Breaking 1h30 in the Stratford Half Marathon

Anything under 1h40, with half an eye on 1h35 had been the target. Of course, race time predictor said otherwise and, based on my current 5 and 10k times, had me a couple of minutes under 1h30 for the half marathon, but my times have always been relatively slower in longer events, probably due to a lack of time spent on longer runs.

I'd pushed hard in my interval training and tempo runs, but always dropped down a gear or two on the longer runs, for fear of blowing up 5 miles from nowhere. The thought of turning up to the race and running for an hour and a half at under 6:55 min/mile seemed ridiculous. The fastest long training run I'd clocked prior to the half marathon, was at 7:40 min/mile pace. Almost a minute per mile slower.

The Race

As the horn sounded, at the start of the Shakespeare Half (and Full) Marathon, the adrenalin kicked in and, predictable as ever, I sped off way quicker than intended, only to find myself sitting in a group who rounded the first 4 corners of the race to finish the first mile in near enough 6 mins 30 seconds. I'm yet to start a race where I've not gone off a little faster than I'd anticipated, I know I'm not alone. It's partly due to the excitement, partly due to a voice inside you persuading you that of course you can squeeze a couple more minutes off your target time. That and you're feeling fresh, fresher than for any of your training runs, assuming you've tapered, makes it tricky to tune your body into a sensible, and sustainable, race pace.

After completing mile one 40 seconds quicker than planned, I pulled back to around a 6:50 pace, as did many of the folk around me. I still felt very comfortable and thought I'd try and hold the pace to mile 4 or 5 and see how I felt. Having run some long training runs and completed a few marathons, I feel capable of visualising how my body will react over the course of 5 or so miles. Beyond that, it's a little more uncertain. I know when I reached 18 miles in my last marathon, I stepped the pace up a notch as I felt comfortable I could sustain it to 23/24 miles, and get myself the last couple of miles on sheer determination. It worked.

A couple of small hills behind us, we hit mile 5 and my average pace was around 6:55. I felt I could sustain this, at a push, so I kept it going. The course had flattened out a little by this stage and I knew there was only one long hill left around the 9 mile mark. We passed through a couple of villages, with pockets of cheerful and welcoming support out along the route, which always picks you up and made for a pleasant middle section of the race.

The miles were passing quickly and soon enough the long drag up around mile 9 was upon us. I slowed a little, focused on the ground a few metres in front of me and just kept the legs turning. The hill wasn't difficult, just quite long and I quickly made up for the slow down in pace on the descent.

I've never done a few hilly courses previously and have never been one to hold back on descents, preferring just to lean forward and let the legs go. The thighs do take a bit of a pounding, but it's a sure fire way to make up for any lost time on the ascents. By the time you reach the bottom, your legs have gotten used to moving more quickly and you find it easier to sustain a higher pace, even when the ground's levelled out.

The mile or so after the descent, I was running a little quicker than 6:40 per mile. I eased off a little through mile 11, having bought my average right back down and, despite my fuzzy running brain, I managed to work out that a quick finish might just get me home in under 1h30.

The 12 mile marker was close to a 180 degree turn down off the main road and onto a track. I checked my watch, which was showing 1:23 something. A little over 1 mile to go and less than 7 minutes remaining. I caught up with the man in front and encouraged him to join me in attempting a quick finish to get in under 1h30. We slogged it out and at 200m to go, I went flat out, realising there were literally seconds in it.

I completed mile 13 in 6:20 and the final 0.1 mile in under 30 seconds, to finish happily in a time of 1h29m56s.

As happy as I was with it, I hadn't set out to achieve this time, it was about 5 minutes up on what I thought I could do, but then you never do really know what you can achieve until you truly push yourself. And that I will keep doing.