 All right, so first of all, I freaking did it. I went sub 130. I did it, I went sub 90, and I've been wanting to do that for a long while. It's not like I've tried a bunch of times and failed. I've tried a couple of times and failed, but that was back in like 2018 and early 2019, and since then I haven't raced. So I was pretty confident that I was going to do it, and I did it. And not only did I just go 129, but I went 128, 48. So I'm extremely satisfied with the race, how it went, how it felt, how it executed. It was just my best race ever really, and I want to tell you all about it. So in this video, I'm going to go into the details in terms of like my pacing, my hydration strategy, my nutrition strategy, what I felt during the race, what I thought, how I approached the execution of the race. That's what this video is about. But I want you to stay tuned, because in a few days, I'm coming out with another video, which is going to be the race vlog. And the race vlog is not made by me. Well, I'm editing it, but it was actually my friend Thomas who did the filming and the commentating, most of it anyway. So he's done a great job on race day, on his e-scooter, filming with the GoPro camera and his phone. And it was just like, he did a great job. And we got lots of cool footage. And I'm going to make a race vlog that's coming out in a few days. Okay, so stay tuned for that race vlog. But for today, let's get into some of the stats and some of those nerdy aspects of running a race. So woke up on race day, feeling fresh, feeling great. The taper was was done well. Temperature was about probably around 10 degrees Celsius when I started the race. Possibly it went up to like 11. It was overcast. So it was really optimal conditions. And I was worried in the beginning, like it or before the race, is this going to be too cold? You know, a little worried, but actually it was definitely not too cold. It was not too warm either, though. It was absolutely perfect. Okay. And that's what the scientific literature is also indicating, that about around 10 degrees Celsius is actually perfect for performance in those long distance races. So arrived in Oslo, did the warm up, felt good, and the race gun went off. We started off. I was in a pace group with two pacers with, they had like flags for 130. And they, you know, they promised that they will cross the finish line before 130. So you can sort of trust that they will set a good pace. And we were a good pack of runners trying to go beyond that barrier of 130. It was just an awesome day. I had Thomas with me, as I said, and then I had my brother, Mads, and my parents. So they were supporting me. And that meant a lot to me to have them there, because it gave me moral support. I look forward to seeing them several places along the course, cheering for me. And it sort of gave me a boost for sure. And also in the pack there was another friend of mine, Guy, who was also running for a sub 130. He also wanted to go below that barrier, never done that before. Having him there was actually also quite nice, because I felt, I don't know, I just felt safer. I knew like I know he's a good runner. And he was in the pack there. And I could see him at all times. And I knew that, you know, he's there. I'm here. We're here. The pack is here. The pace was just the whole situation was just very, very good. And he made his goal as well. I did out kick him at the end, possibly at the expense of my calf, though. So I don't know how smart that was. So essentially, we're pretty much at the same level of fitness. I knew, of course, in my own self, I knew that I didn't want to rely 100% on someone else to do the pacing for me, especially not in the early stages, because I went into this race not really knowing my fitness, you know, down to the minute. So I was like, am I just on the edge? Will I go sub 130? I thought I was going to go below it. I was pretty confident, but I wasn't entirely sure. And I didn't want to blow it in the first half of the race by just trying to stick with some paces who were running too fast. Turns out they weren't really running too fast, although perhaps they were a tad ahead of schedule. Really. So I thought it was probably a good idea for me then to to relax a little bit. I noticed that very quickly that they sort of went a little bit ahead. And I was like, you know what, I'm going to chill a little bit on this this first few kilometers. There's a little bit of hilly terrain over the first few k's, even though it is a fairly flat race. So I just sat back a little bit. I allowed the pack to just stretch out a little bit. I wasn't worried. I knew I could always catch up with them later. And if I tried to stick with them without being fit for that, I would pay dearly later, as I learned in my half marathon back in 2019 in Gothenburg. I'll put a link to the video here, probably, where I talk about what went wrong in that race went out way too hard. So I didn't want to do that. I wanted to start conservatively. And indeed I did. I started conservatively. I was still in the pack, though, and feeling great. Like after just a few kilometers, I was like, this feels awesome. I'm really in control. The pace is easy. I was focused and I just I had a good time. Well, as we go through the race, I guess I can take a quick look on my Strava data here. So the kilometer splits, okay, the time per kilometer. I'll give you the splits. Bear in mind that going sub 130, you want to be at 415 per kilometer. 4 minutes 15 seconds per kilometer. That's spot on sub 90 pace. So I want to be below that, but not too much below it, of course, because that might be too fast. I ended up averaging 412 for the whole race, which is 128.48. And my kilometer splits are as follows from the beginning. 412, 417. Okay, so 417, the second kilometer, a little slower, right? Like just being a little careful. First one is a little bit fast, actually. 412, 417, 416, 414, 410, 412, 409. Okay, we're on the flat now. 409, 410, 413, 413, 419. And there's two laps. You run two laps in the same route. So that 419, which was like my 13th kilometer, that's the same one as one of those early ones, which was like 416 or something. So it sort of makes sense. We get to those hilly portions again, 419. Okay, 413, 410, 416, 416, 415. And at that point, I said to myself that, you know what, I'm going to kick a little bit now. For the last two kilometers, I'm going to run much faster. And I did. I ran 408, 402, and 356, actually, for the last three kilometers. 356 for the last one. And I remember noticing in those last kilometers, increasing the pace from like 412 ish to 405 and approaching even down to four minutes per kilometer, that that was above the threshold. Like at that point, I started feeling the legs seizing up a little bit. I started getting a cramp. I started actually feeling like I was not entirely in control. Whereas at 412, I was completely in control. So certainly below or slower than my lactate threshold, which is likely somewhere around 405, 406, something like that per kilometer at the moment, which is probably the fittest that I've ever been, really, which is cool on less training, right? Like I'm only I've only trained 60 to 70 kilometers per week. I that's less than I did in 2019, when I crashed and burned at the half marathon in Sweden. So cool, I have I'm like, and I feel now that I've broken that barrier, the 130 barrier, I feel almost like the whole 20, the whole 20s, you know, 127, 26, 25, 24, 33, all the way down to 120 feels really within reach. Like it's mentally, it just feels like I've crossed a barrier. And now it's just the whole that whole spectrum of paces or times is mine for the taking. And I can just, I can do it, I will do it. So we interesting to see next year, I'm very confident with this now that I'll be able to go sub three for the marathon next year. But that's like a year from now. My plan is to do a 5k build up next spring, but we'll talk about my plan going forward in another video. Anyway, those were my splits, my heart rate, I did not look at my heart rate like I've done in past races, but I had it had the heart rate monitor on. But I didn't want to look at it, I just want to feel my body instead of looking at the numbers all the time. But it turns out it was around where it usually is for my, for my half marathons, which is just around 190 per, 190 beats per minute, 190. So I have a max heart rate of 205 or 206. So technically that's above my lactate threshold, or perhaps just at it, but you know, the adrenaline and everything, it makes makes the heart rate a little higher during races. Anyway, that was the pacing and the heart rate. Looking back at it, I realized that I was perhaps running slower than I could have. I'm pretty sure that I could have actually gone faster. I think honestly, I could probably go 127 something below 128 even. I'm pretty sure I could do that. Because of the feeling that I had throughout the race, which was the feeling of being totally in control, not really suffering until the last few kilometers when I was pushing it a lot, of course. And of course, I'm not saying I wasn't, I was not relaxed. I was working hard. I was working steady. It was hard work. It took effort, no doubt. But it felt like I could have kept going for longer though, in that pace, which means that I could probably run two or three seconds faster on average per kilometer and still finish strong, which would have been sub 128 actually. But that's totally fine. I'm not not at all upset about that, the fact that I could have gone faster. I'm happy that I did it just the way I did it. Why? Because I didn't know it was like uncharted territory for me, right? I didn't know exactly what to expect. So I didn't want to blow my chance of going sub 90 this time. I wanted that 129. I needed it. I feel like I really needed it. If I didn't go below 130 in this try, I would be very frustrated to be perfectly honest. And I didn't want to blow it. I wanted to be conservative and just run steady. So I just stayed in that pack. And I think also probably that I got a lot, or definitely I got a lot out of being in the pack, mentally knowing we're in it together, physically, you know, in terms of the air resistance, there was less air resistance, less wind in the pack, of course. And also just mentally not having to worry about whether I was on pace or not, just sort of surrendering a little bit to the pace of the pack and the pacers and allowing myself to mentally just trust that I was going to make it. So that was good. And of course, if I actually left that pack and tried to go sub 128 and I ran alone the whole time, would I've been able to, like that would have been much harder. So maybe I wouldn't be able to go actually sub 128. I don't know. I don't know. But I'm pretty sure that next year I'll be able to go sub 125. Actually, I hope so. With a lot of training, of course, a lot of training. I'm very motivated to train now, as always, let a little bit about nutrition and hydration. So there's two, there's two 10 k loops, right, or two 10 and a half ish k loops for a total half marathon. And there's two aid stations on each lap. So four aid stations total. I had my sugar mix, just maltodextrin fructose and an electrolyte mix basically just salt, like sodium and potassium and some other things, chloride, a little magnesium I think in there, that I mixed together by myself, basically a gel, and I have it in this little squeezy thing that I had in my belt went fine. I think I had about 120 grams of carbohydrate total divided by four aid stations. I knew where the aid stations were, so well before approaching the aid station, like two minutes before or something, I would take out the squeezy bottle and I would take my sugar, put it back, relax, swallow the sugar, which was very thick, and then get to the aid station and sort of flush it down with water. I would have water at the aid stations and I knew I needed to get in about 150 milliliters of water, which is like a small cup really at aid stations, but I knew also that I would spill a lot and it's difficult to drink while running. So I usually, I always grab two cups and then I squeeze them in the middle at the top, right, cardboard cups, so there's this little bit of like a spout, is that the right word, where you could sort of pour it in like a bottle almost. So I did that but it was difficult. It was difficult to get it in running in that pace. I would choke on the water and cough and I would get it everywhere and so did everyone else. So I don't think I got as much water in during the first lap, the two aid stations, as I should have. So on the second lap, also knowing that I was definitely gonna go sub 90 or I was pretty sure anyway, unless something crazy happened in the latter third of the race. So because I was confident with the pace, I decided instead to start slowing down more at the aid stations and almost stop actually. So like just drink the water, throw it, jog, drink a little bit more, jog, drink a little bit more, throw it away. Probably lost five seconds on each aid station, 10 seconds total, but that was worth it. So during the last few kilometers, I went really hard as I said and I actually started getting a cramp in my right calf and my, you know, I had a calf strain a few months ago and I did something really stupid at the beginning of the race. I jumped over a fence to get into the pace group in the field and I jumped over a fence and I strained my calf again in the same place or I re-injured it or basically it ripped it up a little bit and that was like, oh my god, no. What have I done? Right, I thought I was gonna fuck up the whole race. Luckily, I didn't. I didn't notice the calf pain at all during the race until those last few kilometers though. And now it is pretty bad. It's not bad really, but it's frustrating. So rehab again, but yeah, don't jump over fences before races basically. And also really, actually I don't like the idea of doing a kick like that at the end of a race. I prefer just running a little faster overall, you know, average pace a little faster and perhaps, you know, a little bit faster in the last couple of kilometers, but not that much faster because I felt like the injury risk was pretty big during those last kilometers for me. Not so cool. I've got a lot of cool footage though. Some pictures also that I bought from the professional photographers and also Thomas took pictures, my mom and dad took pictures and my brother, Mads. So go check out my Instagram, there's a link in the description. I'm putting out a lot of good content there, I feel like. So definitely follow me on Instagram and follow me on Strava too, there's a link in the description to actually look at the race details, to look at my training log, that sort of thing. Now these last couple of days I've just been resting, no training at all, no training today either. The rest of this week I'll do some cross training, a little bit of light strength, some cycling, some swimming. And then from next week onwards I'll start running again. So basically a week off running, I feel like that's a good idea. And then building it back up again and getting into a new base training phase where I'm going to try and push the volume a lot. Anyway, I think that's it for now, I think that's probably more details than anyone asked for. If you stick around this far, you probably as nerdy about running as I am and you can definitely leave a comment perhaps to tell me what you think about what I just said, any ideas or thoughts that you want to share regarding this race or maybe about your own training, let me know how your own training is going. Are you training for a sub 90? Are you training for a sub two hour half marathon perhaps? Or any distance, any goal, it's all about pushing our own limits and growing and evolving and chasing down new challenges. That's what it's all about. I honestly don't think that winning the Olympics would make me any happier than what just happened in this half marathon. For me to go now sub 130, which has been a goal for a while and just to have a good race and just feel so amazing and have such a good day with my family, my friends and with this whole event, I honestly don't feel like I could be any happier. I was super happy. I'm still super happy and satisfied with that and now I'm looking for new goals and chasing new PRs of course. If I was in the Olympics and I won the Olympics, I would get more prestige. I would get more money for sure. It would be more prestige, but I don't know that I would be more happy about it. I actually think that at any level of running, you can be perfectly happy and ecstatic when you're reaching your goals regardless of the level. Anyway, thanks for subscribing. Stay tuned for that race vlog coming up soon and I hope your own running is going well. Thanks for watching. Bye.