Sunday, March 15, 2009

What a Great Day

Today was one of those days were everything just seemed to go right:
  • It was in the 50s with clear skies and no wind
  • I PR'ed at a half marathon, that I had not trained or tappered for
  • I had a great bike ride OUTSIDE
  • Did I mention is was in the 50s in Chicago in March

March Madness Half Marathon

I did this race becuase a few of the guys I train with over at Endurance Nation were going to be there and I thought it would be fun. I had no real goals or plan, I was just going to start off at a pace I thought I could easily hold for the whole race and see what happened.

Leading up to the race, I did not tapper at all, in fact yesterday I did 1:45 on the trainer with a brick run right afterwards and I pushed really hard. Warming up for the race this morning my legs were a little heavy and I could feel the fatigue in my quads from the hard bike ride yesterday, but overall I felt good.

The race was by far the hilliest race I have ever done, and the timing of the hills is what makes it really difficult because from mile 9 to 13 is mostly uphill and rolling hills. As usual I went out too fast for the first mile, but I quickly setteled down and was pretty close to my target pace 6:15 for miles 2-8. From mile 8 to 13 I gave it everything I had and had a few miles at around 5:50 pace, coming into the finish shoot I could see the clock at 19:55 and I sprinted as hard as could. I put it all out there and came in at 1:20:06.

It sure would have been nice to break 1:20, but I'm really happy with my results, a negative split, and I was 1:44 faster then my previous PR which was set at a very flat and fast race last year.

Here is the data for anyone that is interested, check out the total elevation changes even though the biggest single hill was about 200 ft and yes this file's altitude was corrected in WKO:

Forerunner305 [Run]:

Duration: 1:20:06

Work: n/a

rTSS: 150.8 (1.006)

NGP: 5:57 (270.6 m/min)

VI: n/a

Pw:HR: n/a

Pa:HR: 1.83%

Distance: 13.141 mi

Elevation Gain: 2105 ft

Elevation Loss: 2092 ft

Grade: 0.0 % (12 ft)

Min Max Avg

Heart Rate: 100 198 187 bpm

Speed: 1.2 16.2 9.8 mph

Pace 3:42 50:49 6:06 min/mi

Altitude: 696 910 816 ft

Bike Workout

Since I was only doing the race for fun, I wanted to also get my scheduled 2 x 20' at FTP bike ride in today. So after we got home, I dusted off my road bike which hasn't been out of the house since November and went for a ride outside.

My current FTP on the computrainer is 245 watts and I was really hoping that I would still be able to hold the watts after racing this morning. My legs were pretty sore warming up, but I was so thrilled to be outside I didn't care and went on anyway. I ended up holding 255w for the first interval and I figured I went out too hard and would fall apart, but on the way back I came up with 256w and finished stronger.

Here is the some bike data:

First Interval:

Duration: 20:01

Work: 294 kJ

TSS: 36.1 (intensity factor 1.04)

Norm Power: 255

VI: 1.04

Pw:HR: 1.11%

Pa:HR: 1.6%

Distance: 7.156 mi

Min Max Avg

Power: 0 538 245 watts

Heart Rate: 127 187 179 bpm

Cadence: 32 163 97 rpm

Speed: 0 30 21.5 mph

Pace 2:00 0:00 2:48 min/mi

Hub Torque: 0 277 77 lb-in

Crank Torque: 0 921 222 lb-in

Second Interval:

Duration: 20:01

Work: 301 kJ

TSS: 36.3 (intensity factor 1.043)

Norm Power: 256

VI: 1.02

Pw:HR: 5.46%

Pa:HR: 2.82%

Distance: 6.642 mi

Min Max Avg

Power: 0 503 250 watts

Heart Rate: 150 188 180 bpm

Cadence: 40 166 92 rpm

Speed: 0 28.1 19.9 mph

Pace 2:08 0:00 3:01 min/mi

Hub Torque: 0 220 84 lb-in

Crank Torque: 0 771 235 lb-in

Entire workout (213 watts):

Duration: 1:21:12

Work: 1039 kJ

TSS: 120.6 (intensity factor 0.944)

Norm Power: 231

VI: 1.08

Pw:HR: 0.6%

Pa:HR: 9.28%

Distance: 26.094 mi

Min Max Avg

Power: 0 538 213 watts

Heart Rate: 93 219 171 bpm

Cadence: 29 209 92 rpm

Speed: 0 30 19.3 mph

Pace 2:00 0:00 3:07 min/mi

Hub Torque: 0 277 73 lb-in

Crank Torque: 0 921 202 lb-in

I have 2 more weeks left of the Endurance Nation Out Season plan and then I am doing an 8k run as my final test and will post a summary.

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