Colfax Half-marathon -- Race Report

As I explained in my last post, following perhaps too long of a run on Thursday my goal for Friday and yesterday (Saturday) was simply to recover in time to race this morning. Yesterday I was still sore from the long run, but decided to go for a long ride with Stacey instead of doing a double swim day as I had initially planned. We don't ride together too often, so when it fits my training schedule I try to take advantage of riding together. I went really easy and ended up riding 3:20 with a HR of 115-120 bpm, and then followed that up with a 30 minute "flop". Despite putting in a nearly four hour day, the intensity was low enough that my recovery was not hindered.

Anyhow, I made it to the race with enough time to get in two five minute warm-ups spaced apart by about twenty minutes. My legs felt okay during the warm-ups, reaffirming that my recovery was pretty good. The race was pretty crowded -- I heard that around 3,500 people were entered in the half -- but I was still able to walk in at the last minute and get a great starting spot right up front.

Pre-race (it was a bit chilly at 6:15 AM):


The plan was to race completely by feel and to take miles 1 and 2 at a moderate pace before picking the effort up a notch to race pace. Looking at my data (shown below), I think I was successful because my HR climbed to 168 bpm or so within a few minutes and then stayed there until twelve minutes into the race. At that point I picked the effort up and my HR went to the mid 170s, where it remained until a final push in the last half mile.

Between miles 1 and 2 (Stacey made it over from the start just in time to see me passing):


The first 7 miles seemed to be either flat or slightly uphill. I was ticking them off at 6:00/mile on the dot through 7 miles, which I know because there was a nice digital clock every two miles. Not quite as fast as I'd hoped, but I was feeling good and was optimistic that the last 6 miles would be faster because they'd all be either flat or downhill. To my surprise, the last 6 miles seemed almost all downhill with very few flat sections. It was just a gradual downhill, but a downhill nonetheless. I just couldn't get in a good rhythm, though; the timing of my stride felt off. I noticed a few times in the last 6 miles that I was very upright, with my head back a bit further than normal, instead of leaning slightly forward. At 10 miles I noticed my pace dropped down to about 6:10/mile. Hmm...runners aren't supposed to be faster uphill than downhill!

Race data:


The downhill running was surprisingly tough. My legs were taking a bit of a beating, but around mile 11 I caught up with a guy that had been 50-100 feet in front of me the entire race. We exchanged a few pleasantries, and then I pulled ahead a bit. Around mile 12.5 I caught another guy whose pace must have slowed drastically, as he came out of nowhere. I crossed the line in 1:19:05 (unofficially) and in 6th place, or so Stacey tells me.

Just before the finish:


Immediately post race:


An okay shot of City Park, the start and finish location of the race and one of Denver's many fine parks:


Overall a good workout and a decent run. I don't have much experience racing at elevation, and my predicted time was way, way off. This tells me perhaps two things: (1) training specifically for a race and resting greatly improves race results and (2) racing at altitude is slower than nearer to sea level. Regarding the first point, for my first few years running and doing tris every race was a PR, whether or not I tapered. Now a bit more planning is required to have a PR performance. This is likely one reason that I ran faster at Cali 70.3 than either of my past two races, which were much shorter.

Regarding the second point, here's a table I found that shows my predicted paces at other elevations based on today's race:

Not that it matters, but it's interesting to see the difference elevation makes. I should consider elevation when making race predictions -- my prediction of 1:14-1:15 wouldn't have been off by so much had I raced at the elevation I'm used to, at least according to the chart. Also, considering elevation may provide a better comparison to my past results. FYI, my PR stand-alone half marathon is 1:17:XX, IIRC, and I ran 1:18:08 at Cali 70.3 two months ago. The chart shows that perhaps today's run was faster than my Cali run with elevation factored in.

Now it's time to relax for a while and rest my quads -- they're quite sore. Thanks Stacey for waking up early to drive me to the race, taking my jacket, snapping a few photos, etc.