Listen, boob, you need to get faster by when? If you have a goal race in the next 2 months then, sure, prioritize speed over distance. Otherwise maintaining and even increasing your mileage will do more to make you faster in the long run than any particular workouts. My experience is that I can handle more speedwork, the more mileage I am running. My analogy of the day is that mileage is like a sponge and speedwork is the water you are trying to soak up. Bigger sponge absorbs more water. What is your goal distance? When is your goal race? What workouts are you doing now? Why don't you make your log public? So many questions, so little time. You have said in the past that you are aiming for Boston 2008. Well so am I. And FWIW here's my plan: 1. Run 50-60 mpw with some tempo type stuff all winter: check. 2. Add some 5k type workouts starting in the spring in order to run a couple decent races at 5k-10k in the late spring keeping mileage in the high 50's low 60's. (this starts now) 3. Go back into base and tempo mode for the summer, with an emphasis on mileage. Fit as many mpw as I can into my busy schedule. It's summer. I can run morning noon and night if I have to. (June-August) 4. Add 1/2 marathon-marathhon big runs and races in the 13.1 mile to 30k range. (Sept-Oct) 5. Run a fall marathon to qualify for Boston (October) maybe even PR probably Cape Cod or Maine. 6. Take that base and focus on SPEED. Run a sub-5 mile at the BU all comers winter meets in December. 7. Base Jan-Mar 08. 8. BIG Marathon workouts and races inthe 13.1 mile to 20 mile range (March 08) 9. BAA Boston Marathon - April 20th, 2008 in Hopkinton, Massachusetts. This is not the be all end all of my running life and I'm not putting all my eggs in one basket. This is just as far out as I am willing to look. It is a rough outline written in pencil (in my brain). There will be lots of races run between now and then and lots of them will serve no trainng purpose and be just for the fun of it. But I find it is helpful to have at least some kind of long-rang plan to stay motivated in between races.

Some mojo to fix this thread: Click

Muse: Cool. That makes sense. A few of observations you can do with what you will. 1. Since your goal race is 10k, I think you want to stay on the aerobic end of the spectrum most of the time. That's not to say that doing 4 x 800 at 2-mile race pace is a bad workout, just that you should at least alternate that with 6 x 1000, 3 x 2000 at ~10k pace type stuff every other Tuesday, for example. 2. What about combining your AT work and long run? You can still do your 3-15 milers but include 2 x 3 miles or 4 x 2 miles at medium tempo ~ half marathon race pace etc. That would leave you Thursday as either another easy run, or some strides, or even an easy run that turns into a progression run if you're feeling it that day. 3. If it were me, YES, I would (and will) keep my mileage as high. You should be able to adjust, that's what the base is for. Dropping mileage now would not help you at 10K. Trent: I can't open that link or whatever it is. Is this a Mac thing designed to piss off PC users? Some people PR at Cape Cod. Usually these are people whose marathon PR's are relatively soft or who have made big improvements in fitness. I hope to fall into both categories by October. It's not a fast course per se but it is not extremely tough either. I have friendes who have run PR's there. It's probably 3-4 minutes slower than a pancake-flat course if executed properly. I've never run the marathon but I've talked to lots of folks who have and I've run parts of the course. I had it on my calendar for 2004 before I took my hiatus. I don't want to travel too far and I'd rather run a smallish race. Cape Cod is interesting because it is the Grand Prix race so I know I'll have people to run with and will see a lot of friendly faces.

to keep this going toward the real nature of this forum, i just noticed mikey... you are the devil today! happy devil day your YTD miles = 666

yup... that's my AVI that expression on my face is that not only did I not PR by not doing the speedwork I'm suppose to, but the race wasn't chip timed either, showing an even less than stellar performance than I'd like to see on the race clock. That expression is totally of me looking at the clock like boobless.

yup... that's my AVI

What kind of race?

The past few years, I have been up to Woods Hole to give a talk at the MBL in late September. Nice place. More hills than I would expect, which makes a monkey like me really happy! Plus, I like lighthouses and Nobska is a great one. MV has some good ones too!