away from huffer puffer a bit at the last water stop which was about a mile from the end. The stops are staffed with high school volunteers, and this one had people dressed in costumes. I pointed to one as I approached, and instructed her to throw the cup of water she was holding in my face. I think I took her aback a bit, because she kinda acted like a deer frozen in headlights. I tried to grab the cup as I went by, but the handoff failed. I pointed to another one down the line, and she barely managed to toss her drink in my face as I ran by, but it was enough - I cheered back at them and continued on.
As I approached the finish line, I was gaining back on no-tech dude. A sprint to the finish, and crossed with a 10s PR. Not a huge PR, but a PR none-the-less, and I was just happy to have hit sub 1:30 again, after chasing after a repeat for the past two years.
Once I crossed the line, I shook hands and chatted with no-tech dude, and he thanked me for helping him cross in under 1:30. I looked back to find huffer puffer dude, and he said he made it by 10 seconds, and he thanked me for helping him out - it was a goal he was chasing for a year and a half. Then, another guy - apparently someone in the original group when we discussed pace - said that when he heard me say we were close to 1:30, he decided to go for it. So he thanked me as well. That was probably the best part - having three people say 'thank you' for helping them reach their goals. As nice as a PR or a solid performance is, ultimately that is just a battle with my future self - and the nice things about battles with myself is that I usually, ultimately, win :)
Garmin Data
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