Dialing in the Commute Pace

We will run 16 miles this weekend, a half marathon being conducted by NYRRC on Sunday morning with 2.9 miles added before the race. Since we are still recovering from the 20 miler, we are to run this one at commute pace. This will be a good exercise in maintaining the pace while surrounded by other competitors.

I have devised a plan of sorts for the marathon and this is it:

7:40 (7.67 minutes / mile) x 16 miles = 2:02:43
7:10 (7.1667 minutes / mile) x 4 miles = 28:40
6:50 (6.8333 minutes / mile) x 6.2 miles = 42:21
Total Time: 3:13:44 (average pace: 7:24)
Time needed to qualify for Boston: 3:15:59

So I will just run 7:40's for the whole 16 miles. It will be a good exercise in learning what the pace is. When you run often enough, you can get a feel for how fast you are going in terms of pace. It gets so you don't need a watch or GPS system, you can feel that you are going a 7:30 pace, or 8:15 pace, or faster or slower than you should be going, just from experience. So after banging out 16 7:40's come marathon day my memory will hopefully serve me and when I start running I will be able to simply remember how fast it feels like I should be going, at least until I get a chance to check at the first clock (I won't wear a watch).

There will be clocks every mile at the race so it will be good practice for the marathon - you can use the clocks to monitor your pace every mile, so you can make adjustments if you are going either too fast or too slow.


Getting back to the plan. Running 7:40 pace for 16 miles will be no problem. I ran the 18 miler at a 7:28 pace and felt pretty good afterwards. So decreasing by 12 seconds per mile will hopefully give me a reserve of energy for the last 10.2.

Increasing to 7:10 for 4 miles, which will consist of 1st Avenue from 59th Street up to the Bronx will be easy as well. I have run 2 races at 6:36 pace for 4 miles. I have run half marathons at that pace (a 7:11) or better (a 7:03). So with the boost from the crowd on First Avenue speeding up to 7:10 will be no sweat. Actually keeping myself in check and not exceeding 7:10 will be the bigger problem.

Finally the 6:50 last 10K will be the true test. I have run two 6:49 pace 10K's, one in Connecticut in January as part of the Boston Buildup series of races. That was an extremely hilly course, much worse than the last 6.2 of the marathon. On the other hand, the weather was cold and much more conducive to running than the warm weather we've had for the marathon the last few years. The other one was a 10K in Central Park, I believe an identical time down to the second (I just looked it up, the Healthy Kidney 10K on May 20, 2006, 42:20 net time, 6:49 pace, same as the Buildup race).

Well I will have a 2:15 cushion if I do the first 20 miles correctly, or 135 seconds, or 22 seconds per mile, so I could simply do 7:02's and just come in under the wire. That is close to my PR pace for a half marathon, which is more than double the distance than the last 6.2, so pretty doable.