A Report on an 8k Running Time Trial
I don’t think I’ve ever posted a running blog entry on this rarely-used blog of mine. So here we go.
A little background
I began running with some regularity late in 2012, after a friend asked me if I wanted to join him in a Warrior Dash. I wanted to at least be able to cover the distance of the race (3.1 miles or 5 kilometers) so I wouldn’t feel like I was holding him back. At the time I weighed about 236 lbs (107 kg), and was doing the Couch to 5K workouts at a pretty slow pace (10:00 min/mile pace give or take).
Somewhere amidst that training I started to enjoy running. I found it rather meditative, and I could use it to reflect on both bad days and good days. In 2013, I found a local running group on Meetup who pushed me to go further, and I went beyond the Warrior Dash to do additional 5K races and even a half-marathon (albeit sick) at the end of the year. While the running group is essentially inactive, I am still great friends with many of those people to this day, and I started to come out of my shell a bit. I had only moved to Baltimore (Maryland, USA) from a small town only a couple years prior and pretty much did not know anyone outside of my friend who lived in the suburbs. Now I participate in other activities, like bocce ball and dragon boating, which has greatly expanded my social circle as well as my appreciation of the city. Oh, and I managed to lose a lot of weight in the process too!
Last winter, after running for about 7 years, I finally worked up the courage to sign up for my first marathon, the 2020 Baltimore Marathon. It is a distance and challenge that I greatly respect and did not think I would be willing nor able to handle the training rigors. But I felt it was the right time to take up the challenge.
But then the pandemic happened. I was unsure if the race would go on, but I still decided to train for it which ended up being a great thing. Since I was not able to go anywhere due to city restrictions, I was able to run with a consistency that I had never had in prior years. And after having my weight slowly creep up from 185 to 200 lbs over the past few years, I saw it start to drop again in 2020, getting as low as 178 in August/September. I transitioned from the Hal Higdon Winter Training Plan to the Hal Higdon Intermediate Base Training Plan (which introduced me to hill repeats and short-distance intervals) and then to an intermediate-level marathon plan on the Garmin Connect interface, which could be easily uploaded to my Garmin Forerunner 245 watch. I also got used to getting up earlier to do morning runs, since the heat island effect in Baltimore during the summer months is brutal.
However in my 4th week of my marathon training plan the race was made virtual. Nevertheless I finished that week which netted me my longest continuous run ever (14 miles in 135 minutes) and kept up the intensity because I was doing the Race Across Maryland Challenge, which was running 250 miles in 60 days. I did not want to run my first, and probably only, marathon as a virtual race so I deferred my marathon race to 2021. I wasn’t sure what to do next since I was know in between races but I still wanted to participate in the Baltimore Running Festival. I ended up re-registering for the 2020 festival but this time deciding to do a virtual 5k. My 5k race personal best was about a 22:29 (7:14 min/mile) set in 2016 and with my increased mileage and weight loss, I figured that I could easily beat it. My first time trial resulted in beating my personal best by 17 seconds, but I was not satisfied… it was a hot day and my pace really dropped towards the end. The re-attempt was a few weeks later on a cooler day, and I whittled another 30 seconds down to bring my new personal best to 21:46 (7:00 min/mile). Believe it or not, this put me on top of the Baltimore Running Festival Virtual 5K leaderboard for a while until the faster runners decided to run their time trial.
The 8K Time Trial
Made with a new race report generator created by /u/herumph.
Race Information
- Name: 8k Time Trial
- Date: May 16, 2021
- Distance: 8 kilometers
- Location: Ft. McHenry, Baltimore, MD, USA
- Time: 0:35:39 (7:10 min/mile)
Goals
| Goal | Description | Completed? |
|---|---|---|
| A | 7:13 min/mile | Yes |
| B | 7:20 min/mile | Yes |
| C | 7:30 min/mile | Yes |
Splits
| Mile | Time |
|---|---|
| 1 | 7:19 |
| 2 | 7:15 |
| 3 | 7:08 |
| 4 | 7:15 |
| 5 | 6:54 (0.97 miles extrapolated to 1 mile) |
Training
I figured the training plans worked so well for me last year, so I decided I would just follow them again. Currently I am on the Hal Higdon Intermediate Base Training Plan again. For this 12-week training plan, weeks 6, 9, and 12 are the weeks designated for 5k, 8k, and 10k time trials respectively. I have unfortunately put on a few more pounds and have been hovering around 190 lbs for the duration of this training, though I feel that I may have put on some muscle due to more cross-training once I started to lower my mileage last fall. I skipped the 5k time trial and will be on vacation the week the 10k time trial is scheduled so the 8k time trial was the only real opportunity to gauge my fitness. I had a couple of days of rest so my legs were pretty fresh.
Pre-race
I almost actually skipped the 8k time trial entirely today! My stomach was giving me grief this morning and I decided that I would instead just run a hard 5-miler on my normal Key Highway route (from the Inner Harbor to Under Armour Performance Center and back). I don’t want to do any time trials on that route due to having to step up and down on sidewalk curbs. Fort McHenry is the most suitable location for me as it is a nearly 1-mile flat loop, and this is where I did my two 5k time trials last year. As I was walking to my normal starting spot I saw the bus that goes to Ft McHenry about to pull up, and I said “what the hell… let’s do it” and decided to go ahead with the time trial. The weather outside was around 55F and mostly sunny… perfect running weather! I did a quick jog to the restroom there and back to my starting location. And away I go!
Race
Regarding my goal paces, Goal A is the extrapolated pace when I plug in my 5k personal best into a “running pace equivalent calculator”. Goal B would still represent an improved pace over my 10k personal best (47:00 set back in 2015). Goal C was my pessimistic goal. By the way, the splits posted earlier vs in the picture differ slightly because the earlier splits were taken from my Garmin and the latter are from Stryd.
Almost immediately, I settled into a comfortable pace. My legs are a bit tired (I probably should have warmed up longer) but I immediately noticed that compared to last year’s time trials I seemed to lift my legs up higher per stride, so I was feeling optimtistic. After hovering at 7:21 min/mile for a majority of the first mile, I saw the lap time give me a 7:19 which caught me by surprise. Still, a part of me was waiting for the eventual suckitude that would eventually cause me to struggle to meet even my Goal C pace.
Mile 2 was where I started to feel some uncomfortableness in the lungs department, but when the lap time a tick under 7:15, I was even more shocked than the first lap. Am I going too fast? How am I going to survive the next 3 miles. One thing I noticed was that my pace was getting better in the back half of the Ft McHenry loop compared to the front, which was interesting because in my 5k time trials, my pace was slowing on that same back half. However, it is worth noting that I am using a Stryd footpod for measuring distance and pace now, whereas I was using the watch GPS for that in the 5k time trials (and GPS is known for being less accurate at times).
Mile 3 saw an even better lap time! While I was still feeling as uncomfortable as I was in the 2nd mile, I wasn’t feeling worse. This started to give me some confidence that I may be able to hold this pace! And since the pace was continuing to drop as the distance added up, maybe I could actually match the 7:13 min/mile pace I was hoping for.
Mile 4 was what brought me back to reality. It wasn’t a bad pace by any means, but slowing up compared to Mile 3 definitely has to be a slight blow to the psyche. Has the fatigue set in? It certainly didn’t feel that way. I can probably chalk it up to perhaps a lapse in concentration. But I knew that I just had one final mile left, so I could leave it all out there.
And leave it all out there I did. Mile 5 (or rather 0.97 of a mile since it’s an 8k) was by far my fastest pace. While I did not feel I was running faster, I could sense that I was hitting it harder. Lungs were definitely burning but it’s almost over soon. In this last stretch I shifted from drinking water every half mile to drinking every third of a mile. I picked up the speed with about 0.33 miles left, and then turned on the afterburners in the final 0.15 miles. I was really happy for the 200- and 400-meter interval training that I had been doing the past few Wednesdays. When my race was up, I was completely out of breath, but I felt pretty amazing once I learned I beat my goal time, despite weighing 10 lbs heavier than last fall.
Post-race
After my run, I walked the rest of the final Ft. McHenry loop and was fortunate to see the bus waiting at the stop. I took it home and reflected on my run. With how my pace started to improve with every mile, I honestly think I could have held that and set a 10k personal best probably in the 44:30-45:00 min range. I’m pretty content with this run so I don’t feel I need to worry about a 10k time trial anytime soon. I felt the pacing was spot on, even with the slower 4th mile, and my legs felt pretty loose by the time mile 3 hit. This gives me great confidence in ramping up my upcoming marathon training, even if the training paces are wildly slower than the time trial I just ran.
Once I got home, I showered, went to the local Irish pub and sort of treated myself with some mimosas and a meatball sub. And I have spent the rest of the day just lounging and watching Youtube and Twitch. Overall it’s been a great day, and I’m super happy I ended up doing that time trial after all.