My Summer Training Block Part 1: Starting off with a fresh PR

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Hi everyone! Its been a minute. Work has been slow so I've been spending much of the summer running. The summer is going to come and go anyways, so might as well spend it building up a massive aerobic base šŸ˜Ž

In the interest of not being too long winded, I'll break this into parts. I've been meaning to post something about my Half Marathon anyways, so I'll start with a race report about the Foot Traffic Flat on July 4th.
 
My Training: 
 
I didn't have any particular training for this race. I wanted to start incorporating track work, specifically 400m repeats when I can. Its summer but I guess the kids at the high school still do practice for sports on the field. If the track is being used, then I end up going the "Kofuzi" workout, which is 6x1 mile repeats with about 90 seconds of rest. (Kofuzi is this guy)

I wanted to train some speed in before I started slogging through marathon pace work. 
 
Outside of the 400 m repeats or the 1 mile repeats, the other 30+ miles I did during the week were extremely easy: 12ish minute miles, walking if I felt even slightly winded.
 
Race Day: 
July 4th and Portland is already at the beginning of a heat wave being that it was going to be warmer than usual, I figured I set my expectations to somewhere around 1:40 (about an 8 min/mile pace) and be happy with that.  
 
We get there with about 5 minutes to spare but now there's traffic and we're not moving. I have my wife take over driving duties and I do my warmup by running 800 meters from our car to the start line. Of course I have to pee so I can't start right at 6:30. I instead opt to use the portable toilet, which meant waiting in line for one to open up.This wasn't a great start! 
 
I finally get started, but I go out with wave with the 2h45min (~12:40 min/mile) pace group, which started ~ 5 minutes after the starting gun. I felt like a tool sprinting around all the groups of runners while at the same time avoiding cars on the other side of the road. I finally get a bit of breathing room once I pass the 2h00min pace group (~9:05 min/mile) about 15 minutes in. 
 
THIS REALLY WASN'T A GREAT START. 
 
After a few miles, things finally settle as I monitor my HR. I'm using my Polar Verity Sense (an arm band HR sensor and its much more accurate than any wrist watch) so I trust that its giving me good info.
 
My heart rate settles at around 160 bpm at 7:30 min/mile pace for the next 9 miles or so. 
 
The last half mile I fully send it, picking up the pace to 6:30 min/miles with a final 100m at the finish line at 5:35 min/mile pace! I didn't expect to PR, but I did anyways with an official time of 1:35:48 felt great, excited to start my training block for the PDX Marathon in October!
 
Marathon Training Begins:

I like to start off my training blocks with a nice race as a great confidence booster. I'll post a little more about my training philosophy in part 2. Stay tuned!
 
 

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