Musings on the 1/2 Marathon

Coach's Thoughts on the Half Marathon. Despite several PRs very few of the skulls were happy with their half marathon results this past Sunday. (Except Rudy). My job as the coach is to figure out what happened. I spoke with several of the guys from Group 1 and did a little research and here is what I think was missing. We’re getting in the long runs and we’re getting in the shorter tempos and necessary speedwork. But what we seem to be lacking is the longer tempos or steady state runs. A steady state run is run at half marathon pace – ½ marathon pace + 10 seconds/mile for 45 minutes – 1 hour 15 minutes. This should be done about every 2 weeks as you build up for your longer races. If time is an issue it can be incorporated into your weekly long run. When these are not regularly done as a part of your training especially for race distances >= 10 miles your performances will not meet your expectations. These runs train your body to clear lactate acid during longer races. There are several ways to get these in: 1) Run on Monday nights with the team. 2) Run on Saturday with the team – we’ll try to incorporate more especially as we head into the marathon season in late summer. 3) Team up with one or two people at your level from the team and run together. Because of the duration it will be fairly difficult to hit these paces on your own. It will be much easier if you run with a group. If you have any questions see me at a practice. I will discuss this Wednesday before practice.