Dispatches from the middle

Famous Last Words – My New Goal (1:40)

After a week of thesis madness followed by a 50-hour workweek (I theoretically work halftime…sigh…), neither of which allowed for much running (or blogging!) at all, I’ve come to the conclusion that marathon training is probably not feasible this year. It would likely not be successful, and would definitely be frustrating. Properly preparing for a marathon takes a ton of time, and involves a lot of 3-4 hour runs that tend to leave one more or less useless for the rest of the day, and I, unfortunately, cannot fit that in right now.

However, there are other goals to pursue! I’m going to run faster. And then, when I do make it back to marathoning, I’ll just be that much faster. Score! In May, I ran a new half-marathon PB of 1:48. By the end of the year, I want to be running the half under 1:40. Eight minutes in six months. Doable? Maybe. Overly ambitious or overly modest? Who knows. I’ve never set a time-related goal before, and I’ve certainly never given myself a set time period in which to achieve it, so I have no idea what is realistic and what isn’t. This should be interesting, then – eight minutes doesn’t sound like that much. Famous last words?!

It will require a bit of research, and a bit of experimentation, to figure out what the best strategies for running faster over long distances are. Thus far, I know of tempo runs and mile repeats. A bit of strength training in the form of stairs and hills probably wouldn’t hurt either. And I could stand to cut back on the sweets. No point in hauling that extra brownie around with me if I don’t have to (those of you who know me well, know that I’m composed of roughly 99.9 % sugar).

If anyone has any ideas, or proven strategies for running faster, I’d love to hear them! Send them my way, please! I will post ideas and experiment results as they come in.

Topic:

2 responses to “Famous Last Words – My New Goal (1:40)”

  1. Anthony Avatar
    Anthony

    One good one that I’ve been trying and feels like it’s working (although maybe that’s just because it hurts) is to throw sprints into the middle of basic training run. In other words, at a training pace slower than a tempo run, throw in a 30s sprint every 5-10 minutes (depending on how long the run is). The key to making it effective is to keep your pace before and after the sprint the same, i.e. no Wow-that-hurt Jog for a minute after the sprint: e.g. 5:30/km running pace; sprint for >30s; decelaerate to 5:30/km running pace. The minute or so after the sprint, all my body wants to do is not maintain that pace, but I do and it seems to make a difference.

    Of course, I’m coming off of a long training lull, so any training is speeding me up right now, but I heard about it in Runner’s World, so it’s not all bupkis.

    Reply
    1. Katie Petersen Avatar
      Katie Petersen

      Ha ha. Bupkis. I’d totally forgotten that word existed! I like this idea though – thanks! I tried “sprinting” for about 40 m yesterday, and it was a sorry, sorry display. Also felt completely weird. It’s going to take a while to get back into it; perhaps I need to go back to the track and start with some accels and all those hoppy exercises we used to do :). I’ve not run much the last two weeks or so either, so it’s a wee lull, but I’m definitely feeling the effects. I’ll try setting myself a schedule for the next little while incorporating tempo, repeats, sprint runs, stairs, and normal runs. Weeeeeeee!

      Reply

Leave a comment

Previous:
Next Post: