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winter base training questions (Read 253 times)


Latent Runner

    OMG I would freeze to death in just running tights at five to ten degrees F!!!  LMAO, maybe I'm the weird one.  I just don't like to be cold, ever.  So I dress warm enough so I start off comfortable.  By the time I am done running I have soaked my clothes with sweat, but for me it beats being chilly in the beginning.   I'm sure the way I do it is the wrong way, but I would rather be too warm than too cold.

     

     

    I'm the polar opposite, I would MUCH rather be cold for the first mile or two and nice and comfy for the next eight than the other way around.  Even still, I'm usually soaked through with sweat when I finish my runs.  Go figure.  Smile

    Fat old man PRs:

    • 1-mile (point to point, gravity assist): 5:50
    • 2-mile: 13:49
    • 5K (gravity assist last mile): 21:31
    • 5-Mile: 37:24
    • 10K (first 10K of my Half Marathon): 48:16
    • 10-Mile (first 10 miles of my Half Marathon): 1:17:40
    • Half Marathon: 1:42:13

       

      I'm the polar opposite, I would MUCH rather be cold for the first mile or two and nice and comfy for the next eight than the other way around.  Even still, I'm usually soaked through with sweat when I finish my runs.  Go figure.  Smile

       

      heh some people just sweat a lot and then some don't.

       

      as said, I dress lightly and I don't sweat *at all* in winter unless I run hard/fast, then I might sweat a bit.

       

      when I say I dress lightly... I'm crazy enough to still be running in a short sleeved t-shirt down to 38 F or so. Smile (3 celsius). I don't need a hat until 30 F (or under 0 C). etcetera Wink

        Btw to anyone who can comment on this; how does this sample training plan look like, any good? Would you suggest any substantial modification? Goal is building mileage and getting better aerobic paces, improve for races next year... I haven't ever tried this sort of plan yet.

         

        Mon: off

        Tue: 15mins WU + long LT tempo intervals or hill LT intervals + 15mins CD

        Wed: 45mins very easy pace 9:00 pace (2min/mile slower than HMP) + strides

        Thu: 45mins easy pace 8:30 pace (1:30min/mile slower than HMP)

        Fri: 15mins WU + 3x15mins moderate tempo (~ 15sec / mile slower than HMP) or hill tempo + strides + 15mins CD

        Sat: 45mins very easy pace 9:00 pace (2min/mile slower than HMP)

        Sun: long run of about 12-13miles, last few miles moderate pace up to 20/sec mile slower than half marathon pace

         

        Total around 45 miles for this sample week. 30-35 miles easy or very easy paces, 5-10 miles moderate tempo, 4-5 miles LT tempo - is that a good ratio? If not then what would be good?

         

        For background, what kind of training load I've been able to take well recently this year, ~35mpw with 2 faster sessions and recovery runs for the rest (except for last few miles of long runs), 4 runs total, maxing out at 39miles; with every third week a cutback week with only 4 runs.


        Chasing the bus

           

          when I say I dress lightly... I'm crazy enough to still be running in a short sleeved t-shirt down to 38 F or so. Smile (3 celsius). I don't need a hat until 30 F (or under 0 C). etcetera Wink

           

          If I come in from a run and have a hard time warming up afterwards, I know I was underdressed for conditions, otherwise, I like it cold!

          “You're either on the bus or off the bus.”
          Tom Wolfe, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

            ...

            @AKTrail:

             

            Yeah but this "mostly easy, some harder" is too vague. This is what I've been doing and I've been screwing it up somehow.

             

            I think you in Alaska(?) have much crazier conditions in winter, I don't really have that here, weather doesn't affect my training here so much. Just the track is covered in snow because they don't bother to ever clear it up Smile ..

             

            <response to Nikorosa>

            I still don't really understand if that's just me or if this is a normal side effect or what. I think it shouldn't be normal though :/ Because I see all these reports online about people who do base building, 95% easy or something, and still keep improving in races before even starting to add in some faster workouts. So I guess it's all about the structure of the training plan, right amount and balance of easy runs and of course the 5% "faster than easy" whatever runs. :P

            It's hard to tell where you are in your training without any data in your log, so just having to wing it. At some point, you'll have to figure out what feels right for *you*, and strangers on the interwebs can't tell you that.

             

            Real Easy (recovery?) - be able to talk in, say 20-word sentences - or sing - < 75% HRmax - maybe 20% of the time

            Easy - be able to talk in 10-20 word sentences - 75-80% HRmax - maybe 50-70% of the time

            Moderate - talk in phrases of 5-10 words - 80-85% HRmax - maybe 5 % of the time

            SubLT or tempo effort - talk in phrases of less than 5-7 words - 85-87% HRmax - maybe 5% of time

            Hard - LT or harder - can't talk or gasping 1 or 2 words - < 1% of time in winter base

             

            Base training should include all "aerobic" efforts - 70-90% HRmax. (all runs have some aerobic and some anaerobic aspects, but some depend more on aerobic processes than others)

             

            If we have a good snow year - packs readily - I can do workouts very similar to summer since I'll have the traction for the effort, not the speed. If we have a deep or unpackable snow (real cold temps), then it's like running in sand all the time - very fatiguing, not able to get effort up. I just go with the flow. What mother nature allows me to do, I'll do. If she's giving the runners a hard time, then we just deal with it. I don't use a cast-in-stone schedule - summer or winter - but maintain even more flexibility in winter to accommodate ice storms, wind storms, deep snows, whatever - and on the other side to take advantage of good packed snow.

             

            If you don't have weather or footing issues, I'm not sure I'm understanding what the question is about "winter" base training - or are you just referring to the time between end of summer races and start of spring races?

            "So many people get stuck in the routine of life that their dreams waste away. This is about living the dream." - Cave Dog

              @Furthur:

               

              If I come in from a run and have a hard time warming up afterwards, I know I was underdressed for conditions, otherwise, I like it cold!

               

              Heh, I don't really have that problem...underdressed perhaps if my hands are too numb to insert the key in the door coming home Tongue

              (I do have running gloves but it happened before that I left them at home...)

               

               

              @AKTrail:

              It's hard to tell where you are in your training without any data in your log, so just having to wing it. At some point, you'll have to figure out what feels right for *you*, and strangers on the interwebs can't tell you that.

               

              Real Easy (recovery?) - be able to talk in, say 20-word sentences - or sing - < 75% HRmax - maybe 20% of the time

              Easy - be able to talk in 10-20 word sentences - 75-80% HRmax - maybe 50-70% of the time

              Moderate - talk in phrases of 5-10 words - 80-85% HRmax - maybe 5 % of the time

              SubLT or tempo effort - talk in phrases of less than 5-7 words - 85-87% HRmax - maybe 5% of time

              Hard - LT or harder - can't talk or gasping 1 or 2 words - < 1% of time in winter base

               

              Base training should include all "aerobic" efforts - 70-90% HRmax. (all runs have some aerobic and some anaerobic aspects, but some depend more on aerobic processes than others)

               

              If we have a good snow year - packs readily - I can do workouts very similar to summer since I'll have the traction for the effort, not the speed. If we have a deep or unpackable snow (real cold temps), then it's like running in sand all the time - very fatiguing, not able to get effort up. I just go with the flow. What mother nature allows me to do, I'll do. If she's giving the runners a hard time, then we just deal with it. I don't use a cast-in-stone schedule - summer or winter - but maintain even more flexibility in winter to accommodate ice storms, wind storms, deep snows, whatever - and on the other side to take advantage of good packed snow.

               

              If you don't have weather or footing issues, I'm not sure I'm understanding what the question is about "winter" base training - or are you just referring to the time between end of summer races and start of spring races?

               

              Thanks for that reply Smile

               

              As for the log, I do have one on another site, though one must be registered on that site to see training logs... so it would be a bit complicated to show you but I did try to sum up what I've been doing this year that seemed optimal training load to me. The thing is that wasn't base building and I would like to do that in winter hence the thread. The main point is the right way of base building here, it's just that most people do that in winter for obvious reasons. Weather where I live is not an issue because the training plan wouldn't have track workouts anyway. (Anything other than track workouts I can do in winter just fine.) So yes you could say I'm just referring to the time between race seasons.

               

              What you say about intensities does line up well with what I experience myself. I'm aware of where my LT is, it's been tested and I've done enough races as well; over the years I've figured out my real easy == recovery zone too, your talk test matches it apparently and yes it's below ~75% of maxHR. Etc etc. So I can say for sure that I know my intensity zones, I was just asking about building a training plan. Thanks for the info you've given me on mix of intensities.

               

              I indeed don't plan to go past LT for the base building phase. It's interesting you say moderate pace should be only done 5% of the time. So if I run, say, 8 hours a week, that's at most a 30-minute workout weekly that can be done at moderate intensity? And another 30-minute for subLT. Hmm, yes I might be able to handle higher mileage that way.

               

              I'm open to hearing from others about this, of course. But this so far sounds pretty reasonable to me, thanks!

               

              PS: And I'm still saying I envy you runners with crazier winters. Hehehe. Though, that does sound like you do way more than 10% of moderate/subLT effort, don't you? Or what do you do in such deep snow if the run is supposed to be an easy one? Do tell me more, I'm curious...

                @AKTrail:...

                PS: And I'm still saying I envy you runners with crazier winters. Hehehe. Though, that does sound like you do way more than 10% of moderate/subLT effort, don't you? Or what do you do in such deep snow if the run is supposed to be an easy one? Do tell me more, I'm curious...

                I don't have a full year of recent data in one spot, but going across the years, it looks like I'm averaging about 80% in recovery / easy, 14% in moderate (what I call general aerobic), 7% in subLT/LT, 0% above LT (about 1 hr a year). For 2013 so far:

                 

                Recovery 59%

                Easy         23%

                GA              9%

                SubLT         2.5%

                LT                0.5%

                Above LT     0.1%

                 

                That's over about 1300+ miles, 445 hours, and 162,000 ft of uphill and almost as much downhill (some uphill only races). Most on trails. That includes warmups, cooldowns, recovery intervals, downhills, etc. Figure 1/3 to 1/2 of runs are not workouts. (There's probably some time in there associated with volunteer work, which includes running or hiking on trails, but this year, that's been during my post summer race season recovery anyway.) I'm most interested in longer races, so while I do some speed and anaerobic stuff (they're different), they're a small component. Strength endurance and agility are more important.

                 

                When "running" with snowshoes in fresh snow, I may do a lap to pack the snow first, sometimes 2 laps. If the snow is deep, I'll be hiking and unable to get the HR up, no matter how hard I seem to be working. If I get the HR up, it's way up, like a beginners, and not able to go far. If I'm on a groomed multi-use ski trail, then I can sometimes snowshoe run at easy effort. When I was newer, there was no "easy" effort with snowshoes. And even today with snowshoes, there's not really an "easy" run in the sense of something for recovery. When the trails get to be really slow going, I may use the paved bike path, which sometimes gets plowed if they have enough time. I play it by ear as to which trails / bike path to use depending on snow and ice. Running on packed snow isn't that much different than being on a trail as far as effort goes.

                 

                If there's fresh deep snow, I usually adjust my runs accordingly. I'm not training for a winter ultra, so no need to do scheduled long run in this stuff. (Actually, I don't setup a schedule but use a general outline - get this stuff done in this time period, which may be a couple weeks or a month.) It might be an easy effort (but physically hard) hike with snowshoes to pack the trail. Or if trails are groomed, I can head there for an easy run. This is what I mean by go with the flow. Trying to maintain a rigid schedule in Alaska winters is nonsensical for training benefits. The exceptions are the ultra runners who are out there hauling their sleds around training for 50k to 1000mile (most are in the 100mi range) races on trails. They need to get the experience in all weather and trail conditions and test their gear. But they wouldn't do speedwork in soft snow - ain't happening. They might do strength work instead.

                 

                MTA: When I first started running, I couldn't run below about 80% HRmax.

                "So many people get stuck in the routine of life that their dreams waste away. This is about living the dream." - Cave Dog

                  I don't have a full year of recent data in one spot, but going across the years, it looks like I'm averaging about 80% in recovery / easy, 14% in moderate (what I call general aerobic), 7% in subLT/LT, 0% above LT (about 1 hr a year). For 2013 so far:

                   

                  (...)

                   

                  MTA: When I first started running, I couldn't run below about 80% HRmax.

                   

                  Thanks, all that was very interesting.

                   

                  As for the MTA... When I started running, I didn't have a HRM but when I got one about a month into it, 83-84% of HRmax was what felt easy effort. Heh. It's no longer that way, it's moderate effort now, though if there's HR drift it can still feel like easy. It took me about 3 months to be able to run at a slow but a still tolerable rhythm below 75%.

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