Are you sure you are reading this correctly ?Quote:
Originally Posted by Jimmy
Seems to me that these comments are directed at the psychological aspects of training; "stress", "guilt", "mentally hard",
not the physical
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Are you sure you are reading this correctly ?Quote:
Originally Posted by Jimmy
Seems to me that these comments are directed at the psychological aspects of training; "stress", "guilt", "mentally hard",
not the physical
there is a zone in cycling heart-rate theory (zone 4 out of 6) that doesn't get targetted much in training cos it replicates the average race-day heart rate and is used mainly for tapering
but that is a very specific and narrow zone
what Jimmy seems to be saying from a running perspective is that only zones 1-2 and 5-6 are useful for training purposes
so zones 3-4 - which the theory goes in cycling raise aerobic endurance over 1-2 hour efforts - are unproductive for running training
Just back from a 2.5hr guilt-inducingly slow run :) Yep, Zoot that's exactly what I'm getting at - nothing to do with psychological stuff at all, it's purely optimized physical training I'm talking about - the "guilt-inducingly slow" stuff is just light-hearted banter.
By the way, I dig your name. I love the Captain too & saw him live in 1980 in Brum (on the Doc at the Radar Station tour I think). One of my true musical heroes, and a real gent too. Sadly missed.
I still don't understand - if I divide my training between slow/steady long runs and faster runs of 1 hour maximum, when do I find out what pace I should be aiming for on race day? Shouldn't I be doing some long runs at race distance AND hoped for race pace, so as to make my mistakes in training rather than during the race?
Alexandra - the problem with doing a long run at race pace is that as far as your body is concerned you've run the race, and you'll need just as much recovery as you would after the race day. Someone once said that when people think they're doing their long runs at race pace, they're really doing their races at long run pace.
Your tempo runs are the best guide to race pace. Personally, I think 1 hour is a bit long for those: I tend to go for about 4 miles. You should aim for an effort that you feel you can sustain for longer. If you're getting it right, you probably won't feel like you could run an entire half-marathon at that pace, but trust fresher legs after a proper taper and the adrenaline of race day to take care of that for you.
When I ran my half-marathon PB, I basically spent five months training for it. For the first two of those, I was doing lots of steady running (70+ mpw). In the third month, I started adding some tempo runs, usually once per week. In month four, I added some interval sessions: either 10x400m, or 10x2mins. Then I allowed a good 2-week taper before race day. I would do long runs of 14-17m 3 weekends out of every four.
The tempo runs were the only runs that I did at my target race pace (the intervals were faster). I was aiming to beat my old PB of 1:28 and that was what I based my training on, but in the race I went faster for the first few miles and felt good, so I went with it and finished with 1:23, which I guess goes to show that whatever you do in training you never really know what your race pace is until the day itself.
From what I've been reading it's seems pretty simple really (although the "scientific" technicalities can sound a bit daunting).
Just do 90% of your running at a comfortable conversational pace (not super slow), and about once a week do a horrifically painful "depletion" session where you're glad to finish, no more than an hour though. Something like horror hill reps, say.
This is very interesting - thank-you. I get the point about not doing long training runs at race pace. However, I am wondering how to adapt the rest of your advice, given that our situations and capacities are so different. I wish I had time to adopt your training plan, but obviously before 10th April I haven't. But in any case, your training plan would not give me your ability. You were aiming to beat 1:28 - I am hoping to beat 3 hours!!!. This means that a tempo run of an hour would represent two thirds of your race time, whereas for me it would be only one third - a big difference. I cringe to admit this, but one hour of my best training effort, off road, would probably cover less than 5 miles.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mandovark
Alexandra - how would you judge your endurance at this stage? If you had to run 13.1 miles (slowly) tomorrow, would you expect it to be easy, difficult but achievable, or next to impossible?
The reason I ask is that with about a month of training time left (allowing for a good taper), my advice about training would depend on your current level of endurance and aerobic fitness. If you think that running 13.1 miles would be fairly easy at this stage, then you can use the next few weeks to start adding some tempo sessions and intervals. If the distance itself still represents more of a challenge, then I'd recommend concentrating on steady endurance work - concentrate on running good mileage and improving your endurance and aerobic fitness.
If you decide to go for the tempo run approach, don't worry too much about the speed or distance covered. The main thing is that you're spending time running at the effort level that you'll be working at in the race. Concentrate on getting the effort level right, and let the speed take care of itself. I'd still recommend not doing tempo runs for more than 40-60 mins.
Remember too that if you're training off road, then the terrain is probably slowing you down, even where it isn't hilly. You'll probably run a bit slower than you would at the same level of effort on the road. Again, don't worry about that: focus on hitting the right effort level.
I'm convinced that for races of 10m and over aerobic fitness and endurance are the keys to success. What counts is the speed that you can maintain, not the speed that you can run. Adding speedwork on top of a good endurance base is great, but it's the icing on the cake. If you need to choose between speed and endurance, go for endurance.
First thing please don't listen to Jimmy's advice
which, as I understand it says "run really slowly most of the time, run really really fast occasionally and never run at your race pace"
Maybe its the right approach for cycling, which is a very different sport to race compared to running. Cycling is massively tactical and races are not undertaken at a consistent effort, most of a cycle race is done really easy. Most individual cyclists will only crank it out hard for a short period of a few minutes within a race.
Anyone I've ever spoken to or anything I've ever read says that the key to good Endurance running is to do plenty of running at race pace, not all your running, but a decent bit.
These are Tempo runs.
It makes you familiar with that pace, it improves your running efficiency, you become comfortable with it.
Doing runs at race pace does not mean doing race distance, as Mandovark says.
Tempo runs (race pace runs) don't need to be over long.
One approach that I have found really effective in developing race endurance is to embed a tempo session within a longer run.
example - based on your 3 hour target
your weekly long run might be 2hrs 15mins (3/4 of race)
spend the first 45 minutes running easy, warming up
spend the middle 45 minutes at your target race pace (or effort)
spend the last 45 minutes running steady (which will feel easy relative to race pace)
ooh, I'm not sure about that now!!Quote:
Originally Posted by andy k
(but don't necessarily disagree with the rest)