Half Marathon Time!

After a rather eventful day, I am currently relaxing about 45 minutes outside of Philadelphia, counting down the hours until the R&R Half Marathon.  I decided rather last minute to sign up for this race mostly because I didn't have the money!  Thanks to my 2nd place in the 20 miler though, that race no longer cost anything, so I decided to throw my name into the mix for this race.

The course is flat, there will be a ton of competition, and the weather should be perfect for running.  I am looking forward to shooting for a PR and based on last year's results, maybe a top-100 finish.  Based on my training and racing as of late, I think I'm in great shape, so this should be an exciting race.

For the week, I've done about 60 miles of running and 75 of biking.  The bike rides consisted of an easy 50 miler, and a 25 miler with two all out sprints about a mile or more each and one hill climb; I'm trying to get myself prepared for next year's competitive group rides.  I also did a 10x 1000 meter track workout with 1 minute rest between reps on Tuesday night, certainly a killer workout.  My times started at around 3:29 but I inched down to sub 3:20 by the last couple, doing it in a progression style.  Being that all my reps were comfortably under 5:40 pace, I don't think 5:45 for the half is out of the question, especially since I ran a couple of sub-5:50s in my 20 miler race without completely killing myself.

Of course, I won't be 100% fresh for this race since I did a 20 miler today, 6:34 average pace with the last 5 miles at marathon pace or better.  It was a great progression run, and much needed for my confidence.  Overall, I feel pretty good considering!  I made sure to eat up and hydrate afterwards, and a good shake out during my warmup tomorrow should have me good to go.  I call this training through the race, which I do all the time.


Back in March when I ran my 1:16:12, I had run 84 miles in the week leading up to the race, with a speed workout on Friday and a 22 miler on Saturday.  So if anything, I'm much fresher for this race.


Time to get it done!