This is the recap of Week 11 of Mo’ Cowbell Half Marathon training. Even though my race is October 1, I am considering September the month of the half marathon. So basically we are in half marathon month ha! It’s crazy that we are 5 weeks away. Next week I have a Friday night 5k that we will see what happens.
A few things from this week’s training before I get into the breakdown.
- I bought a new Garmin. I was a bit envious of the crisp AMOLED display I kept seeing. Plus there were a few new features that mine did not have. When you have a coupon and you have been doing good with training and your health, you reward yourself, right?! So I’m upgrading my Fenix 6s (also selling if you are interested!) I upgraded to the Epix Pro Gen 2. I’ll have to get used to charging it a bit more often than I did my Fenix, but I’m okay with that.
- If you need a nice little motivating pump up song, then you should check out Quavo’s song “Not Done Yet.”
- I tried the Maurten 100 gel and wow I think this was the worst gel I have tried so far in regards to texture. Every bit I took I had to swallow electrolytes down with it. I don’t know how you all are doing those. Which means my gel review has officially come to an end. My winners were Huma and Spring Awesome Sauce if you have missed me sharing that information. I have one Huma + caffeine gel that I am saving for pre-race and then will have the Spring Awesome Sauces the rest of the race.
Monday
3 miles @ 10:39 pace
- 10:54
- 10:46
- 10:18
Tuesday
Treadmill recovery 2 miles @ 10:29 pace
- 10:22
- 10:37
Wednesday
6.63 miles @ 10:37 pace – 1200m workout on the track
1.31 mile warmup @ 11:25 pace
3x1200m with 600m recovery (goal was 7:45-8:12 pace)
- 8:36 pace
- 8:21 pace
- 7:59 pace
3x200m with 200m recovery (goal was 7:11-7:37 pace)
- 7:25 pace
- 6:57 pace
- 6:45 pace
1.43 mile cooldown @ 10:30 pace
I was pretty pleased with this workout, especially because it was already in the 80’s and really humid with thick air at 6am. It was supposed to be 4x1200m but I didn’t have enough time to fit that in and do the 200’s. I was trying to fairly judge how long it all would take me to get back home in time for work.
Thursday
off
Friday
off
Saturday
3.34 treadmill miles @ 11:59 pace
No mile splits for this one because I hadn’t set up my new watch to the treadmill and it was splitting me at 7 minute pace. The whole run I was thinking “dang, people this fast can really knock out some mileage quickly.” HA. I think back to when I was running in the 7’s for training runs. Weren’t those the days? Maybe one day I will see those again.
Sunday
11 miles split between treadmill and road
5 miles on treadmill @ 11:19 pace
- 11:51
- 11:38
- 11:14
- 10:56
- 10:56
Rain calmed down and the sun rose a bit, so headed outside
6 miles @ 9:33 pace – I was supposed to try to hit race pace at the last few miles, but instead I just tried to continue with the progression run
- 10:26
- 10:18
- 9:35
- 9:01
- 8:41
- 9:18 (cool down mile)
It will never not mess with my head the way a treadmill makes my fast feel slow. Meaning I feel like I am comfortable or cruising and it’s like “nah you ain’t.” But the same effort on the road is a lot different in pace. But I don’t let it bother me. When I’m faced with the treadmill, I just don’t look and go off feel and what is comfortable no matter what it’s telling me. Let’s just be thankful races aren’t on treadmills (at least the ones I will sign up for.)
That is the recap of week 11. Excited to be getting closer to race day. I’m feeling strong when it comes to the distance, just need to get my speed there. Like I already said, it may not be there this time around, but I really hope if it isn’t that it shows up in April for my next half. I think that’s more probable because I will be doing 5k specific training from mid October – January and then back into half marathon training. Hopefully some speed can be gained and carried over.
