It's all relative

Florida Beach Half Marathon- Series Finale

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Location:

FL,United States

Member Since:

Feb 08, 2015

Gender:

Male

Goal Type:

Other

Running Accomplishments:

Certified course PR's:

Mile: 4:28.0 (Florida, Jan 2020)

5K: 15:12 (FL, Jan. 2020)

10K: 31:44 (FL, Feb. 2020)

15K: 49:03 (FL, Feb. 2020)

1/2 Marathon: 1:10:34 (FL, Feb. 2020)

Marathon: 2:26:57 (WA, July 2019)

100k (63.7 miles, trail): 9:11:00 (FL, Jan. 2019)

Personal:

I started running in 2010 and have (mostly) kept it a habit ever since!  

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Miles:This week: 0.00 Month: 0.00 Year: 0.00
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
309.4161.19370.60
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
14.400.0014.40

AM: 3 miles then to the gym- arms, back, plyos.

PM: 11 miles, mostly with Anthony.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
18.102.0020.10

AM: 10 miles.  Ran with Alan and Michele at the track, did some fast stuff with them, nothing worth noting.

PM: 10 miles, half with Anthony.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
10.500.0010.50

PM: 10 1/2 miles solo.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
7.155.0012.15

AM: Track tempo in Safety Harbor with Anthony.  We did 4x200, 2x3200, 4x200 with 400 recovery between the 3200s.  I incorporated a fair amount of plyometrics and tried to focus on my knee drive.

Splits: 38, 35, 35, 35, 10:43, 10:39, 35, 35, 35, 35

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
20.700.0020.70

AM: 17 miles pretty easy with Lee, Steve, Anthony, and Christina.

PM: 3 miles then the gym- chest, tris, shoulders

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
13.000.0013.00

Late PM: 13 miles solo.  Felt great.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
14.304.0018.30

AM: 8 miles in SH.  Did a workout- alternating 200s and 600s x4 with short recoveries.

PM: 10 miles in EL with Anthony and Chad.  We did a modified workout of 2 miles worth of 30 and 60-second intervals on the trail.  I did not pay attention to pace at all.  

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
10.600.0010.60

AM: 3+ miles and then the gym- arms, back, and legs.

PM: 7 miles with Anthony in SH.  Feeling great.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
7.101.008.10

7 miles with Anthony in East Lake.  Some striders added later.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Race Prep- So it looks like I'll have a good shot at the top 3 this Sunday for the last leg of the halfathon race series, but will try for higher.  I’m already pretty pumped for it in a “racing” aspect.  It’s a culmination of 4 half marathons where 3 of your times are added together and the lowest cumulative total time wins $1,000.  This last race must be ran and counted in your total time.  Right now the standings are:

1st- Anthony-  - Leader -
2nd- Chris-     + 0:48 seconds
3rd- Me-        + 0:50
4th-  Sean      +3:48
5th- Lee        +3:55

I’m excited to see what I will do with a proverbial hill to climb.  I have to try to beat Anthony by 51 seconds who I beat in the 15k by 37 seconds two weeks ago.  As you can imagine, that extrapolates to almost exactly an overall tie for Sunday based on the above standings.  I also have to beat Chris- notorious for his stick-and-draft technique- by 3 seconds.  He’s usually the most fit of the 3 of us at any given time, but hasn’t raced locally in a while so who knows.  We once finished a race together and our times were the same and neither of us could tell who crossed the line first.  His PR is also similar to mine, so it could be a VERY interesting race

That being said, I will tentatively make a pace goal of... hmm… winning- by 50 seconds?  That, though, is dependent on the weather and the fitness/race plans of Chris and Anthony.  I’ve never gone into a race with the direct intention to “race” before, so this is going to be quite an experience. 

What strategy should I pick?  And will I cave, or do I succeed?  Drama ensues… :)

Comments(5)
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
0.000.000.00

Planned day off.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
4.000.004.00

AM: 4 miles easy.

Comments(2)
Race: Florida Beach Half Marathon- Series Finale (13.109 Miles) 01:12:45, Place overall: 1, Place in age division: 1
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
3.7013.1116.81

Race Report: Florida Beach Half Marathon finale  

Race prep: Nothing specific, just been in a holding pattern for the past month with so many races close together.

Weather: 70s, humid, windy, partly sunny.  It could have been worse.

Goal: Win by 50 seconds against those ahead of me in the series, or try to by racing on my own terms.  If they beat me, they beat me, but they’ll have to take my best punch.

The race: Wow.  I was seriously geared up for this.  I was third entering this race, and had serious work to do.  I was down 50 and 3 seconds from 1st and 2nd respectively to try and win the race series which started October 31st.  Now I am sincerely thankful for the comments (from this site) to tell me just to run my own race plan and not let anyone get comfortable.  I chose to go out hard- much harder than I ever have.  I wanted to make the pace uncomfortable from the start.  No one even attempted to stay with me from the gun, and I had a 20-second lead at least by mile 1.  It was 35 seconds by mile 2.  And I pressed to open a 55-second lead by the end of mile 3 on second.  I’m sure the next two guys assumed I would fall off.  I did not.  I was hoping somewhere along the way they all broke apart, which I wanted to happen as this is a really windy course.  The first 3 water tables weren’t ready for me or the lead bike come by even to even hand out water, and one of the tables wasn’t even being manned.  The biker felt bad by the third table and dropped back to me to offer to go back and grab me some water and offered me one of his GUs, but I didn’t really mind and told him thank you, but I’m okay.  Although the water would have been nice since it was humid, things happen and they are all volunteers for goodness sake.  I’m just thankful they are there to begin with.

I was on a mission until mile 8 just plowing through the wind solo, where there is a big turnaround loop at the end of the island in the middle of some serious crosswind.  I knew I needed to keep pressing but gained some confidence at this point.  Timing from the turnaround, my lead was 2 minutes on the nearest person, Anthony (who was ahead 50 seconds in the series on me), and then at least 3 minutes on the next two guys which included the 2nd place guy, Chris, who had a 2-second lead on me entering today.  I pressed on- wind now on my back.  By mile 10 I was feeling great, and that was probably where my mistake was- I unintentionally changed breathing patterns and lost control of my breathing by the end of mile 10.  I developed a cramp pretty quickly thereafter in my obliques/abdominals.  For mile 11 and 12 I battled that to no avail, and decided it best to slow down until I got back onto a 3/2 pattern in mile 13.  This worked perfectly and the stitch dissipated within 30 seconds- I wish I had tried that two miles earlier!  Dumb of me.  The last ¾ mile went fine and I crossed the finish at 1:12:45.0.  I then anxiously waited out the next 50 seconds to see if I would win the money for the series and was relieved to have earned it as the seconds ticked away.  What a fun experience! 

Final results- 

Me- 1:12:45   Anthony- 1:15:49    Lee- 1:16:56    Chris- 1:17:41                

Race Series $$$ results

1st- me, 2nd- Anthony, 3rd- Chris, 4th- Lee, 5th- Sean

Splits- 5:24, 5:25, 5:23, 5:33, 5:28, 5:33, 5:32, 5:33, 5:26, 5:30, 5:42, 6:02, 5:40, Finish- ~ 0:34

Comments(6)
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
12.600.0012.60

AM: 10.6 miles solo.

PM: 2 miles solo on the teadmill then gym- chest, tris, shoulders.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
20.450.0020.45

AM: 10 miles solo.

PM: 10 miles with Anthony.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
16.101.0017.10

AM: 4 miles on the treadmill, one mile fast to try out some new shoes.  Then lifted- arms, back, (light) legs.

Also, I cracked 1,000 miles!  I remember in 2014, I thought the idea of running 1,000 miles in a year was nuts.  Now it's reached in March.  Cool.

PM: 13 miles, 9 with Anthony.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
15.903.2519.15

AM: Track- 9x600 with 200 recoveries. Did not look at the watch, just went on effort. Felt great.

PM: 9 miles, 5 with Anthony.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
8.150.008.15

PM: 8 miles in some incredible weather.  

Rarely is Florida like it was today- 70 degrees, 20% humidity, 28-degree Dew Point, <5mph wind.  Wow.  What a run.  Anthony and I ran 7:00s without even trying to. 

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
7.633.1110.74

I saw an age group World Record today!

AM: What a cool morning!  I was asked to try and pace a Gainesville girl in an age-group world record attempt in the 5k (road) for a 12-year-old girl named Ani in Clermont, FL the other day.  I figured what the heck- how often do you get to say you were a part of that?  So I said sure.  Well, today was the day.  We actually had a group of 6 guys running her along to pace her which I think really helped.  She wanted to go 5:25 to open the first mile and then try to hang on to that for the rest.  Although she lost a couple of seconds along the next two miles, however, she did a great job and to my knowledge, she set the road course world record!  Her final time was 17:16.77.  I have no idea of the rules/requirements that go into it from here on out, but it still was fun.

It felt good at the end when she mentioned the group really helped motivate her.  She seemed genuinely thankful and thrilled to have us there.  She was just plain adorable.  Afterwards, she said she appreciated us supporting and pushing her down the stretch.  Made my day.

Here she is below with us.

Comments(3)
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
7.8010.5018.30

AM: Long run.  I broke it up with 2 miles easy with some striders, then a 10k in ~36:30 (19:30 for the first half, then 17:00 for the second half), 5 miles easy, then a 5k in ~16:30,  1 mile easy, then a final fast mile at effort.  

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
10.500.0010.50

AM: 3 miles and then the gym- chest, tris, shoulders.  I fell off the treadmill today, so that was a thing that happened.  It happens to everyone at some point... right?  Right?!

PM: 7.5 solo in EL.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
17.200.0017.20

AM: 8+ in SH with a good group at track.

PM: 9 miles- 7 with Anthony. ~7:30 avg.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
10.250.0010.25

PM: 10+ miles in Safety Harbor.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
12.002.0014.00

AM: 8.5 at track in SH with Alan.  16x200 with 200 recoveries at effort.

PM: 5.5 with Anthony.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
0.000.000.00

Day off.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
2.200.002.20

AM: Recovery run.

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Race: New Orleans Half Marathon (BDR) (13.109 Miles) 01:13:35, Place overall: 1, Place in age division: 1
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
2.6013.1115.71

New Orleans Half Marathon (BDR) Race Report

Pre-Race: I decided to shoot for the moon- a 1:10.  A lot of things were working against me here- crap conditions,10-hour drive the day before, no one to run with, small race, excuse, excuse, more excuses....  However, I decided to go for it anyway.  Why not, right?

The Race: 5:15 on the first mile got me going.  I came through the halfway (6.55) mark at 35:00 which had me pretty excited.  I felt good to mile 8, and then just... well... it all hit the fan ;)  I struggled mightily and sadly even resigned on running even respectable miles by the beginning of mile 11.  I think the lead SUV and biker thought I was dogging it into the finish- but I really tried hard.  I finished the race with a whimper- shuffling across the finish.  

First half- 35:00

Second half- 38:35

Final time- 1:13:35

Final thoughts: Welp, I would've been mad if I didn't try.  It was good to fail.  Now I will have that salty and sour taste in my mouth to hold me over until October.  Joy.

Comments(3)
Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
0.000.000.00

Day off.  Exploring New Orleans!!

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
0.000.000.00

Day off.  Exploring New Orleans!!

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
14.000.0014.00

AM: 2 miles, then gym- chest, tris, shoulders, abs, legs.

PM: 12 miles, 7 with Anthony.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
18.033.1121.14

AM: 11 miles at track.  Wasn't planning on giving a real effort, but did anyway.  Workout was solo.  Did a ladder up/down- 2x100, 2x200, 2x300, 2x400, 2x600, 2x400, 2x300, 2x200, 2x100, 1x200.  All were 100 or 200 jog recoveries.

Splits- 22, 22, 40, 39, 56, 58, 1:16, 1:13, 1:52, 1:52, 1:13, 1:12, 56, 56, 36, 36, 20, 19, 35

PM: 10 miles with Anthony. ~6:58/mile average.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
10.450.0010.45

PM: 10+ solo.  ~7:00/mile pace.

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Slow milesFast milesTotal Distance
309.4161.19370.60
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