HM Pace

I have only been running regularly since January and my only timed race was a park run last sunday.

I have run 30+ miles per week for the last 3-4 weeks and just started to ease off for a HM i have a week on sunday.

I have twice run 13.1 miles in training @ 1hr 52mins and 1hr 50min.

My park run was 5k@ 20.50mins

What pace shall I aim for at the HM. Calculators range from 1hr 35min to 1hr 45min which scares me. When I started training my aim was to beat 2hrs.

As this is my 1st HM should I take it steady and enjoy the day look for under 2 hrs or risk setting off at 8mm pace and see what happens-what would/did you do?

Your 5k pace is pretty good, which is probably why calculators are giving you a good predicted time for a half marathon. If you came in comforatbly in 1:50 in a training run, I would consider a pace of 8:06, to come in at 1:46. As this is your first race, it's better to pick a time you could beat in the furture than pick something you won't achieve now.

As Gez has said, your 5k time is much better than your 1/2's in training. That's understandable - I can never get near race pace in training, even when I really push. The other issue is that there is a big difference between the distances being compared - a 10k or 10 miler would give a much better idea of predicted outcome.

Assuming you have done the necessary long runs, I think I would go slightly faster than Gez says, under 1:45 would be nice. The worst that is likely to happen is that you get to 9 or 10 miles or so, and can't sustain it and have to slow down. Obviously it is up to you, you don't want to be stupid about it, but then it is about what you want your experience to be like. Do you want to go & enjoy the experience, finish strongly and relatively comfortably, or do you want to see what you are really capable of at the moment? The more you risk it, the greater your potential satisfaction at the end, but the greater the chance of an uncomfortable finish.

thanks all that helps

Hi Craig RM

I was in a similar position earlier this year. First race and no idea what to pace it at. Decided to sit inbetween the 8min/mile pacing group and 9min/mile pacing group. On the day this felt too slow and ended up dropping infront of the 8min/mile pacer. I ended up with a reasonable time of 1:41 happy to finish my 1st HM, but also a bit cheesed off that I didn't give it more from the start. Ran another shortly after in 1:28 now that I had a bit of race experience behind me. From your long runs (providing you took then easy), 8.00min/miling seems on to me

Craig

I started off using a Sub 1:50 HM plan (Runner World Garmin plans) - started off with the pacing  and structure from this - that was the target I set myself as I had no clue what I could do.

Week5 of training, entered a HM just for a bit of experience in pacing, and following that, reset my target as 1:35, and updated plans accordingly

I also deviated from the planned Long Runs as I knew I was heading for a Full Marathon later in the year, and so some of my Long Runs were extended (there was a 16 and a 20 mile in there)

Mileage was in the low 30's to begin with, and peaked at 42 a couple of weeks before the 1:28 HM , mainly because of a longer Long Run, and increasing one of the Easy midweek runs.

My Long Runs / Easy runs were around 8:20 - 8:40

My Tempo Runs which I held for 4 to 5 miles were 6:50 - 7:10

None of my training gave me any indication of being capable of running 6:44 min/miles for 13miles.  I asked the same question as you on the forum at the very beginning - what pace to run the HM? It's really difficult to answer that and I am starting to apprecate that now. There are so many variable.

I've tried with and without tapering, and tapering definitely helps me. It could just be psychological, but I feel faster and stronger after tapering and carb loading.

I do the same amount of runs (only 4 or 5 a week for me), but less distance (60% less miles in the week) and less intensity on speed sessions.