Breakthrough

For the majority of non-elite runners who take part in races, there is a symbolism in each 5 minute interval of time that could make up a race result. I remember my first half getting 1:50:01 and being a bit peeved that I hadn't pulled finger a bit more to go just 2 seconds faster. (I'd pulled a hamstring instead.) My next half I was ecstatic to cleanly break 1:40. I foiled myself getting a possible sub 1:35 in 2017 when I took the wrong road a couple of kilometres short of the end at Omaha. And then last year I had the sweetness of smashing that with a 1:31 time at Millwater.

But the times are a little like cricket milestones. The difference between a batsman getting a century and being out for 101 or falling short of the century of 98 for a team or a game's result isn't much. But for the batsman him or herself, 101 is so much more satisfying than being just 2 runs short of a century. You'd almost prefer to get out for even less, maybe 87, than to be so close on 98. The 1:31 was a little bit bittersweet because I'd felt like a million dollars in full flow when running and almost got within sight of another milestone: 1:30.

1 hour and 30 minutes is something of a symbolic threshold for a decent half marathon runner. 100 minutes (i.e. 1 hour 40) is a solid result for good training. 1:35 is a special result for sustained training. 1 hour 30, for most of the running population, can only really be gotten with a long sustained, focussed training. It's been my target since that 1:31 at Millwater last year that made me dare to believe. But since then I had Devonport 1:33 on a challenging course, 1:37 at the cursed Omaha course where I fell pre-race, 1:38 at Coatesville post surgery and 1:39 at Maraetai, one of the few recent races where I'd paced beyond myself and struggled. So there had been an odd trend away from my goal. There would be one last opportunity to make amends prior to trying to better Millwater and that was the Waterfront Half, the last in the half marathon series.

The Waterfront was weighed down with the expectations of a great many. It would be what most were building up to. It was also the flattest half marathon you could ever really imagine. Apart from the need to four 180 degree turns, it was going to a race to pace consistently, because there was no texture of hills, terrain, beach or otherwise to make strategy any more than an idle preoccupation. Pacing consistently isn't as easy as you'd think because you need to know exactly what pace is your maximum for your current fitness, the course and the conditions and then not go over that unless you're in the last few kilometres. But what is that pace? There can be guess-work from recent results and training. My most recent result, Maraetai, was not the best example as it was hillier and I quickly struggled with the wrong pace. But my training had gone well except for the niggle. I knew the pace that I'd need for 1:30 was 4:16mins/km which was achievable over short periods but still seemed to be a mental barrier if not a physical conditioning barrier in thinking I could do that over 1 hour 30 minutes.

The race though did start. I made the same mistake as Devonport, doing the warm-up and not realising that any shrewd racer would be in the starting chute near the front. Once the warm-up was over 1,789 people all tried to get through the start gate. It took me over half a minute before I actually crossed the start-line and again it was a tiring exercise in dodging and weaving to find some "clean air". Once I had though I locked into a 4:15 pace and found that my breathing was pretty even and I also found some good pacing buddies pretty quickly, obviously other decent runners were delayed by the start gate crush. For the first half of the race, I followed "Hamilton Old-Boy" a scrawny but dynamic runner. He was efficiently moving through the slightly slower runners and I noticed that staying with him meant I maintained speed. After the half-way point, I felt even easier and pushed past him and for a while didn't have a particular person to pace against. The hairpin turns had an advantage that you could see who was ahead. My friend Jonathan was killing the course, over a minute ahead at all points, but I could see the 1:30 pace group / cluster not far ahead of me. One bad thing was one particular hairpin puts you in the flow of runners much slower than you. When I converged with them, I quickly identified two runners who were at the same progress of the race as I was and stuck with them, then dropped one and stayed with the faster. Then dropped him and was all alone. Like Devonport and unlike Maraetai, I had the high of only passing and barely ever been passed. All but one of those that passed me got to see me later.

When I got to the 19th kilometre I felt confident that I was breaking 1:30 and even though I was feeling tired, I wasn't decelerating. In fact I "negative splitted" the race (ran the last half faster than the first half). As I went through the finish line my watch claimed 1:29:50, although it had overestimated the distance I'd run. I was exhilarated. The body felt fine and I'd finally got the monkey off my back.

When I got back that I saw my official net time was 1:30:28. It was a mild downer and couldn't really understand how the times would be different. Did it feel like it detracted from what was still the fastest half marathon of my life? Yes. Not just because I had already celebrated and shared the result but also for the very reason that those 30 seconds over 1:30 did not get over that symbolic line. Fortunately, it wasn't long before I heard that there were some problems with everyone's timings. And then by evening my time was reassessed to the rather precarious 1:29:58. 2 seconds under. How do I feel? Happy but now over it.

Thinking about the event: Putting a half marathon in one of the most popular cafe areas on a Sunday morning has got to be one of the most courageous decisions ever. They closed the Tamaki Drive completely and with the lack of parking even on a good day, an additional 4,000 people worth of vehicles in the back streets of Mission Bay was always going to be a "mission" to find a park and then get out. They did have special bus services but I didn't realise before they were sold out. I played it safe and stressless and drove early, parked far up the Patterson Rd hill and besides having a long uphill cooldown stroll after the race, I got in and out without much fuss.

And that is the end of a series. Even with the surgical interlude and two fizzers, I'm still pretty stoked to have run all five half marathons. Rotorua is three weeks away and with the business trip also in between I don't have time to rest on my (partial) laurels. This evening, tomorrow morning and the long weekend before the trip are all going to be full of mileage.