Breaking the 1:50 barrier in HM

When you run, either there are good days or exceptional days (never a dull one when you run 😁).

September 23, 2018 turned out to be an exceptional day for me. It was the day when I broke the 1:50 barrier in HM and quite comfortably so with a 1:46 finish at the Spirit of Wipro Half Marathon.

I realized that I was only running FMs, Ultras and occasional 10Ks. So much so that I hadn’t run a timed HM since the 2017. So, when we registered for this event, my idea was to go all out and see what happens. 21K is a distance that I have grown extreme confort with owing to mileages gathered during training for Ultras.

I was confident about going below 1:55 for sure. So, I set myself a target of finishing between 1:50 to 1:55 prior to the run and spoke about the same with other running buddies. The course was single loop (10.5 km out and in) was elevation gain in 190m zone – a moderately tough course, across the scenic route of Nice Road in Bangalore and featured several uphill/downhill pairs.

Like with all events, there was a large contingent from Running Ninjas. It was good to see quite a few attempting their first 21 Km – Rajmeet, Kunal, Anindya & Anagha. Most of them have been training consistently with the group.

I had synced up with Vimal to pace me for a 1:50 finish so I did not think much about the pace plan prior the the race. Unfortunately, Vimal went down with illness and had to skip the event. With this, I decided to just run free with an out an out aggressive run – just stick to even pace of 5 to 5:10 throughout the distance.

We arrived just in the nick to time for the scheduled flag off at 6:30 am. Thankfully, the organizers delayed it by about 10 mins. I squeezed in a quick warm-up routine in the holding area. Bhaskar, Chandra, Gaurav, Anna & I started out together at a comfortable pace. I got into a good stride rhythm by 2km mark and decided to push up the pace. Eventually, moved ahead of the pack and thereafter I was pretty much on my own. At 5th Km, my Garmin showed a 4:44 which bumped up my spirits. 9th and 10th km were gradual declines and I pushed up the pace further in 4:40 zone. At the loop u-turn I was comfortably within the 1:50 mark but I was waiting to the pace decay to set in the second half. On the way back, I saw other running buddies and greeted them all. Bhaskar was within a half a km zone and I was sure he was going to catch-up soon.

I decided to keep up the pace even after the u-turn till as far as I can. 12th and 13th km were uphills but came in at 5:30 and then 14th and 15th km, I pushed further and got back the lost time with 4:50 mins. I was still dreading about the decay in pace but decided to move on. Km 17 came in at 5:27 and I decided to take a breather to kind of reset the pace. That helped as the next 2 km came at 4:51 and 4:59. With this, I knew that I was comfortably below the target and would end up between 1:45 and 1:46. With finish line in sight, last 2 km came in easy. I was elated to see 1:46:08 on my Garmin. The official race time came a few hours later and that showed 1:46:04.

Bhaskar finished a few mins later – picked up his PB with 1:49. Then, Nirav, Gaurav and Shikha finished. Anna and Vikas finished together; got to know later that Vikas pushed Anna in the final 3km.

Overall, it was a wonderful day for me. I went below 1:50 mark in HM for the first time. Did it in style by going 4 mins below. I actually surprised myself with this strong finish. Overall, an exceptional day in my short running career. And I hope to have many such days going forward – yeh dil maange more :-D.