With only six days to go until the race, it’s time to set some half marathon race day goals!
It’s the week of goals here on the blog! Today, I’m sharing my goals for race day (six days away!), and a week from today, I’m sharing my overarching goals for the month of November. I’m already wondering what the heck I’m going to blog about after next Sunday. 😉 Just kidding–I have a few things planned, though I’ll miss all the 13.1 talk for a while, I’m sure.
As the day gets closer and closer, I’ve begun thinking about my goals for race day and what I’m hoping to get out of it. This is a Disney race, so it’s meant to be FUN. But it’s my first Disney race and only my second half marathon, so I definitely have some ideas of how I hope it will go.
Wine & Dine Half Marathon Race Day Goals
ONE // Follow the run-walk-run protocol
Since about August, I’ve slowed down A LOT. My splits have been all over the place and I can’t figure out why. In my last few weeks of long runs, I’ve been doing Jeff Galloway-style run-walk-run training with 4 minutes of running and 1 minute of walking. This has helped me power through those runs and keep my splits more consistent than they had been. I want to keep this up on race day!
Related: How to Train for a Half Marathon With a Busy Schedule
TWO // Run the tangents
This is new terminology for me, but once I heard it described it actually made so much sense. I’m definitely one to bob and weave through the course to try and get around people. I did this in Las Vegas at my first half and my GPS registered almost 13.5 miles by the time I was finished. No wonder my time was so far off from where I wanted it to be! This time, I want to run as tightly as I can to not only conserve energy, but to provide a more accurate reading of my half marathon time.
THREE // Stop for my absolute favorite characters (depending on the line)
Part of the RunDisney magic (or so I’ve read/heard) are the character stops. There are some runners who try and stop for every single character, but there are some who just keep moving. Because I’m doing this by myself, characters aren’t my number one priority. But I will stop if I see my faves and the lines aren’t ridiculously long.
Related: 2017 runDisney Virtual Running Shorts Review
FOUR // Smile and enjoy the time on the course
While I do have a certain time goal in mind, I don’t know if I’m going to reach it. Instead of being down on myself for that from the get-go, I want to enjoy the fact that I’m running through my favorite place in the world. I also want to celebrate the hard work I’ve put in these last few months. Though I may not be right where I want to be, it hasn’t been easy.
FIVE // Finish strong!
I’m definitely one of those people who will sprint to the finish. My goal is to have enough energy reserved at the end of the race to be able to power through that .1 and finish strong! I love that feeling at the end of a race knowing you gave it your all.
Question: What kind of goals do you set for race day?
Your goals sound great! I always run so much longer than the course. At my last half I ran like 13.22 miles from weaving.
I’m so excited for you to run your Disney race! When I run Disney races I rarely have any time goals. You should definitely stop to get a character picture on the course since it is your first race!