2018 Sub-3. No rules. Run. (Read 792 times)

Mikkey


Mmmm Bop

    My week....

     

    Mon - 16 w/8x1 @  6:15 (2min rec) TM

    Tue - 10 @ 9:09

    Wed - 16 @ 7:17 (progressive from 8:02 to 6:26 pace) TM

    Thur - 15 @ 8:08 TM

    Fri - 7.5 @ 9:07

    Sat - 4.5 @ 8:17

    Sun - 13.1 @ 6:45 (1:28:55)

    Total - 82

     

    I’ve had a cold all week (still got it) and went into Sunday’s race feeling a bit rough and didn’t have the energy to run a decent time with average HR at 152bpm which was well below my normal half HR. I’m going to cut back this week and figure out the best way forward for the next 10 weeks. I’m taking a rest day today so my 2018 streak has come to an end after 43 days. 

    5k - 17:53 (4/19)   10k - 37:53 (11/18)   Half - 1:23:18 (4/19)   Full - 2:50:43 (4/19)

      Mikkey - Pretty much. Wink When the weather gets warmer and brighter more outdoor running I would think. Heck, this hobby jogging has gotten me to my lowest weight since last March.


      Laura

        Glad you liked the progression run Mikkey! I really enjoy those and I have found they give me more confidence in the later stages of races. Great week of training and solid mileage! Fighting a cold for over a week (or longer) is tough, and taking a rest day probably isn't the worst idea...unfortunately sometimes our bodies just need the total rest...better in the LR to take it now than reeeaallllyyy need more than one rest day down the line.

        Pre-Baby PR's (all from 2015): 5k: 18:46  10k: 38:37 HM: 1:24:51 FM: 2:58:13

        Postpartum PR's: 5k: 18:18 (2018)  HM: 1:21:14 (2019) FM: 2:57:02 (2019)

         

        Next Up: Unsure - but most likely some solo TT's

         

        {Strava}{IG}

         

        watsonc123


          Mikkey - that's a big week, the especially with a cold.  I have raced one half and both full marathons with a cold / sinus infection, and it does affect things.  One thing I find is that stopping training until it is definitely better is really effective, otherwise they linger for ages.

          PRs: 5km 18:43 (Dec 2015), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:26:16 (Sep 2016), full 3:09:28 (Jun 2015)

           

          40+ PRs: 5km 19:31 (Oct 2020), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:29:39 (Jun 2018), full 3:13:55 (Sep 2022)

           

          2023 PRs (hope to beat in 2024): 5km 20:34, 10km 41:37, half 1:32:32, full 3:21:05

           

          2024 PRs: 5km 20:25

          tn_weather


            Iam - I was waiting for a response and you did not disappoint.

            watson - Steady as she goes.

            weather - Looks like you are recovering well.

            JT - Glad the blood metrics are headed in the right direction. Nice 10K TT.

            Marky - Good news that the IT issues are subsiding.

            kram - Nice week and workouts.

            finbad - nice mileage.

            swim - Looking good.

            dcv - Zwift addict. Nice 10 miler.

            lela - Nice wave tempo.

            Mikkey - Smart move.

             

            An up week with a big downer at the end.  The progression was a highlight but post run things kinda fell apart. My heel/achilles insertion has been acting up. I basically couldn't run on Monday so I made an appt with the dr. By Tuesday it was feeling a lot better. I have decided to start a 12 week protocol to address the issue. Eccentric heel drops on a level surface, eventually with weight. Will try to keep running while doing this.  Figure the dr. is basically going to tell me to do this or something worse like ride a bike so I have cancelled that appt for now. At this point beginning to wonder about whether racing is in my future.

             

            Weekly Summary
            Monday, Feb 05, 2018 thru Sunday, Feb 11, 2018

            <tfoot> </tfoot>
            Day Miles Pace Description HR Egain Link
            Mon 8.0 7:37 8 mile cul de sac cruise 125 (66%) 98 strava
            Wed 8.2 7:07 8 mile moderate progression 132 (70%) 265 strava
            Thu 8.1 7:24 8 mile easy run   262 strava
            Fri 8.1 7:32 8 mile easy run 133 (71%) 131 strava
            Sat 9.0 7:41 9 miles easy progression on the dreadmill   0 strava
            Sun 13.2 6:39 13 mile progression 129 (69%) 242 strava
              54.6 7:17     998  
            Andres1045


               

              That article is reasonable, in that calling Stryd a "power meter" is misleading. I've come to think of it as an effort meter that is very consistent across different runs. The biggest way this helps me is to get the effort level right on the workouts.

              It's 100% fair to point out that working with a coach has helped as well. But I don't think it's fair to say that I had "messed up the balance with high mileage, high quality." I ran without power leading up to both Boston 2016 and Boston 2017, and in both cases had injury-free cycles at/around 100mpw. While I did have an injury coming into fall of 2016, that was me getting dumb with hills in SF on the heels of a 50k, not anything my normal training regime did to me. I think I had basically figured out how to run 90+ mpw and stay in one piece.

              The biggest change I see with the power meter and the coach are best explained via the concept of the power/duration curve. Prior to working with Steve, I thought of training roughly like this: the FM is an endurance event, so I need to run a lot, and my progress is driven by LT work, so do a lot of that. Note that this a reasonable approximation of what you want to do to train for a FM!

              The reason the power/duration model has likely worked so well for me is that it better describes the goal of training: being able to sustain a specific level of effort for a specific length of time. (There's a semi-marketing-y writeup on Steve & the PDC here: https://blog.stryd.com/2017/08/17/steve-palladinos-training/). If you look at the whole curve and not just single points, you can see where your deficiencies are, especially the ones likely to prevent hitting your goals.

              Now, the big training change I got when Steve started planning my workouts (he gives me 3 workout targets for the week, I set the overall mileage and fill in all of the non-workout days) is that because the Stryd is a more accurate effort meter than HR (or anything else that I'm aware of), he can build a pretty good model of the cumulative fatigue I'm carrying. (For those of you use to TrainingPeaks, this is very much like the PMC. For me, PMC based off of HR never reflected how I subjectively felt, but the power-based one seems to do that well.) He uses that info to dial my workout stress up or down. This appears to have allowed me to get in way more workouts, with (so far) a lower incidence of burnout/injury. So I'm basically using data to move closer to my potential; this is clearly better than my previous brute-force approach. Note also that I have a literally empty calendar for next week right now - I won't get workouts penciled in for Tu/Th/Sa until Steve looks at my data from this past week and assesses my fatigue level. 

              So how much of that is Steve and how much of that is Stryd? Those things are somewhat inseparable for me, but part of the reason I'm working with him is to learn about how he's tracking my fatigue, how he makes workout budgets, and how he chooses workouts based on my PDC and races. I'm pretty geeky about this stuff, but I'm still very much learning. My guess is that after another cycle or two I'd be able to do this for myself. You might look at this and say "duh, if you just learned to run by feel you could get 80% of the way there." That might be true, but A) I'm bad at that and B) the difference between 80% and 99% is meaningful, at least to me. 

              One thing I know for sure: it's complicated enough that it's a big investment to move to the power/PDC/PMC way of doing things and do it in a non-haphazard way. Stryd is trying, but they're still pretty far away from canned plans using power (or at least ones that would be useful to me). 

              All that said, with all of the warts and deficiencies, it seems to me to be a clearly better way of training, because 1) there's some feedback week-over-week to put into the next week's plan and 2) the PDC gives a nice frame of reference for tracking progress / picking areas of improvement. Is it worth it if you're already hitting your goals / don't like being incredibly nerdy about running? Prolly not. 


              Good analysis, and I clearly mis-remembered your history.  Also, I didn't fully appreciate the value the meter had in your communications with your coach (which allowed for a check or to be used as a compliment to the other information you provided to the coach for him to understand your levels of fatigue week over week).

               

              The biggest part of the power meter that I am skeptical of, though, is the importance of needing something to tell you precisely what zone you're in throughout a workout.  This "instant feedback" benefit that keeps you from trickling out of a specific effort level whether you're going up or down a hill.  This is all based on me not believing in the importance of that level of precision.  But again, maybe it will become more important when I need to squeeze every last bit of toothpaste out, which is the level you're approaching (for me, coming close to 80% of ideal training would be awesome).

               

              I also never remember you touting this "instant feedback" benefit.  From your workouts, you really do appear to use it as a rough guide, and will be ok with things being a little above or below.  Ultimately, I believe your gains came more from putting in hard work, not a gadget.  You've always put in hard work, and with the coach (and I guess it's the coach plus the gadget) you were able to put in a little bit more "hard work".

              Upcoming races: Boston

              paul2432


                IAM -  Can the power meter tell the difference between 0%, 5% and 10% grade on a TM? I guessing no, but would like to confirm.

                iamdisappoint


                  IAM -  Can the power meter tell the difference between 0%, 5% and 10% grade on a TM? I guessing no, but would like to confirm.

                   

                  Nope. It calculates elevation using a barometric altimeter, so it has some kind of onboard algorithm for detecting changes in pressure then using those to calculate grade. 

                  tn_weather might be amused to know that a side-effect of the way this works is that a strong weather front coming in can mess up your power readings :P

                  https://www.strava.com/athletes/5795019

                  iamdisappoint


                    Good analysis, and I clearly mis-remembered your history.  Also, I didn't fully appreciate the value the meter had in your communications with your coach (which allowed for a check or to be used as a compliment to the other information you provided to the coach for him to understand your levels of fatigue week over week).

                     

                    The biggest part of the power meter that I am skeptical of, though, is the importance of needing something to tell you precisely what zone you're in throughout a workout.  This "instant feedback" benefit that keeps you from trickling out of a specific effort level whether you're going up or down a hill.  This is all based on me not believing in the importance of that level of precision.  But again, maybe it will become more important when I need to squeeze every last bit of toothpaste out, which is the level you're approaching (for me, coming close to 80% of ideal training would be awesome).

                     

                    I also never remember you touting this "instant feedback" benefit.  From your workouts, you really do appear to use it as a rough guide, and will be ok with things being a little above or below.  Ultimately, I believe your gains came more from putting in hard work, not a gadget.  You've always put in hard work, and with the coach (and I guess it's the coach plus the gadget) you were able to put in a little bit more "hard work".


                    The "instant feedback" is kind of the whole thing for workouts. I memorize the target range / times before starting, then I'm checking the watch every 30-60s to see if I'm still in that range when I'm in the quality sections. I was doing that at Richmond too when I started to fall off around mile 19-20. I could tell I was fatiguing, but it was nice to know how hard I had to push to get back into the target zone. I don't talk a lot about this because I assume that no one is very interested in hearing stories of me being a slave to my watch :P

                    I agree that this is about optimizing training, and if one hasn't already maxed out a bunch of other variables, it's less useful. I suspect it's more useful for less crazy people who are training for 5k/10k, as hitting the intensity accurately for mid-d up to 10k is likely really important. For a marathon, most people just need to run damn more.

                     

                    Gains: yeah, of course the work is the basis. If I were running 50mpw with a power meter the power meter part wouldn't matter. Well, it might help someone like me (with a crap internal sense of effort) hit the workouts correctly, but it wouldn't be the magic sauce that would cause times to improve. As you say, it allows me to put in even more work, which for me is a pretty substantial benefit.

                    https://www.strava.com/athletes/5795019

                    iamdisappoint


                       

                      An up week with a big downer at the end.  The progression was a highlight but post run things kinda fell apart. My heel/achilles insertion has been acting up. I basically couldn't run on Monday so I made an appt with the dr. By Tuesday it was feeling a lot better. I have decided to start a 12 week protocol to address the issue. Eccentric heel drops on a level surface, eventually with weight. Will try to keep running while doing this.  Figure the dr. is basically going to tell me to do this or something worse like ride a bike so I have cancelled that appt for now. At this point beginning to wonder about whether racing is in my future.

                       

                      This gives me a significant sad. Sorry to hear.

                      https://www.strava.com/athletes/5795019

                      DoppleBock


                        I had posted in the 2017 thread.

                         

                        Since then been drinking / eating too much and running very little.  So I am not in all of your league ... yet. I am starting from scratch with the belief that I can still reach a sub 3:00 (Based on a younger version of me results)  For me the start is not really being able to run more than 2 miles really slow (9:30 Pace) without a walk break.  Weight #266.  Knees feeling arthritic.  Right knee either bursitis, tight IT band, weak inside quad muscle ... something.

                         

                        I am starting to work on diet and stretching / strengthening to quiet my knees and lose weight.  I am doing a 5 mile race March 3rd as my 1st fitness test.

                         

                        I have the capability of running a sub 3 ... Am I willing to consistently train and do the mileage and workouts to hit a sub 3?  The distance between where I am now and a sub 3 = Fall marathon.  My focus for the spring is to get my fitness to a place where I can run a sub 9 hour Ice Age 50 mile trail race.

                         

                        This week training goal (run walk) mostly on treadmill

                        * 30 Miles

                        * No speedwork

                        * 2500 feet of elevatition

                        * Volleyball 1x

                        * Downhill skiing 1x

                        Long dead ... But my stench lingers !

                         

                         

                        DoppleBock


                          my 1st 2 years of running were a constant struggle with Achilles.  Eccentric heel drops will help address it.  To help heal I would make another suggestion from past experience.  The achilles area has very little blood flow - So it is hard to heal.  This protocol will help increase the blood flow and get new blood into the area to heal.

                           

                          2 - 5 gallon buckets

                          1 - 1/2 full of Ice water ... so you still have cubes floating

                          1 - 1/2 full of scalding water ... hot enough that you can barely handle it

                           

                          Alternate 5 minutes in the cold bucket with 5 minutes in the hot bucket.  I would stand at the kitchen counter and catch up on my work e-mail for 30-50 minutes as I alternated buckets.  When I was in the cold bucket I would take a little of the hot water and microwave it and mix it back into the hot bucket.  I did this every day.

                           

                          The cold water pushes blood out of the area the hot water helps draw new blood into the area.  This promotes healing.  This is also an excellent treatment for athletes that roll their ankles (Soccer)

                           

                           

                          An up week with a big downer at the end.  The progression was a highlight but post run things kinda fell apart. My heel/achilles insertion has been acting up. I basically couldn't run on Monday so I made an appt with the dr. By Tuesday it was feeling a lot better. I have decided to start a 12 week protocol to address the issue. Eccentric heel drops on a level surface, eventually with weight. Will try to keep running while doing this.  Figure the dr. is basically going to tell me to do this or something worse like ride a bike so I have cancelled that appt for now. At this point beginning to wonder about whether racing is in my future.

                           

                          Long dead ... But my stench lingers !

                           

                           

                          DoppleBock


                            So basically I am following the couch to 50 miler 13 week plan ... That's gonna leave a mark Smile

                             

                             

                            I have the capability of running a sub 3 ... Am I willing to consistently train and do the mileage and workouts to hit a sub 3?  The distance between where I am now and a sub 3 = Fall marathon.  My focus for the spring is to get my fitness to a place where I can run a sub 9 hour Ice Age 50 mile trail race.

                             

                            Long dead ... But my stench lingers !

                             

                             

                            watsonc123


                              I have done the ice bucket for achilles, and found it really good.

                               

                              Never did warm bucket though.

                              PRs: 5km 18:43 (Dec 2015), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:26:16 (Sep 2016), full 3:09:28 (Jun 2015)

                               

                              40+ PRs: 5km 19:31 (Oct 2020), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:29:39 (Jun 2018), full 3:13:55 (Sep 2022)

                               

                              2023 PRs (hope to beat in 2024): 5km 20:34, 10km 41:37, half 1:32:32, full 3:21:05

                               

                              2024 PRs: 5km 20:25

                              Mikkey


                              Mmmm Bop

                                DoppleBock - Welcome to the 2018 thread and looking forward to seeing how you progress this year!

                                 

                                I’ve noticed that some folk still aren’t using the training log on here. (this is RunningAhead and not Strava)

                                5k - 17:53 (4/19)   10k - 37:53 (11/18)   Half - 1:23:18 (4/19)   Full - 2:50:43 (4/19)