One of my long term goals is to qualify for and run the Boston Marathon. My BQ time is currently 3:15. Well, actually.. 3:14:59.9 but who’s counting. A 3:15 marathon is a 7:27 mile average. Currently, that is not attainable for me.
My marathon PR, set last spring on accident, is 3:45:24. I say it was set on accident because I did not start the race intending to go after a PR. It just kind of happened to be attainable late in the race, so I resolved to give it a go somewhere around mile 21 or so. A 3:45:24 marathon is a 8:38 mile average. So, I have to shave 1:11 off of each and every mile.
For half marathons, I’ve been running about the same pace for a while now. My first half was around 1:48. I stepped down from there to 1:46 and change. My recent time in the Winter Carnival half is my current PR in 1:45:14. A 1:45:14 half is a 8:02 per mile average. Improving the time in the half marathon has been slow.
The formulas
One way of calculating your marathon time is to double your half and add ten minutes. By that formula, I should still be able to get to around 3:40 without improving my half marathon time. However, an improvement to 1:40 (7:38 miles) works out to a 3:30 marathon time.
Runner’s World magazine has a more scientific
technique they use in their Race Time Calculator. They use the following: T2 = T1 x (D2/D1)1.06 which calculates a 3:28:29 finish time.
Implications
Running a 1:40 half is a hard, but reasonable goal. If I achieve that time, I can start to look at Grandma’s as a major step toward my BQ time. However, recent mid-week long runs don’t indicate making the time. Yesterday, I ran ~9 miles in 70 minutes, (~7:47) and I’ll be raising the HR limit for the race to ~170. Perhaps..
If I make the time, I’ll reduce my Grandma’s goal time down to near 3:30
from the current sub 3:40
level. Wouldn’t that be a kick? It would be great to chop an additional 15 minutes off. We have to keep perspective on these things though.
My guess is that in order to get down to 3:14 I have to:
- Reduce my weight to around 125 lbs.
- Raise my peak weekly mileage to around 80 miles.
- Give up drinking beer.
All that might mean, Not this year, kid.
Tags: Boston Marathon, Marathon, Qualifying Time, Running Goals, Training
{ 2 } Comments
Hey - did you do the Earth Day Half? I checked the results and there is someone there by your name. If that was YOU - WOW! You chopped some time off your PR, dude!! Way to go!
Yea, that was me. I’m really happy with the time, but I’m not sure what it means relative to my expected time at Grandma’s. I’ll have to write something up about it later tonight. BTW, Thanks!