Canada Day 1/2 marathon

By the numbers 1:35:51, 7:17 pace, 148 average HR, placed in my age group with results here.

It was a great day for a race with blue skies and temps around 15C at the start, though it did warm up during the run. The course elevation profile are shown below in green and my HR is in red. Two things to notice, not a flat course with plenty of rolling hills (think MDI) and gradually increasing HR as I struggled to maintain my planned MDI goal pace of 7:15/mile.

I arrived about an hour before the race start with plenty of time to pickup my free technical t-shirt and then get in a decent 2.5 mile warmup. It was just an easy jog over the last mile of the course but it was good to refresh my memory of what the finish looked like. My plan for the day was to attempt to run at planned MP for the duration but started too fast and immediately knocked of a 6:50 opening downhill mile, which was quickly offset by a 7:43 uphill mile (see the profile) followed by a 6:55 3rd mile before finally hitting pace of 7:15 on the 4th mile.

About this point I linked up with one of the lead women who was also blessed with a pair of evil rascal kids who were following their Mom along on the course. The kids provided great entertainment, yelling from the car "Hi Mom, want a ride?". They also pulled out their powerful waterguns at the water stops and laughed hilariously at their poor mother running her heart out. We ran in range of each for most of the rest of the race, taking turns at the lead as our energies ebbed and flowed. I was working mainly at trying to maintain a fixed pace and was more or less successful until the final mile or two. One hill in particular knocked the stuffing out of me as I didn't easy up on the pace and paid the price at the top in not being able to recover. From that point on my legs seemed to lose their snap and it was a struggle in. However, looking at the profile once again it looks like there was a good reason (more hills). I finished just behind the same lady (it would have been silly to try to outsprint her) and just about a minute slower than my goal time of 1:35.

I'm fairly pleased with how this run/race turned out. While I didn't quite make my time, it did give me a good indication of my current fitness and what it will be like to run on a hilly undulating course. It's time to work on my speed endurance and the lack of tempo runs showed through in today's performance and will be something to work on this month before the Grand Manan 1/2 on July 28th. After the race I also signed up for the Saint John marathon which is on Sept. 23, and only 3 weeks before MDI. 5th Sun had a question about how I plan to run this race with 18 miles at planned MP so close to MDI. It's an interesting question as doing a marathon so close to your goal race is not something I'd recommend anybody to try at home. My plan is to do a 6 mile cutdown, followed by 12 miles at MP and then shutting things down and jogging in the last 8 miles (or better yet quitting at that point). We'll have to see how much self control that I'm able to muster when the time comes.

Update for last weeks running: another 60 miles in the book. Six runs with 8hr 12min total and avg pace of 8:09. No speedwork to speak of except for a fartlek run with a total of 15 minutes in harder efforts. And that's all he wrote. And I'm on holiday's for the month! Whoopee!!

Have a great week!