Upcoming Races – signed up for 2 half marathons in Sept 2013

So I have been waffling on what to sign up for in the coming months – I knew the yard work and getting the pool set up was going to take a lot of time and I didn’t know what I would have the energy to train for and what would keep me motivated.

So seeing that Goofy doesn’t appear to be in the cards for January 2014 for me I started looking at other races local to Winnipeg in September and October and had several options.

In September alone I quickly counted 6 races with half marathons options all taking place either in Winnipeg or within about an hour drive – there is also a full marathon in September in Treherne which was on the table as was a 30k in Lockport (both of these race days have a half option as well included in the 6 I counted above).

In the end though I discounted a few options for now:

• Treherne – full and half – reviews for the race are good but there are so few participants that I’m not sure I would enjoy it as much as it probably deserves.  Plus large portions of both the half and the full take place on country gravel roads and if there is any rain or anything like that it will quickly turn into a real mess.  I have trained on country gravel roads and they are good for training but for a full endurance race?  Not for me at this point.
• Lockport – there are 2 separate events in Lockport in September – the first is in conjunction with a festival there and has a half marathon and a 30 k option (doesn’t look like gravel roads either) and this one looks pretty good but the timing and location of the packet picket doesn’t really work for me so I am going to put this one on the back burner and revisit it later.  The second is for a charity raising money to get racing greyhounds into loving homes – I’m not sure if this is an inaugural race but I can’t find much info on it yet and what info I see seems to be a bit sparse so far so I will come back to this one as well.
• Niverville (Imagine) this one takes place at the same time as one of the Lockport races (the second one) but the info on it is pretty sparse too so I will come back to it as well.

So I have decided on 2 half marathons in September:

• The Cash Store Financial Freedom Run for Diabetes Research – Sept 2^nd
• Rotary Half Marathon – Sept 22^nd

I also missed the window to get in on the Winnipeg Fire and Paramedic Services half marathon in October (19th) – apparently they filled their spots 2 days ago and I missed the window.  I have sent an email to get on the waiting list and if a spot comes open I will get in on this one as well. (Edit – I managed to get in for the second wave of registration for this race so this makes #3)

So…I have signed up for 2 races coming up – what are my goals for them and how do I expect to train?  Good questions and I am not exactly sure yet…but I do want to see if I can beat my personal best on a half marathon on one of these 2 races.

My personal best is 1:46:11 for a half (back in 2002) and I did 1:56 at the WPS Half Marathon in May and was very close to 2 hours for the first half of the Manitoba Full (with a couple stops to visit with the wife and kids tossed in there so a bit faster than 2 hours).  If I train solid getting close to my personal best should be possible based on these times but it will require strong training and renewed focus on losing weight.

So to meet those requirements and goals, I am in the process of figuring out what my training plan will be and I will post it once I have it sorted.  Some things for certain are that I will want to be doing lots of speed work – so 2-3 nights a week on the treadmill forcing myself to run fast.  I will also want to take advantage of the nice weather to get outdoor runs in on the weekends (and some week nights) – so I suspect I will do several runs of greater than half marathon distance outside over the course of the summer so I stay used to running longer distances than what the races will be (easier to run harder when you mentally know you have gas in the tank).  I will also be wanting to include the pool in my training – between laps and underwater swimming for endurance and increasing lung capacity and then water resistance training to help work the muscles and increase weight loss.

It all adds up to a busy summer with a day shy of 8 weeks until the first of the races – time to get pushing!