Well.
That sucked.
Okay, it didn't actually suck. It was more like I ran a pretty good 9.5 mile race and then immediately followed it up with a truly awful 3.5 mile race.
A little race report
I was pretty stoked to start training for this one because my running in summer and fall of 2023 had gone pretty well. So when I signed up, I had in mind 2:30 as a goal time. A little bit ambitious given the paces I'd been hitting during my summer jogs, but it felt possible. In 2021 during the Pandemic I'd run the Hypo as a virtual race and finished in 2:39 plus change and I was in much better shape this year. In fact, I ran 12 miles a couple of Mondays ago as my final long run and was on pace for around 2:35 if I'd kept going.
Man makes plans, etc, etc.
I was also stoked for this because the Hypothermic Half is one of my favourite races and a few years ago it moved to become sort of part of Festival du Voyageur, with the race begining and ending at Fort Gibralter. My favourite race! Basically in my backyard! (The worst part of any race is logistics so the start line being a 10 minute walk from home is sweet)
It was a great day to run temperature-wise. I think it was around -8 Celsius when we started. A bit breezy but I barely noticed it. Ice was a problem because of all the melting and freezing we had in February but I didn't have any problems thanks to a pair Icebug Certas. I've probably put more miles on them this winter than all previous winters since I bought them several years ago.
So, I maintained my goal pace through St Boniface and Ft Rouge, hit the turn around point with a solid minute or so cushion and then...after 9.5 miles I just crapped out. I could barely put one foot in front of another and finally stumbled to the finish line around 2:43. Embarrassing. (That's my watch time, my chip time will be a few minutes slower beucase I paused my watch when I had to take a bathroom break)
Ah well, I'm still pleased to have got at least a half-marathon finish under belt after a few years of pretty crappy running. I think I have the fitness to beat 2:30 but just had a bad day. And now I have spring, summer, and fall to train more and perhaps do another half in October.
The nice thing about running as a hobby is that if you have a fantastic race or a garbage one, either way you do the same thing: rest and recover from the race and get back to training.
I guess it was all worth it for a medal featuring a yeti on a snowboard...
So what IS next?
I mentioned in an earlier running post how I was musing about trying to work on my 5k time and I think that's my next plan. I'm going to take it easy through March and then in April I'll do a 5k time trial to see where I'm at, then train hard for 8 weeks to see how much I can improve. I jinxed myself by talking about my half-marathon goal time but I'm going to do it again. I think 27 or 28 minutes might be doable! We'll see, though. I think my best 5k this year (when I say year, I mean since last May) has been 34ish minutes but I didn't really train for speed in 2023.
For fun and curiousity, I think I'm going to let my Garmin tell me what workouts to do. It claims to create training programs adapted for your fitness and I'm quite curious to see what it comes up with.
After that, I'll probably just go back to building base though the summer and then come August start ramping up again for a potential October half.
