The Sub 4 Support Thread

ariana`

eyrie wrote: »

I've been wondering about this too. Clearly several people (including our wonderful mentors!) have managed this well and had great experiences, but much of the general advice/data I've come across on marathons suggests that a negative split is very hard to achieve, and a lot of the advice seems to be to aim for an even split at best. I still think I'm going to give it a go, and stick with slow start/hope to get faster later, but I am kind of hoping it doesn't just end up as slow start, slow middle, slow finish... :eek:

I think Murph's point is very valid. And admittedly part of the reason it worked for your 3 mentors is that we were all running well within ourselves or i'd go so far as to say our targets were underwhelming for various reasons. The closer you are to the limit of your ability the harder it will be to run a neg split and subsequently the smaller the negative split target should be - it might be a case of just seconds (rather than the minutes we ran last year ) - 2:00:15/1:59:44 is a negative split of 31 seconds and sub 4

Ultimately only you can decide your target and your strategy! Don't forget you did a fair few progression runs in training. And i know in at least one of your 20 milers you added blocks of MP miles in the latter miles, this is all good preparation for lifting the pace on tired legs.

RayCun

eyrie wrote: »

much of the general advice/data I've come across on marathons suggests that a negative split is very hard to achieve, and a lot of the advice seems to be to aim for an even split at best.

It's also very hard to know what is a realistic target to aim for.

I would say, run a time in the first half that
- if you maintain it in the second half, you'll be satisfied with your finish time
- leaves you room to push on in the second half, and run the time you'd really like to.

Lots of people say they're caught between choosing a conservative target time, and a target time that they think does justice to their training. I think run the first half to that conservative target, and then see where your training can take you in the second.

Murph_D

RayCun wrote: »

It's also very hard to know what is a realistic target to aim for.

I would say, run a time in the first half that
- if you maintain it in the second half, you'll be satisfied with your finish time
- leaves you room to push on in the second half, and run the time you'd really like to.

Lots of people say they're caught between choosing a conservative target time, and a target time that they think does justice to their training. I think run the first half to that conservative target, and then see where your training can take you in the second.

And where your guts can take you in the final 10k!

eyrie

ariana` wrote: »

I think Murph's point is very valid. And admittedly part of the reason it worked for your 3 mentors is that we were all running well within ourselves or i'd go so far as to say our targets were underwhelming for various reasons. The closer you are to the limit of your ability the harder it will be to run a neg split and subsequently the smaller the negative split target should be - it might be a case of just seconds (rather than the minutes we ran last year ) - 2:00:15/1:59:44 is a negative split of 31 seconds and sub 4

Ultimately only you can decide your target and your strategy! Don't forget you did a fair few progression runs in training. And i know in at least one of your 20 milers you added blocks of MP miles in the latter miles, this is all good preparation for lifting the pace on tired legs.

RayCun wrote: »

It's also very hard to know what is a realistic target to aim for.

I would say, run a time in the first half that
- if you maintain it in the second half, you'll be satisfied with your finish time
- leaves you room to push on in the second half, and run the time you'd really like to.

Lots of people say they're caught between choosing a conservative target time, and a target time that they think does justice to their training. I think run the first half to that conservative target, and then see where your training can take you in the second.

ariana and RayCun, both of your comments make total sense to me. I'm actually fairly happy that I've settled on my own approach for the day, and within the best of my knowledge at this point I think it's reasonable and not wildly optimistic, but if it turns out I'm not able to follow it through so be it.

My comment above was more just general wondering about the fact that a lot of fairly widespread advice/consensus seems to be that negative splits in a marathon are like some kind of elusive holy grail, and that to attempt it is not the standard (generic) advice.

skyblue46

eyrie wrote: »

ariana and RayCun, both of your comments make total sense to me. I'm actually fairly happy that I've settled on my own approach for the day, and within the best of my knowledge at this point I think it's reasonable and not wildly optimistic, but if it turns out I'm not able to follow it through so be it.

My comment above was more just general wondering about the fact that a lot of fairly widespread advice/consensus seems to be that negative splits in a marathon are like some kind of elusive holy grail, and that to attempt it is not the standard (generic) advice.

Brilliant! So we can expect a prompt entry onto the predicted times table on the novices thread....*sits back in anticipation

Sheep1978

eyrie wrote: »

My comment above was more just general wondering about the fact that a lot of fairly widespread advice/consensus seems to be that negative splits in a marathon are like some kind of elusive holy grail, and that to attempt it is not the standard (generic) advice.

the negative split plan / option is particularly applicable to Dublin. might not always be the case for other marathons

RayCun

eyrie wrote: »

My comment above was more just general wondering about the fact that a lot of fairly widespread advice/consensus seems to be that negative splits in a marathon are like some kind of elusive holy grail, and that to attempt it is not the standard (generic) advice.

In most marathons aiming for an even split, or hoping for a small negative split, would be more reasonable, but Dublin has a harder first half than second half.

skyblue46

Sheep1978 wrote: »

the negative split plan / option is particularly applicable to Dublin. might not always be the case for other marathons

I think it's the optimal way nearly everywhere but also the most difficult to do. I think I read somewhere that every world record from 1500m to marathon has been done with a negative split...even if it's a small negative.

eyrie

True, I was forgetting about the course profile making Dublin a special case right enough.

skyblue46 wrote: »

Brilliant! So we can expect a prompt entry onto the predicted times table on the novices thread....*sits back in anticipation

Ha! I said "fairly happy" with my plan, that's not quite the same as being ready to commit to it in writing! Although I did promise myself I'd decide everything this evening, so I suppose...

The Black Oil

So, we're running a marathon on Sunday..?

skyblue46

eyrie wrote: »

True, I was forgetting about the course profile making Dublin a special case right enough.


Ha! I said "fairly happy" with my plan, that's not quite the same as being ready to commit to it in writing! Although I did promise myself I'd decide everything this evening, so I suppose...

It's now night....evening has passed....a promise is a promise!

boardtc

Lazare wrote: »

How do you work out the % there, I'm stumped? Seems closer to the 2% I would have thought, no?

Ok, I am, with you. 3.5 min faster 2nd half is not as big a negative over as a full as a half which is what I am used to. A 3.5 min negative for 4h is 236.5min/240min or c1.5%.

Murph_D

boardtc wrote: »

Ok, I am, with you. 3.5 min faster 2nd half is not as big a negative over as a full as a half which is what I am used to. A 3.5 min negative for 4h is 236.5min/240min or c1.5%.

That’s an eight-hour marathon you just ran there.

121.75 / 118.25 splits = 3% faster 2nd half.

Lazare

I'll take either.

Murph_D

Me too. Have never achieved a negative split in a raced marathon.:(

judeboy101

Are the 4hr pacers at the back of wave two or the front of wave 3?

ariana`

judeboy101 wrote: »

Are the 4hr pacers at the back of wave two or the front of wave 3?

Wave 3.

Pomplamousse

Good luck to all attempting sub-4 at DCM tomorrow!
Unfortunately my sub-4 attempt will have to wait for another day as injury has meant I'll be going slowly and dropping out if/when my injury comes back bad. On the plus side I've enjoyed this round of training more than the last so I'm not too annoyed about having to attempt another marathon in the future til I finally get my sub-4!!
Hope you all enjoy tomorrow!

The Black Oil

3:57:25 today, decent dent in last year’s 4:11. Good to catch up with people in McGrattans. Hope the 2018 novices and mentors had a good day too.

coogy

The Black Oil wrote: »

3:57:25 today, decent dent in last year’s 4:11. Good to catch up with people in McGrattans. Hope the 2018 novices and mentors had a good day too.

Well done! I was 3:57:01!


Hey check ME out, posting after 10pm!! 😂

ewc78

Well done lads. I'll be hanging around this thread a bit longer. Wasn't to be for me today. Hadn't the best of days at all if I'm being honest. Don't know if the bit of man flu I had last week was a contributing factor or not but I felt something wasn't right very early on and it was a bit of a horror show from about 10miles onwards. I finished it but no sub 4.
I said in my opening post when I started the thread this was maybe my last Marathon but I've got unfinished business now, especially with Dublin,so I'll be back next year.

Dev1234

Just popping in to say thanks for the advice in this thread over the last couple of weeks. I went for a negative spilt as recommended. I hit halfway in 2:01:31 and crossed the line in 3:59:29 😠The last 2 miles were torture but I think that's to be expected!! I'm delighted to get that monkey off my back. Now to focus on some of the shorter stuff!!

Murph_D

Well done, both. Good to see a few people make the milestone. All about setting new targets now! What do you think was the most important factor in your success, for the benefit of those who didn’t make it this time?

ewc, you started this thread so it must be disappointing. The marthon can be a cruel beast but also one that shows up any weaknesses in our approach to running generally. Good that you’re thinking already about the next one. What do you think you will do differently?

judeboy101

Didn't work out, posted a 4:13, just didn't do enough quality training tween Longford and Dublin. Might skip dub next year just do Longford , warmer but flatter. Congrats to all who broke 4, someday ill join ye in the sun.

Dev1234

Murph_D wrote: »

What do you think was the most important factor in your success, for the benefit of those who didn’t make it this time?

For me it was having confidence from the 1:44:5x half I ran in Charleville a few weeks ago. That's when I started thinking that sub-4 could be on. I've used the same training plan for most of my sub-4 attempts but i never had a sub 1:45 half to fall back on.

The negative split approach definitely helped. I tend to run my half's and 10 milers getting quicker towards the end as I want to make sure I don't red line in the middle of it so I was happy to take my time in the first half yesterday.

I also had a cleaner diet and less alcohol over the last couple of months. I'm the lightest I've been in a good few years so it all came together on the day.

ewc78

Murph_D wrote: »

Well done, both. Good to see a few people make the milestone. All about setting new targets now! What do you think was the most important factor in your success, for the benefit of those who didn’t make it this time?

ewc, you started this thread so it must be disappointing. The marthon can be a cruel beast but also one that shows up any weaknesses in our approach to running generally. Good that you’re thinking already about the next one. What do you think you will do differently?

I don't think my training was all that bad to be honest, I did plenty of MP miles and hit the pace quite easily on all of them.
I'll reflect more on it in the coming weeks but for now I'm just going to get back to running in a few days and take it from there.
One thing I did notice looking at my Strava stats was my heart rate was extremely high before I even started the race. I know HR isn't entirely accurate on Garmin watches but mine was in zone 4 before I started. I don't think I hit zone 4 in any of my training runs even those at MP.

I don't do a lot of races so maybe I need to do more of them to get used to bigger occasions, maybe a bit of anxiety hit me or something I dunno.
It was a bad day but it was only one day and I'll be back stronger from it.

bucketybuck

03.55.38 for me, delighted with that!

I'm also one of those who took a lot of heart from my half marathon time, I did 1.45 there when I was worried if I could get near 1.50, it gave me a lot of confidence and I knew that the legs had it in them if I did everything else right.

Dev1234

I actually turn off the heart rate page on my Garmin for races as I don't want to see how high it is. It worked yesterday as my average heart rate was 177 and my peak at the end was 204!!!

Although the pins and needles in my arms for the last two miles told me all I needed to know!!

The Black Oil

Murph_D wrote: »

Well done, both. Good to see a few people make the milestone. All about setting new targets now! What do you think was the most important factor in your success, for the benefit of those who didn’t make it this time?

Hmm, probably a mixture of things - strategy/execution mainly. Conservative starting out, never put myself under much pressure re sticking on top of the balloons. They were generally always visible or just up ahead - and felt catchable. In the Phoenix Park I let them tick away. I did look back a few times early in the race to see if the 4:10 balloons were behind me, had they been I might have moved closer to the 4 hours, didn't spot the 4:10s anyway. I stuck fairly close to a woman in a purple shirt for the first 14-15 miles or so as I thought she was doing something similar and likely to catch the 4 hours later. I decided to move on past her. There was a small group of women with Esker shirts running a lot closer to the 4 hours than I was and I thought of shadowing them too, but decided to leave that. I noticed later they were no longer together and I passed two, one before the RDS I think. Decent sized group from Lusk AC also tailing 4 hours quite closely, but again, they became smaller. Maybe they moved passed them early in the double digits, I dunno. I was close enough to the 4 hours through the half gantry. Thought I was going to lose them as this (or after) was a fuel station (iirc) and bit chaotic. I had forgotten the rubber band idea, tbh. Never felt tempted to surge forward solely the catch balloons which probably helped overall. Didn't think back to training much in terms of specifics or mileage, wasn't in my head...knew the legs could deliver, though.

I had forgotten how busy it is in the back end of the course, both with runners and supporters. Theoretically, I could have passed the 4 hours sooner, say around RTE or just before and may have done 3:55 or something like that. I definitely had the legs and stamina and the final 10k felt grand. I think for next year I would move forward earlier as congestion's a factor with the volume of people. But no regrets at all. JFDI did kick in because I got a shout out from my aunt at Terenure. Support was bloody amazing in those final miles. I said welcome to Dublin a few UK visitors who had 100 marathon t-shirts, spoke briefly to a Naas parkrun RD too, her first outing. Little things, I guess.

10k - 56:29
Half - 1:59:23
30k - 2:50:35
Finish - 3:57:25
@ 9:04 min/mi avg

Sleep seems to have helped re today and the legs are not doing too badly.

DubOnHoliday

My first marathon. My half marathon time of 1:38 gave me a bit of room to work with in getting under 4. I really decided I’m the two weeks before that I would stay comfortable in my first marathon and that’s how i did it. Started at the back of wave 2 (waiting for loos!) which really helped with taking it easy. Ran two splits of 1:54 each to finish in 3:48. Really happy with that and felt good all the way bar the last mile when the super support pulled me home. A wonderful race, nearly got emotional at the support sometimes thank god that training block is over and back to hill running for the next while. Will I be back? ... when does registration open?