(Road Racing and) Time Trialing and Training Thread - Week Ending 11/22/2020

M35, 6'2, 174 lbs

Next: On The Road To Recovery

Mon - 12.94 mi cycling @ 16.7 mph

Tues - 2.79 mi WU+S | 4.50 mi @ 5:58/mi | 2 mi CD

Wed - 6.21 mi @ 8:12/mi

Thurs - 20.05 mi cycling @ 18.0 mph

Fri - 2.09 mi WU | 0.68 mi S | 4.37 mi @ 6:10/mi | 2.10 mi CD

Sat - 5.70 mi @ 7:56/mi

Sun - 12.25 mi @ 7:27/mi

My coach introduced some more speed into the week.

Tuesday was a 3 x 800-400-400 workout with 200 recovery between reps and 400 recovery between sets. He wanted the 800s at 2:50 and the 400s at 80, so that's what he got! Felt like I could have kept going, which is good.

Friday was a structured fartlek that took forever to plug into my watch: 30-60-30-90-30-60-30-90-30-60-30 with double-time active recovery on all. Kept all of those paces between 5:00/mi & 5:10/mi and it felt good.

highhoppingworm wrote:I am going to give a marathon a shot tomorrow morning. It’s the only day with reasonable weather through Thursday. Should be a bit cold with a real feel of 25 but that isn’t a bad thing necessarily. Plan is to take it out REALLY easy.

In a race situation, I would expect 2:45 at your current fitness. Even running solo, sub-3 should be a given. Of course, nothing is truly guaranteed in the marathon. How easy is "REALLY easy"? 6:50 pace? 7:00?

Do you have a support crew? Setting water bottles out ahead of time? Actual air temp above freezing? Good luck.

Also, congrats on a superb effort in last week's 5K. 6:45-pace tomorrow should feel very relaxed.

Nice job RunnerSam! What a beastly effort! How much elevation gain is in that race?

HHW - nice 5k - your frustrations about being slower of about 10s vs. what you thought are funny. Its not even a race situation! Enjoy the ride :) Tomorrow's marathon should be obtainable - it'll come down to nutrition and hydration - do you have a Nathan vest you can wear? Breaking 3 is sort of arbitrary, so if you're going to do it, might as well make a "legit bq" time out of it - go for 2:57:xx

Decent week for me - 70 miles, about 12 miles "faster" and the rest "hanging out" - enjoying the daily grind and got some runs in with my 2 year old - lovin' it!

Sub 6:00 wrote:

M36, 5’10”, about 160

A highlight of the last few weeks has been often running by a parking lot full of animatronic dinosaurs.

Your runs are inspirational

you in the DC MD VA area? They're doing that at Fedex Field.

Hi Allen,

No crew. This race will start at 2am on the bike path near my house. Out 4 miles out and back on my daily route followed by a 10 mile loop around a pond I do when I get bored of running the bike path followed by the same 4 mile out and back loop with a bit tacked on at the end. Only 4 total road crossings! I’ll place 2 water bottles at the start and grab them at miles 8 and 18. Will strap some maurtens to them. Weather looks to be about 25 real feel (33 real temp) throughout with 8-10 mph winds so certainly not perfect but not horrible for a big Sasquatch like myself. Will wear long tights and long sleeve + some gloves and hand warmers.

Most of my easy runs are 7:00-7:20 pace with the opening mile usually around 8 minutes progressing down into the 6:40s by the end. I’m guessing with some race day shoes and adrenaline 715-730/705/7/650 will be the target for the first 4 mile before settling into 640 pace through the half. I will re-evaluate at that point.

Thanks Chef. I’ll bump the sub 3 thread if I can pull it off for old times sake. No vest for me. I can’t stand running with anything bouncing around and I have setup the course so I should be able to pass stuff a few times. That + the cold (lack of sweating) I hope will work in my favor.

Agreed that breaking 3 is arbitrary but sometimes arbitrary goals have a nice ring to them. 18 months ago sub 3 was my lifetime goal... I feel like this would put a good stamp on 2020 and allow me to focus on bigger and better things in 2021.

hhw - Best of luck with that marathon endeavor. Unless you are used to running hard, longer efforts in tights, a long sleeved shirt and such, I'd advise against dressing so warmly. You are going to warm up quickly out there and unless you have somewhere to shed that clothing, you'll have to carry it the entire time. Food for thought.

Good plan! You've got it!

runnerchef wrote:Good plan! You've got it!

Agreed! 2 a.m.?! Man, that is hardcore crazy impressive.

Ha. It’s just another normal day in the worm household. Mrs. worm has work, toddler worm has daycare to get to and I took the day off but still need to care for infant worm which I may find exceedingly difficult to do after a marathon but we will see.

highhoppingworm wrote:

Ha. It’s just another normal day in the worm household. Mrs. worm has work, toddler worm has daycare to get to and I took the day off but still need to care for infant worm which I may find exceedingly difficult to do after a marathon but we will see.

2AM is still PURE NUTS. Go get it, hhw.

Allen1959 wrote:

highhoppingworm wrote:I am going to give a marathon a shot tomorrow morning. It’s the only day with reasonable weather through Thursday. Should be a bit cold with a real feel of 25 but that isn’t a bad thing necessarily. Plan is to take it out REALLY easy.

In a race situation, I would expect 2:45 at your current fitness. Even running solo, sub-3 should be a given. Of course, nothing is truly guaranteed in the marathon. How easy is "REALLY easy"? 6:50 pace? 7:00?

Do you have a support crew? Setting water bottles out ahead of time? Actual air temp above freezing? Good luck.

Also, congrats on a superb effort in last week's 5K. 6:45-pace tomorrow should feel very relaxed.

In terms of fitness, I wouldn't think that you're going to have any trouble breaking three. Overall, I think you're quite a lot fitter than I was when I ran just under 2:45, though I may have been doing a bit higher mileage and a bit longer long runs, which are obviously relevant for the marathon. Of course, I had the benefit of running in a race. The solo TT part definitely poses a challenge, but on the positive side, you won't have to deal with travel and race-day logistics, you won't have to navigate crowds, and you'll be running in a familiar environment. (Sounds like a nice course, by the way!)

I agree with Tyler that you probably don't need to wear tights for a marathon in those temps. Personally, I'd go with a hat (but I always run in a hat), gloves (preferably something you can drop), probably a jacket/longsleeves, whichever you prefer, and maybe half-tights. But really, a hat and gloves will go a long way.

Have a great run!

You guys have altered my plan. Half tights it is... but the hand warmers stay!

Allen1959 wrote:

runnerchef wrote:Good plan! You've got it!

Agreed! 2 a.m.?! Man, that is hardcore crazy impressive.

One might even say....epic.

Have a great one!

25 degrees for me is half tights ... cut off T shirt , arm warmers and gloves... beanie over a headband and when get warm off comes the beanie and the arm warmers.. Suns not out guns still out.

Maybe rail a couple lines if gonna run at 2 am.

runrincerepeat wrote:

25 degrees for me is half tights ... cut off T shirt , arm warmers and gloves... beanie over a headband and when get warm off comes the beanie and the arm warmers.. Suns not out guns still out.

Maybe rail a couple lines if gonna run at 2 am.

worm checks back in tomorrow morning: "So I ran 1:59:39"

Tyler_Runs_Lifts wrote:

runrincerepeat wrote:

25 degrees for me is half tights ... cut off T shirt , arm warmers and gloves... beanie over a headband and when get warm off comes the beanie and the arm warmers.. Suns not out guns still out.

Maybe rail a couple lines if gonna run at 2 am.

worm checks back in tomorrow morning: "So I ran 1:59:39"

its like christmas eve on the thread...what will HHW post once we wake up?!?

highhoppingworm wrote:

You guys have altered my plan. Half tights it is... but the hand warmers stay!

Go after it sir! Excited to see the recap in here tomorrow morning! I think you'll easily get under 3:00 especially with the 15:45 you just ran. You are definitely in better shape than I was when I did my virtual Boston thing. I managed a 2:50 there and definitely wasn't prepared (

)

The 4 mile warmup to start will definitely be your friend! If the top ends up being too warm you can always drop it on one of the loops and pick it up after!

Good luck!