Sub 80 HM

Amazing time there Chris, I can’t wrap my head around moving at that speed! :clap:

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That’s rapid. What sort of training volume have you been doing?

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Jan and July are my two biggest ever months, so don’t have years of running behind me. Did similar overall distance in the 2 preceding 12 months.

Plus 1-2 swims a week for last 12 weeks and about 4hrs a week cycling.
Difference for the last 12 weeks has been shift that bike has been all Z2 and moved to quality on the run. April may doing 400-800m at 5k pace, then shifted up towards 10k and half marathon pace work.

Read this thread three weeks ago and see I could progress threshold sessions in future cycles if I can tolerate them. My biggest were broken sets of 30min (6x5, 4x8, 3x11).

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That’s a very good result off relatively low mileage.

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Yeah I read other peoples volumes and feel like I have to do more, but I don’t think I physically could done previously even if I wanted to. Running injury risk (although I’m getting better there), but also just all round fatigue and recovery to keep nailing the quality sessions.
I’m working a lot less hours now though so good potential to increase if wanted!

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Great running there, proper pleased for you :blush:
Sub-75 is definitely there, patience will be key.

I got my 1:20:41 off just a bit less volume than that, too. So for low volume folks, there’s hope.

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I wasn’t going for sub75 on Sunday, but did have an outside hope of something in the region of 78 which would have been a 90s pb. In all honesty, my run training this year has been sporadic at best, and hasnt really had any specific focus at all. But I think I’ve got a bit carried away with somehow breaking my 5k pb twice, knocking a total 18s off to 17:04. The blow up in the track 5000m I did should have probably been a bit of a forewarning however.

I ultimately faded quite badly from halfway on Sunday and came in a just over 50s outside of my pb, with an 80:28. I was aiming to hold 6:00/mile, although started off faster than that with two 5:50’s. The second was downhill into the tunnel however. The problem was coming back up the other side. Up to that point, my HR had been at, or slightly above, full marathon level, but it spiked on that climb and I never got it back down. What had felt super comfortable initially, slowly began to overfill the funnel. I hung on as best I could, but deep down I knew I wasn’t going to be setting any bests. In hindsight, I’d really not done enough (/much at all) at target HM pace.

The fade did make me question how I set my best. Key averages per mile are as follows (I’ve done the same race 4 years running). Power seems as good a metric as anything to judge relative effort … it should at least be representative to itself, even if there are questions about it’s relevance more generally.


I think the key takeaways are that when I set my best I had left something in the tank to finish strong. Much more clearly shown graphically…
image
And then the other thing is that I definitely can’t criticise myself for not trying this year. I don’t think I’ve ever seen HR numbers up in the 180’s and been able to hold them there for that long. I was certainly working!

I do think a 78ish is in the tank if I trained specifically for it. But going sub75 really seems unrealistic. 3:33/km seems completely unattainable for that duration when I haven’t even done that for 10k

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@stenard with the science again! :heart_eyes:

It would be really interesting to see those power lines overlaid onto pace per km (or the VAM pace). I’d guess they should corelate very closely. Similarly to have overall time as the X axis against power per km/min on the Y.

Main takeaway for me is that you have run 4 races, across 4 years all within 2 mins of each other! That’s tasty consistency! All really strong performances as well.

But yeah, sub 75 is one of those big jumps i think. I’d be confident i could run a 77 again, but those last 2 mins are just nasty to chase.I’d guess a lot of specificity and consistency.

… oh and forgot to say well done! Looks like my ‘mate’ (deffo not my mate! haha) Jake Smith won the overall. Little bugger.

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Yeah the step from 80 to 75 min does seem quite large or at least mentally anyway!

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The other thing I have spotted is what the Nike’s have done to my cadence.
I had an average cadence of 181spm in the pre-Nike shoes. It was 172spm yesterday, and has trended down throughout that time (176, 174, then the 172). But the biggest jump was 181 to 176 in 12 months, with the initial change in shoes.

It relates to the other thread on changing stride length I think. These shoes give you a bit more propulsion per step, but if you’re flying through the air a bit longer, then it seems you end up being able to take less steps. What effect that has overall, other than a reduction in cadence and increase in stride length, I’m not sure

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Interestingly, probably your best run out of those is 2018, pre Nikes?

To give you some perspective, I ran 2 1:17’s pre Nike’s when I was a kind of triathlete, ie lower mileage than now supplemented with umm commuting and sporadic swimming.
It was only when the Nikes first appeared and I ran a 34:14 that 75 even came on the radar and even then it was because GB gave it a go a few years back. It has then taken a further 2 or 3 years of being only being a runner to get there, I still cant believe the time I pulled off, but as you know somedays you are just ‘on’.

I agree 78 or even a 77 would seem a realistic goal in the next year or so, not wanting to be negative, but I would say to get to 75 whilst not being a runner only on silly mileage you need to be pretty damn high on the talent spectrum.

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Yeah, I think this is fair. My run training for probably the last 21 months hasn’t been hugely structured. My 2:48 mara was definitely the best block I’ve put in, and that was the back end of a year where I’d also run big volume early season for VLM (and then got ill). So I had a fair bit built up then. I’d not really run anything faster than about 3:55/km pace for weeks and weeks, and still stuck in a sub36 a couple of weeks out from the marathon, but that was peak endurance and running faster than that 10k for more than 2x the distance just seems unfathomable.

It’s an interesting point, and one I’d probably agree with. In some ways I’m glad I went sub80 before they came along as at least it’s one of my milestones that noone can say was only due to the shoes! I definitely don’t think I was as fit the following year, yet beat the time in the Nikes. And my strava comments did use the word “cheating”, not that I actually think they are. But they’re undoubtedly beneficial

Yep same, I scraped in at 2:44:55 pre super shoe in 2017 VLM. Felt great until about mile 22 then the leg fatigue that the super shoe as gone some way to eliminating kicked in and it was a real struggle to the point that I couldn’t have cared less whether I would get under despite it being a six year goal, all I wanted to do was stop.
Of course that is irrelevant to running a fast half where the super shoe is all about the extra something (bounce?) they give

Now that Kona had been moved, I will spend October and November with more running focus. Don’t think that a 75 is on the cards, but 80 would be a nice target and sub 2:50 marathon

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1:16:37 for me back in 2011. Ha ha - think that’s as fast as I’ll ever go in a half now. Never say never though I guess

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Who renamed the thread?

I think I’ll stick with my 80:41 and add it to the collection of “close but no cigar” PBs :sweat_smile:

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… I should buck up my ideas. Got a good talking to from ex running club president about keep racing - but then he’s from that generation when every man and his dog could walk a 10k under 35 minutes

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Less than 2 seconds per km?
Bet you can squeeze them out

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@fruit_thief - I had just changed jobs and had to go to London for two weeks, plus I’d only really started exercising again 10 months prior (last May Bank Holiday 2018 I started up again, half marathon was March 2019)
I was targetting a <90 minute, but bought the 4% and lined up in the <85 minute brigade.
I was only doing ~19minute park runs at the time.

ETA: I ran an 18:42 the week before race day as part of my target race pace run.

I’ve just been through TrainingPeaks, Garmin and Strava, checking out my KM splits and HR and the session names, I barely did anything.
Keep in mind I was cycling 120km Wednesday, 80km Friday and 100km on alternate Sunday’s, plus swimming 3.5km three times per week with the tri-club at this point.

Week 1 1hr 50mins 28km
30 min easy jog (6km)
25 min easy jog (5km)
50 min easy jog (10km)
35 min fartleks (7km)

Week 2 2hr 23km
40 min easy jog (8km)
50 min hills (9km)
30 min fartleks (6km)

Week 3 2hrs 15mins 28km
55 min target race pace (12km)
30 min easy jog (6km)
50 min hills (10km)

Week 4 2hrs 5mins 27km
65 min long run (13km)
30 min easy jog (6km)
30 min target race pace (8km)

Week 5 1hr 40mins 16km
50 min easy jog (10km)
30 min easy jog (6km)

Week 6 25mins 5km
25 min easy jog (5km)

Week 7 3hrs 15mins 44km
65 min long run (14km)
50 min easy jog (10km)
15 min brick run (4km)
35 min target race pace (6km)
50 min easy run (10km)

Week 8 2hrs 5mins 29km (+ RACE)
55 min target race pace (12km)
45 min fartlek (10km)
25 min easy jog (5km)
RACE DAY

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Can we age grade this? My PB was set at 49, not 29!

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