Race report: 2014 Maidenhead Half Marathon

Ran this race for the first time earlier today. Was not feeling great this morning, went to bed early but tossed and turned, awoke with a headache for reasons unknown, and before the race felt run down and light headed, like maybe I'm fighting something off. Wasn't expecting a great time for these reasons, and also because of  mediocre recent runs, e.g. went 18 miles last Sunday but felt unfit and sluggish. So before the start, my state of mind was similar to what it had been before the Burnham Beeches HM three weeks ago: just wanted to finish and expected this could end up being my slowest HM ever.

I was wrong, just like I was at Burnham Beeches. I ended up with a chip time of 1:34:25, my fourth-fastest HM out of the ten I've run. Mile one was my slowest (7:39) and mile thirteen was my fastest (6:58), but I kept a pretty even pace throughout: my average pace was 7:12, and aside from miles one and thirteen, my miles ranged from 7:01 to 7:19.

Enjoyed having the whole family there. They had fun runs for kids and both of mine ran the 800 metre race.

 

Race report: 2014 Burnham Beeches Half Marathon

I ran this race for the second time yesterday. My expectations weren’t high. I’ve been running so many half marathons lately that I’ve become more blasé about my times. Also the night before I’d gone out with my wife for our 10^th anniversary and had a few drinks. I slept OK but wasn’t in ideal form. Towards the start I expected that I might not even break 1:40 (for the first time ever), and it didn’t bother me that much. I just wanted to finish.

I averaged only a 7:41 pace in the first three miles. But as the race went on I seemed to gain more energy than I lost. This has been something of a pattern in my recent halfs, but never so much as in this one. My average speed for miles 11-13 was 6:51, and I finished in 1:35:12 for a 7:16 overall pace. I was very happy with that. It’s nine seconds per mile faster than I ran the same race a year ago.

Burnham Beeches is a pretty good race. It’s a really nice wooded, totally traffic-free course that starts about 6.5 miles from my home. It’s well-organized, has great locker room facilities, everything is simple and stress-free. In fact it may be a bit too simple, in that post-race all you get is a medal (nice design but same as last year’s) and bottle of water. If the goody bag were better and they had a fun run for kids, it might be the ideal race for me. Nevertheless I enjoyed it and will probably do it again.

I had no obvious way to get home after the race, because my wife needed our car to take our kids to swim lessons. I had no specific plan for how to handle this, thought I might walk to a train station or call a minicab, but then close to the start of the race I saw a sign that said that the town of Hedgerley was only a couple miles away. I remembered that Hedgerley was home to the White Horse, perhaps the best beer place in Bucks county. I’d been wanting to spend more time there, so I walked there after the race and had a couple of pints and crab pie for lunch before my wife came and got me. A pretty nice post-race reward.

Next race in three weeks: the Maidenhead Half Marathon. This one does have a fun run so it’ll be for the whole family.

Race report: 2014 Wycombe Half Marathon

Ran this for the fourth time last Sunday and enjoyed it as usual. Both kids did the fun run. My official time (1:37:12) was my slowest ever, one second slower than Burnham Beeches last summer. (However Wycombe's chip timing is only used to record finish time, not start time, so I can console myself in knowing that 1:37:12 is actually my gun time and a few seconds slower than my net time).

I really like this race. When I ran it for the first time five years ago, it was my first race after getting back into running and after moving to England. It was a good experience then and continues to be. It's simple and well-organized, the medal this year was nice and better than previous years, and the t-shirt and goody bag were again very good. Also, kids' fun run medal was excellent and higher quality than in previous years. The big hill at the very beginning is tough but you make up for it with an equally steep downhill portion later. And once you're over that hill, the rest seems relatively easy.

Am I concerned that my time was kind of slow? Am I definitely slowing with age? I don't know. I do wonder if I can ever get back to sub-3:15 marathon form at this rate. However, I don't treat half-marathons like races as much as I used to, I treat them more as training runs. I ran 20 miles on the Sunday before this race and I hardly tapered at all. So maybe I'm doing fine. I'm keeping my mileage up and avoiding injury, and my performance was OK, so maybe I actually am on track to get back up to speed for the marathon. Wait and see. Next up is the Burnham Beeches Half, which I'll sign up for today.

Entered: Wycombe 2014, London 2015

Just paid £17 to enter the 2014 Wycombe Half Marathon, which will happen in three weeks, and £35 to enter the 2015 London Marathon, which will happen in ten months. Am happy to do Wycombe for the fourth time, more than I've done any other race. Charlie and Maggie can do the fun run again. And really pleased to be in London again on a good for age entry. Finishing within 7 seconds of 3:15 at the 2013 North Dorset Village Marathon has certainly paid off, affording me two good for age entries now. But unless I run sub-3:15 at Abingdon 2014 or London 2015, I won't qualify for London 2016. And I'm not sure how realistic it is to expect to ever get that fast again. I'll try, but I seem to be getting slower. Have thought about quitting the marathon and just focusing on the half, actually. We'll see what happens over the next year. I'll probably stick with the marathon at least as long as I can keep qualifying for London.

Shoes etc.

Had to go to Oxford Circus today for work so stopped by Nike Town. Got a pair of the new Free 5.0. I wore the 2009 model in Luton 2009 and Edinburgh 2010 (yellow for Luton, grey for Edinburgh), and Edinburgh was by far my best ever marathon, so I have a good history with these shoes. Having brought these home today, I threw out my old grey 5.0's in which I had been continuing to run. They served me well but I'm happy to see them go, they'd grown a bit distended and ugly (they weren't very good looking to begin with, the new model looks much better). I think I will wear the new ones in Abingdon 2014.

Below is a photo of the new 5.0's with the St Albans t shirt I like so much and the new shorts I also got today at Nike Town. The outfit is laid out because I'm wearing it to work tomorrow -- I joined the Brunel gym today, and will start my five mile run from there tomorrow morning so afterwards I can lift some weights. Haven't lifted weights in years (used to do so regularly though) and am looking forward to it.

So I have a good shoe plan, eight pair of minimalist designs that I can alternate to keep my body guessing, to avoid overuse of any particular set of muscles/joints/tendons and thus better avoid injury. I have two pair of zero-drop shoes (Mizuno Wave Evo Ferus Trail [which I especially love]; Puma Faas Zero), two racing-flat-style 4mm drop (Mizuno Wave Universe 3 and 4), two more padded 4mm drop (2012 and 2013 Nike Free 3.0), and two relatively padded approximately 8mm drop (New Balance MT101 and the new Free 5.0).

Next race on the horizon is the Wycombe Half Marathon, which I plan to run for the fourth time on 20 July.

Race report: 2014 St Albans Half Marathon

Ran this today and loved it. Finished in 1:36:26, my third-slowest HM time ever (out of seven), but it was hilly and hot, and I placed 133rd out of 2,503 finishers (top 5.3%) and I'm happy with that. Nice course, woodsy and rural with no cars, and maybe nicest t-shirt I've ever received in a race, good colours and design (although shirt from 2012 Wycombe HM is a contender too). My wife and kids ran the 1.5 mile fun run so it was a family affair. Beautiful weather, sunny and low 70s. Good experience overall.

New watch, half marathon plans

Excited about my new Garmin 220, ordered it yesterday on Amazon and it arrived today. An upgrade to the Garmin 10 I've been using for the last 16 months. Color screen, bluetooth (can synch wirelessly with smartphone) and ability to display average pace (seems like a basic feature but not possible with the 10). Haven't used it for real yet but I think the GPS reception will be much improved as well.

Have been thinking about running several half marathons between now and the Abingdon Marathon (in October). I don't see any halfs I must do between now and our trip to Sicily at the end of May, but I'm thinking about St Albans on 8th June, and then two I've done before, Wycombe in July and Burnham Beeches in August. Also one in September, out of four that look good: Farnham, Richmond, Ealing, and Windsor. Ealing and Windsor are probably out though because they are three weeks pre-Abingdon, and I'd like my last long run to be that day. Farnham and Richmond are both four weeks pre-Abingdon so I may choose one of them.