That great feeling when achieving my first half-marathon goal

Last week Saturday (10th February 2024) I ran the Joburg North City Half-Marathon. This was my longest race to ever run. I completed it in my goal time of 1:58:09, this was 25 minutes and 2 seconds faster than I have ever done that distance.

Starting Point

I first started running more seriously in 2020, getting stronger and working slowly through the 5k and 10k training plans to build up my running ability. I would occasionally attempt longer runs, including some of the Garmin 15K monthly challenges.

Some of the Garmin 15K Challenge badges I achieved.

This slow, but steady, progression in training continued through 2021, 2022 the start of 2023 and I was averaging around 10km (~6mi) a week and 50km (~31mi) a month. Looking at the stats, I took 7 months to complete the first 5k plan and over 13 months to finally get through the 10K plan…

Thinking back as I write this, I cannot recall what changed in my life that pushed me from a 42km (26mi) total distance in March, to do 81km (50mi) total distance in April, to 134km (83mi) in May and beyond. My current average is now 35km (21mi) a week and 150km (93mi) a month total running distance!

Even with these increases in total running distance I was still only running for fun (occasionally coffee, but that is another post) there was no race goal or training plan target being followed, just miles on feet.

Garmin Coach

I finally decided that a race would be a worthwhile goal to focus my running and in October 2023 decided to leverage all the fancy features of my Garmin sport watch and try out the Garmin Coach feature – specifically their 12 to 26 week half-marathon program to get me to my first race finish.

Having months of consistent running without a race in mind really did help build my required aerobic base and made doing longer distances easier; I had even done a 21km (31mi) run/walk as a personal challenge on a cool day in July 2023 (completed in 2:24:43). I believed I had enough personal benchmarks on hand to select my first half-marathon plan with a realistic target of completing the race in under two hours.

Garmin Coach setup questions

Overview of the questions asked to setup the Garmin Coach plan:

Weekly Distance: Options from ‘I don’t run’ to ’40 kilometres or more’ are available.
Average Running Pace: Options from 9:30/km to 3.45/km available, sorry for those really, really fast peeps. (I am guessing that pace/mi is available if your watch settings are as such)
Half Marathon Goal: Options being just ‘complete the race’ or complete the race in a specific time from 1:32:00 to 2:40:00.
Choose a coach: Options are from Jeff Galloway, Amy Parkerson-Mitchell, and Greg McMillan – each has their own style of coaching which is reflected in the plan activities and approach.
Available Days: Which days a week are you able to run – the plans will still allocate rest days even if you select every day of the week.
Long Run days: Which day would you prefer to do you long runs.
Race Event: The plans align their training to a specific race date; the app encourages you to select an event in your area to run (the app contains most official road races events worldwide)

With the above information locked in for my goal and a race date set, I’m ready to train.

Training

My training plan started with a very short “Benchmark Run”.

Garmin Coach training plans are only pace based, as this is the easiest metric to use for an automated plan, so do not expect any zone 2 easy runs or any heart rate based workout with the Garmin Coach plans.

My training plan started with a very short ”Benchmark Run” to get the metrics in order and the next 18 weeks went by faster than expected – with a steady increase in distance.

My typical week was:

Sunday: Long Run Day (Set pace)
Monday: Rest Day
Tuesday: Tired Run (Any pace)
Wednesday: Speed session (Fast interval pace)
Thursday: Rest Day (I did swimming or a short run on these days)
Friday: Easy Run (Set pace)
Saturday: Easy Run (Set pace)

To keep things interesting on my runs (short or long) I tried my best to find different routes around my neighbourhood (or around my work neighbourhood on the days I travelled into the office). This not only provided good variations in elevation, but it also provided an abundance of new sites and scenery for me to enjoy on each run (I love looking at interesting houses and gardens).

Videos and coach notes

The training plan included short videos from the coach and blog type posts with additional information on strength training, gear selection, running form, what to expect on race day and more.

Concerns

The only real concern I had during the entire process was believing the phrase “Run slow to go fast” and trusting the plan on that. With my race day approaching, I had never run my race pace for any distance over 10km (6mi) never mind the required 21km (13 mi).

Race Day

During training I had come across the concept of A B C Goals for a race, these are:

A Goal: Get an aggressive, ideal time goal. For me, this was finishing in 1:58:03
B Goal: Get a more realistic time goal. For me, this was finishing in sub 2:30:00 (as there were specific medals for finishing in this time and faster and it was a time I had achieved in the past outside of a race)
C Goal: Finish the race.

On the day I set my alarm for 4 AM but got up at around 3:30 AM due to nerves. This gave me enough time to eat my pre-race toast and peanut butter, snack on some mixed nuts, have my morning coffee, and drive to the start line at Mark Park Sports Club. I did all my running training on my own (I do not run with a club) so having the vibe of other runners and the race day ambiance at the start filled me with energy.

Garmin PacePro

I had pre-loaded the race route on my watch, so I quickly added a Garmin PacePro plan on the start line, hopefully giving me an idea on how my actual pace would align to my goal pace over the course. The first 6km (4mi) I was slower than I needed to be, but this is something every runner doing their first race must accept – you are now running with thousands of other people on roads that are only so wide, you are going to be slowed down by the mass of other people on the route, particularly around the start.

You are now running with thousands of other people on roads that are only so wide, you are going to be slowed down by the mass of other people on the route.

I was concerned about going to fast, over-exerting myself early, hitting the wall and possibly needing to walk to finish, or worse, not finishing at all. Passing a water point and hearing a spectator shout that we are nearly over the halfway mark (it was just after the 10km (6mi) point) was a great surprise, I was in a good rhythm, still felt strong and I was slowly gaining back some of the minutes I had lost in the chaos of the start.

The last stretch

The rest of the race was a mental game, me taking chunks and completing those (“If I complete this km, I only have 2 X 4KM sections to do”. “If I complete this 2km I only have 5KM to go”). Taking on a little fluid at each water point and keeping to my fuel schedule with gels.

My watch buzzed at me – my 21km was done! What!? I’m not at the finish line yet!

Finally, my watch buzzed at me – my 21km was done! What!? I’m not at the finish line yet! Thank goodness I was less than 600m away from the finish line, I pushed a little bit more, finishing my first race, more than happy with the result!

Disclaimer: I am not sponsored or affiliated with Garmin, I am just a user that is very happy with the products and wanted to share my enthusiasm for the sport of running.