In June of 2022, my wife and I decided to sign up for the Stockholm Half Marathon scheduled for September 17th. This would be our first half marathon since the Cowtown Half Marathon in Fort Worth, Texas in May of 2021 and just our third race since we moved to Stockholm in August of 2021. After a year of easy running around Stockholm, I was ready to get serious and follow a plan built for speed.
Half Marathon Training
Using my Runner’s World plus membership, I downloaded a 10-week sub-2 hour plan for my wife Lynn and both a 1:45 and a 1:30 10 week plan for myself. Having run a 1:37 half in February 2021, I decided that would be my goal for Stockholm. The main difference between my two plans was the pace of the runs on interval days, so I selected a pace about halfway between the two plans.
Starting 10 weeks out from the race, Day 1 of our half marathon training was on July 11th. We were on our home trip back to Texas for the month of July and it was hot! Since we had moved from Chicago to the Dallas area in 2013, we had never experienced such a prolonged period of heat with daytime temperatures consistently over 100 degrees. One day the temperature even peaked at 108. Our runs started before sunrise, but the temperature was still above 80 degrees and humid.
Training went very well the first week and Lynn and I took a side trip to visit our oldest daughter who was interning for a company in Allentown, PA. Looking for a place to do our long run, we found Lehigh Valley Parkway which had beautiful trails that weaved through towering trees. We enjoyed the cooler weather in Pennsylvania and kept our training on track during the trip.
Injury!
The second week of training, however, is where the wheels came off for me. During my cool down after my second track session I felt discomfort in my right achilles tendon. I finished my 2-mile cool down, but when I got home, I was walking gingerly. Still, I was hopeful that I would bounce back after a day off.
On Saturday, on our club run with the Prosper Running Club, my achilles tendon was quite tight and at mile 4 of our 8-mile run I felt a sharp pain and had to stop. After convincing my running mates to continue without me, I ran/walked, mostly walking, back to my car. Finding my phone, I went online and much to my chagrin, found that achilles injuries could take anywhere from 2 to 8 weeks to fully heal depending on the severity of the injury. It was time to rest right after I started to ramp up training.
Maybe it’s the wisdom of 20 years of running, or maybe it was fear of a serious injury that would jeopardize our European family vacation in August, but I didn’t run again for two weeks. We returned to Sweden on August 1st, bringing our son and youngest daughter with. Our oldest daughter would arrive a week later after her internship concluded at which point, we would travel around Western Europe. On August 5th I joined my wife on her interval run. We ended up running 7 miles including warm up and cool down, and following my wife’s pace, I felt fine.
I had been excited about running around Lake Brunnsviken with my son since we made his travel plans. The lake is about 8 miles around with crushed gravel trails and mostly shaded by trees. It’s one of my favorite places to run in Stockholm and only half a mile north of where we live. Having run with my wife successfully the day before, my son and I ventured out on Saturday at a faster pace. Unfortunately, I felt the tightness again and around the halfway point I urged my son to run ahead. At mile 6, the sharp pain started again, and I walked and limped the rest of the way home. I guess I needed more than 2 weeks to heal and probably should not have entertained back-to-back speed work and a long run.
I decided to stick to walking for another two weeks as we started our European tour. I won’t go into all the details here, but the 6 of us (my eldest daughter’s boyfriend came with us) had a fabulous time visiting Munich, Lucerne, the Black Forest, Nancy France, Paris, Normandy, and Amsterdam. While I didn’t run, I did average over 20,000 steps per day which I hoped would preserve some level of my fitness. During the entire trip, my achilles felt good.
On August 20th, after my older 2 children returned to Texas for school, I joined my wife for her 10 mile long run at about 9 minute per mile pace. My achilles tendon felt good, and I was back in business. Or so I thought.
On Tuesday, I got up early to put in 4 easy miles before work and only made it half a block before stabbing pain from my achilles stopped me in my tracks. Frustrated, I walked a mile to get some exercise in and then returned home. Now I was a little angry as well as frustrated so after work, I decided to try again. My daughter has archery practice on Tuesday evenings about 3 miles away from our apartment so while my wife and daughter take the bus, I liked to run over. I have a bit of a stubborn streak, so even though I felt stabbing pain, I managed to run 2 miles before finally shutting it down and walking the rest of the way. I resolved not to run again until race day which was about 3 1/2 weeks away.
A New Training Plan
Meanwhile, my wife was following her plan to a T, even though she missed a few days on her training plan while we were on vacation, she made up for it when we got back. I was concerned that double the speed work per week would lead to injury for her, but she managed to stay strong and healthy. To keep Lynn company on Sunday long runs, I rented a bike and pedaled by her side.
Stockholm Half Marathon Race Day
After almost a month of not running, I laced up on Saturday, September 17th determined to run the Stockholm Half Marathon with Lynn to the finish. Based on her training plan I was sure that Lynn could maintain 9 minute per mile pace. This would have her to finish around 1 hour and 58 minutes, keeping with her goal of under 2 hours. I figured I still had enough fitness to keep up with her barring further injury. In the end I did not feel any effects of the lingering achilles injury, but how did I do?
In coach mode, I suggested to Lynn that we take the first mile slightly slower than race pace and ease into the run. The plan was to run the first mile around 9:10 pace. Instead, we ran the first mile in 8:51. I was feeling great, but I worried that Lynn might be pushing too hard.
The 2nd mile we completed in 8:24, followed by 8:33. Throughout miles 2 to 7, Lynn averaged 8:28 per mile. I was worrying that she wouldn’t have enough for the 2nd half.
Somewhere in the 8th mile, volunteers were handing out bananas and Lynn started to fall behind. Ah, I thought, now it’s time to slow down, but 30 seconds later she was back by my side to tell me she just slowed down to eat. As she pushed ahead, I was impressed with her determination and conditioning and started to wonder if I could keep up.
After a steep downhill in mile 9 where Lynn raced ahead with seeming ease, I caught back up on the flat. She kept pushing at mile 10, while my legs started to feel like jelly. I encouraged her to go on without me and started to drop back. As I continued, somewhat close behind her for another half mile, but after a brief walk at a water station, I could no longer see her in the distance.
I prefer the half marathon distance to the marathon, because I never have hit the wall in the half. Usually after mile 20 in the marathon, it’s a long mental struggle of moving one foot in front of the other. In the Stockholm Half Marathon, the last couple of miles became a battle of attrition. With my wife somewhere up ahead of me, I pushed on averaging over 9-minute pace per mile over the last 5K. My achilles tendon was fine, but I just had nothing left in my legs and I felt a bit lightheaded. I worried about being caught by the 2-hour pace group. I pushed on though because I wanted to get to the finish to see how Lynn had finished.
The Results
I ended up with an official chip time of 1:55:39, and I walked through the finish area, accepting my medal and a bottled water before finding Lynn. She had done fantastic, keeping up the pace through the end to finish in 1:53:06! She had come into the race hoping to average 9:00 per mile but ended up averaging 8:38 per mile. I was extremely proud of her, and I was also glad to have finished the race without aggravating my injury. Next up for both of us is a 10K on November 5th, and I told her I’m gunning for her. Unless of course, I manage to injure myself again in the process.
