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blowing off the dust, cleaning the cobwebs
From my legs, that is. Tomorrow morning I'm driving to Moab, Utah, and on Sunday morning I'll be lining up at the start of my first race since...the last time I was in Moab, in March. Yikes.
I almost didn't sign up for The Other Half this year, as you, O Constant Reader, know. But in the last few weeks I have gone from "just finish it, and enjoy it" to "okay, maybe I can run it at MP as a workout" to "RACE THAT PUPPY!!!1!one!" I mean, I know I'm not going to PR; I'm definitely not in PR shape. But I am going to run it as fast as I can.
The past three weeks I have averaged 41mpw, and I'll match that this week after the half. My easy pace has floated down to the 9 minute range, and I even ran a "hard end of easy" run at 8:42, which is the sort of run I was doing just before I was injured. I have run a tiny amount of speedwork - a threshold run of 2x1.5 miles at 8 minute pace (which gratifyingly did not hit my LT heartrate, so I am pretty sure I can run faster than that for a half) and 6x half miles with 2 minute jog recoveries, which averaged 7:25 pace. Now, last spring before I was injured I did a similar workout in 7 minute pace, so clearly I'm not in that kind of shape yet, but it's really encouraging to see that I seem to be getting back more quickly than I had hoped.
It's really hard to talk about goals for this one, though. Race-day magic nearly always surprises me, with paces better than I ever run in training; I guess I need the adrenaline of actually being in a race to run my best. Moab's lower, so I get the altitude advantage, but on the other hand this is a rather hilly race. I know I said I was looking for 1:52-1:58, but I think I can do better. So I'm going to say: stretch goal is sub-1:41:44 (my slowest time on this course, from 2009), A goal is sub-1:44:18 (my slowest half since getting serious about running), B goal is sub-1:46, C goal is sub-1:50. And of course, overriding goal is don't hurt myself.
I almost didn't sign up for The Other Half this year, as you, O Constant Reader, know. But in the last few weeks I have gone from "just finish it, and enjoy it" to "okay, maybe I can run it at MP as a workout" to "RACE THAT PUPPY!!!1!one!" I mean, I know I'm not going to PR; I'm definitely not in PR shape. But I am going to run it as fast as I can.
The past three weeks I have averaged 41mpw, and I'll match that this week after the half. My easy pace has floated down to the 9 minute range, and I even ran a "hard end of easy" run at 8:42, which is the sort of run I was doing just before I was injured. I have run a tiny amount of speedwork - a threshold run of 2x1.5 miles at 8 minute pace (which gratifyingly did not hit my LT heartrate, so I am pretty sure I can run faster than that for a half) and 6x half miles with 2 minute jog recoveries, which averaged 7:25 pace. Now, last spring before I was injured I did a similar workout in 7 minute pace, so clearly I'm not in that kind of shape yet, but it's really encouraging to see that I seem to be getting back more quickly than I had hoped.
It's really hard to talk about goals for this one, though. Race-day magic nearly always surprises me, with paces better than I ever run in training; I guess I need the adrenaline of actually being in a race to run my best. Moab's lower, so I get the altitude advantage, but on the other hand this is a rather hilly race. I know I said I was looking for 1:52-1:58, but I think I can do better. So I'm going to say: stretch goal is sub-1:41:44 (my slowest time on this course, from 2009), A goal is sub-1:44:18 (my slowest half since getting serious about running), B goal is sub-1:46, C goal is sub-1:50. And of course, overriding goal is don't hurt myself.
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41MPW from where you were a few months ago- well that is PROGRESS.
Looking forward to the RR. Have a great race!!
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