WillRunForPizza
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Apr 20, 2022
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The Princess Diaries, part 4: Reflections
In which I have numbers
You guys. I think I might be kind of fast now?
I know; I can hear you rolling your eyes from here! But being fast has never been part of my self-conception. I always just sort of thought of myself as an okay runner. And I really still am if you look at elite performances - I have not run even one mile at 5:20 pace, let alone 26.2 in a row. But if you asked me any time before last week if a 1:33 half was fast for a regular person, I would have said yeah, that's pretty fast. So I guess that means I must be pretty fast for a regular person.
I also do not have an exact definition for a breakthrough performance, but I think official PRs in the 5K, 10K, and HM, plus unofficial PRs in every distance from 2 miles on, plus four sub-7 miles when I had never run one in a race before, probably qualifies.
Interestingly, while I did have a negative split, it was much less pronounced than it has been for most of my longer races. I wish there had been an official 20K time for better comparison, but I was at 44:30 for 10K and then Strava has my 10-20K time as 43:34. I actually think that's a good thing; starting out a lot slower than you finish means you're leaving time on the table. This time, my pace was actually pretty consistent, just speeding up a little throughout (except for mile 11 which, as I have already explained, was evil
).
Actually, if you look at the GAP, it's probably more consistent:
I'm happy with that, especially considering that, as usual, I didn't have much of a sense of how fast I could run going into the race. So my race strategy of "eh, let's just see what happens" continues to succeed!
This is the first time I've raced with my Coros armband, and I have more accurate HR zones now as well, so it's interesting to see the breakdown there. I spent the vast majority of time in Z4 and most of the rest in Z5:
At any rate, I can check off a few goals for the year now:
The equivalency calculators actually put the potential time close to 20 minutes (20:08-20:18), which...
.
That leaves me with two more goals for the year, beyond officially snagging that sub-7 5K pace:
So that's where we are now! The race that kind of changed things. I've been really lucky to have been able to train consistently for almost three years now thanks to not getting seriously injured, flexible/remote work, and not having kids, and I have really, really seen the benefits of it. Just look at what's happened since I started training consistently until now. Big progress is possible!
May 2022, National Women's Half Marathon: 1:59:56
February 2025, Disney Princess Half Marathon: 1:33:11
In which I have numbers
You guys. I think I might be kind of fast now?
I know; I can hear you rolling your eyes from here! But being fast has never been part of my self-conception. I always just sort of thought of myself as an okay runner. And I really still am if you look at elite performances - I have not run even one mile at 5:20 pace, let alone 26.2 in a row. But if you asked me any time before last week if a 1:33 half was fast for a regular person, I would have said yeah, that's pretty fast. So I guess that means I must be pretty fast for a regular person.
I also do not have an exact definition for a breakthrough performance, but I think official PRs in the 5K, 10K, and HM, plus unofficial PRs in every distance from 2 miles on, plus four sub-7 miles when I had never run one in a race before, probably qualifies.
- 5K: 21:49 official (10-15K), 21:37 unofficial (previously 21:56)
- 10K: 43:54 official (5-15K), 43:25 unofficial (previously 45:50)
- HM: 1:33:11 official, 1:32:36 unofficial for 13.1 miles (previously 1:43:11 in the second half of the MCM)
Interestingly, while I did have a negative split, it was much less pronounced than it has been for most of my longer races. I wish there had been an official 20K time for better comparison, but I was at 44:30 for 10K and then Strava has my 10-20K time as 43:34. I actually think that's a good thing; starting out a lot slower than you finish means you're leaving time on the table. This time, my pace was actually pretty consistent, just speeding up a little throughout (except for mile 11 which, as I have already explained, was evil
).Actually, if you look at the GAP, it's probably more consistent:
I'm happy with that, especially considering that, as usual, I didn't have much of a sense of how fast I could run going into the race. So my race strategy of "eh, let's just see what happens" continues to succeed!
This is the first time I've raced with my Coros armband, and I have more accurate HR zones now as well, so it's interesting to see the breakdown there. I spent the vast majority of time in Z4 and most of the rest in Z5:
At any rate, I can check off a few goals for the year now:
Um...yeah. I'd say I did this. 93 minutes for the win!
At least unofficially, this is also done. Strava says my new 10-mile PR is 1:10:12. (That 1:21 official PR is getting increasingly silly!)
Yup, my official 10K PR based on the 5-15K split is now 43:54.
I did manage this one unofficially (21:37 = 6:57/mile). Officially, I was close but not quite there, but if I could run a 5K under 7-min/mile pace in the middle of a half marathon, I'm pretty sure I can do it in a 5K race.
The equivalency calculators actually put the potential time close to 20 minutes (20:08-20:18), which....That leaves me with two more goals for the year, beyond officially snagging that sub-7 5K pace:
I guess this might be more achievable than I thought. The mile equivalents I'm seeing for a 1:33:11 half are about 5:48, so...yeah. Maybe I'll have to throw in a time trial soon just to see what happens.
And the marathon equivalents are something like 3:14-3:16. Even if that's wildly optimistic, that's like 15 minutes of wiggle room. Of course, you never quite know what's going to happen in a marathon, but...I might have to upgrade that prediction as well.
So that's where we are now! The race that kind of changed things. I've been really lucky to have been able to train consistently for almost three years now thanks to not getting seriously injured, flexible/remote work, and not having kids, and I have really, really seen the benefits of it. Just look at what's happened since I started training consistently until now. Big progress is possible!
May 2022, National Women's Half Marathon: 1:59:56
February 2025, Disney Princess Half Marathon: 1:33:11
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I guess put it on your calendar for 2027? (MCM is past the qualifying window for 2026.)
), and I did a total body strength workout the afternoon after those runs.
ran 540 miles (not including race day). I missed one run due to a calf strain, but that was it.
did 20 hours of strength/mobility.
set 5 PRs (1 mile, 5K, 10K, 10 mile, half marathon).
