Next weekend, I’ll be lining up for Grandma’s Half Marathon again.
Last year, I finished Grandma’s in 2:44:41, with my watch recording 13.25 miles at a 12:25 average pace. It was a hard day, and looking back at that race now, it feels a little wild to see how much has changed over the past year.
Since Grandma’s, I have run 921.8 miles across 173 runs.
Other than a couple of easy shakeout runs this week, the training is done. The miles are in.
Honestly, the number that means the most to me might not be the total mileage or even the faster paces. It is the consistency. Across nearly a full year of training, I averaged around 18 miles per week. I ran at least 15 miles during most weeks, usually ran at least three times, and did not have a single week without a run.
There were illnesses, travel, winter footing, schedule changes, tired legs, and plenty of runs that did not feel particularly impressive. But I kept going.
Right after Grandma’s, I was averaging around 14 to 15 miles per week, with an overall pace around 11:19. Over the final couple of months of this training block, I have regularly been running more than 20 miles per week, often at an average pace somewhere in the mid-9s. I am running more miles every week while averaging more than a minute and a half faster per mile.
The progress happened gradually, and I really think the move to the new house and having a neighbor to run and lift with made all the difference. I ran 54 miles in July, 80 in August, and almost 90 in September. In November, I crossed 100 miles in a month for the first time during this stretch. Winter slowed my pace a little, as Minnesota winter tends to do, but I kept running. Then I hit another 100-mile month in May, this time while averaging more than seven miles per run.
The Garmin numbers also do not capture everything I was doing. I have lifted semi-consistently throughout the year, sometimes having friends come over to lift in the garage gym in the mornings and sometimes taking GTX classes. I went to quite a few GTX classes throughout the winter, including nine classes between January and early April. Those workouts usually included some treadmill mileage too, but most of those miles did not make it into my Garmin export.
I think the strength work has made a difference too. It is hard to point to one specific workout and say that it made me faster, but I feel stronger and more durable than I did a year ago. I have been able to handle more mileage, longer runs, and faster workouts without feeling like I am constantly falling apart. (It helps that I’m down around 70 pounds since this time last year, so less mass to carry around).
The race results show that progression pretty clearly too.
Last June, I ran Grandma’s at a 12:25 average pace.
In September, I ran the Elm Creek Half Marathon at about a 10:41 pace. That was already a huge improvement only a few months later. I was still building mileage and figuring out what faster running looked like for me, but I had already taken nearly two minutes per mile off my Grandma’s pace.
Then in October, I ran the Twin Cities 10 Mile at about a 9:28 pace. That was another big jump and probably one of the first races where I really started to see that I was becoming a different runner.
This spring, I ran the Get in Gear Half in 1:55:12, an 8:43 pace, and the Women Run the Cities 10 Mile at a 9:02 pace.
Seeing those races lined up makes the progress feel much more real:
Grandma’s Half: 12:25 pace
Elm Creek Half: 10:41 pace
Twin Cities 10 Mile: 9:28 pace
Get in Gear Half: 8:43 pace
Women Run the Cities 10 Mile: 9:02 pace (it was hot and hilly! I had more in me…)
The long runs have changed too. Last summer, a 10-mile run was a major part of the training schedule. This spring, I ran 14 miles three different times. I also raced the Get in Gear Half in 1:55:12, an 8:43 pace, and ran the Women Run the Cities 10 Mile at a 9:02 pace.
At Grandma’s last year, I averaged 12:25. At Get in Gear this spring, I averaged 8:43. Obviously they were different races, on different courses, on different days. Still, that is almost a 49-minute difference over the half marathon distance.
The final week of the training block felt like a good summary of how far I have come. On Wednesday, I ran six miles with four five-minute tempo intervals and averaged 9:17 overall. Then on Saturday, I ran eight miles with friends at a 9:24 pace and an average heart rate of only 137.
That eight-mile run did not feel like a final test or a huge accomplishment. It just felt like a comfortable Saturday run with friends. Maybe that is the clearest sign of progress.
The improvement is bigger than one race result. My overall average pace went from around 11:03 during the summer after Grandma’s to somewhere in the mid-9s this spring. I am not only capable of running faster. I am able to run faster while handling more mileage, longer runs, workouts, and strength training alongside it.
I have also learned that progress does not always look exciting while it is happening. Most of it looked like getting up and doing another ordinary run. It looked like running in the dark, running on the treadmill, navigating bad footing, meeting friends for long runs, lifting weights early in the morning, going to GTX classes, and squeezing workouts into already full weeks.
Now I have one decision left to make: Do I actually try to race Grandma’s, or do I relax and enjoy the experience with my friends?
Part of me wants to see what I can do. I have trained consistently, I am faster than I have been since having kids, and the work suggests I could have a really strong race. The other part of me knows how much fun it would be to run with friends, soak up the course, and not spend 13.1 miles obsessing over my watch.
I may not decide until race morning.
Either way, I know I am arriving at the starting line as a much stronger and more confident runner than I was a year ago. The training block is basically over. The miles are in. There is nothing left to build now.
Last year, finishing the race was the accomplishment.
This year, I get to decide how I want to enjoy everything those 921.8 miles have built.