Running • Page 83

Weather on Saturday looks great, drive to Iowa will be nothing but constant rain though. Oh well lol

 

Can cross Iowa off the list, it has been marathon-conquered.

No new PR but I really don’t give shit and knew that it would not be a PR day like, mile 9 as I started way too fast (typical cliche lol). Pretty sure it was like my third fastest half marathon time ever so I guess there’s that!

knew the course was a 13 mile loop done twice but my god that was more of a mental struggle than I thought. On one hand - good! No surprises, knew the route and what was coming. Downside is exactly that - I had just seen all this so there’s anything new to see.

Legs are shot, as expected.

Only 80 people did the marathon which was much lower than I expected. And since they started an hour before the half marathon folks and we were mostly running through parks it felt a bit like a small group run or just a regular weekend long run since you went long stretches with not seeing anyone.

8 weeks away from my Illinois marathon. Gonna focus on recovery (duh), core and strength training in preparation for that one.

 

Vastly different than my race experience this weekend for my 8k. 25,000 people lol. I actually crushed my expected time as I was hopped up on adrenaline for my first race. However, officially I ran nearly a minute slower as I was forced to take a bathroom break like 3k in. Then my nerve pain knee issue kicked in around 2 miles and I had to fight that one for more than half the race. Ended up running way too much on my back foot to compensate and was so sore after I could barely put any pressure on it.

i definitely want to do more but fear I’m going to need an MRI or something to figure out what’s wrong with my knee. I can’t do longer distances if it’s going to flare up.

 

25K for an 8K, goddamn! Can I ask what city this was in? Do you feel like most were from that city / nearby cities? So many people - larger than most bigger multi-distance events so that’s blowing my mind lol

sorry to hear about your knee! Hopefully if you do get it looked at there is a fix that doesn’t involve surgery or a lot of time off. Hopefully it’s something that can be corrected with either different cadence or strengthening exercises or something.

 

Yeah it was the Shamrock Shuffle in Chicago. I’ve never ran it before but it appeared most people were local.

Yeah as far as my knee we’ll see. I’ve had this issue for over a decade but before it usually only flared up when I exert direct pressure on it/touch it, like kneel, touch an object, etc. Since I started running more it will occasionally do this even just through the motion, thought it’s not an every time thing. I ran 4-5.5 mile segments each of the past four weekends and it didn’t occur.

 

It was pretty awesome yesterday running on the lake path in Chicago bc we saw Emma Coburn running the opposite way of us twice. She is such a beast.

 

Temps dropping twenty degrees below normal for my half tomorrow. Ugh.

 

I missed my goal (sub-2:15) by FOUR SECONDS.

If you ever want to be absolutely bodied by a half marathon, come to Knoxville.

 

Damn, that sucks about missing by 4 seconds, but congrats on finishing!

I’m guessing you knew it was gonna be tough but was it tougher than expected all the way through or were certain parts significantly more brutal? Gonna have to Google this now and take a look at an elevation map if I can find one

 

I knew about five of the six hills (and planned my run/walk to hydrate strategy accordingly). The sixth got me, but it was pretty short (and I was cramping at the time). I train in this area all the time so I knew what to expect for about 8 of the 13 miles. There’s a two mile climb from 3.5 to 5.5 that I made sure to keep going no matter what because it was the lowest grade. I walked the two sections at 9% grade (and passed people “running” so I kept momentum).

Edit: Here’s the map: https://knoxvillemarathon.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/2019-Marathon-Profile-Final.pdf?x92082

 

damn, it started with a hill too? Oof. Haven’t done an event yet with a hill at the start, that’s quite the way to start, yeesh. And 9% is no fucking joke!

 

I thought it turned left right before that first hill and then it started and I just let the people stream past me. Tried to really run “my” race (I’m slow, so my fast pace is like 9:15 and my average is like 10 flat) as opposed to getting sucked into the excitement before I could really warm up. It helped a ton when it came to the later hills.

It’s funny, the back half is much flatter with some really random hills. I was looking at the marathon top finishers and they all ran faster on the back 13.

 

Wanted to make it a goal to focus on strength training, core work and having the last mile of every run be the fastest.

pretty meh on increasing strength training and core work if I’m being honest, but doing really well at having my last mile be the fastest. Bigger goal isn’t to run a sub 3-hour marathon (at least not yet) but try to get in the mentality of finishing better / faster than I start.

 

Considering signing up for a fall marathon, looking at Richmond on November 12th.

It's been 5 years since my last one but I'm in way better shape now, at least 20 pounds lighter and a minute per mile faster.

 

half marathon done! ended up having a better time than my practice runs. hell yeah

 

awesome!

what race was it and what did you think of the course?

 

charlotte racefest and I liked it! it was a lot prettier than the areas I was training in and not as strenuous. nice part of town

 

Finally doing my first trail run of the year tomorrow morning and so excited. Been almost a year since the last one since once summer hits it’s bugs and pests galore.

 

Any other strava users here find that their caloric burn data is hyper inflated? I've been wondering about it for some time and decided to look into it...Found this. Kind of annoying.

https://www.yellowjersey.co.uk/the-...imated my calories by,that it works both ways.

 

I think I’m going to try the lottery for NYC 2023.

 

Granted I only have 4 finisher medals so far, but finally bought the wall display medal hanger thing that I’ve been looking at for two years.

has a map of the US so you can color in each state you complete so it will be fun to see the map get filled in slowly but surely over the next decade+

 

Did a tune-up race today for my marathon, which is five weeks out. 10k, 35 flat, won by 6 minutes and 15 seconds. Feels good!

 

35 flat. Okay Speedy Gonzalez.

 

Jesus Christ I can’t imagine running one mile in six minutes let alone a 10K or more. Incredible.

 

Curious as to what everyone uses to track their HR? I just use the strava app on my Apple Watch but am a bit curious about its accuracy. It always seems to be near my max no matter what kind run I’m doing. Dunno if it’s inaccurate or if I’m just not in that great of shape