Looking for guidance/advice - Background and Questions Below (Read 160 times)

A little background:
I’ve been running off and on for several years now, mostly to burn calories and work on general cardio fitness. I’ve done races here and there since 2002, but I have never trained for a race. Usually, I hear about someone doing a race and I join. About 2 years ago, I started running pretty regularly, averaging 20-25miles/week. Within the last year, I decided to actually do a training plan (through Endomondo) with the hopes of improving on previous times that I achieved without dedicated training. My first attempt, I upped my mileage and speed too quickly and got some ball of the foot pain and had to ease off. Two weeks later, I started running again and eased into increasing mileage and speed a little smarter. About 8 weeks into a 16-week plan I strained my left soleus muscle pretty bad and had to take a couple weeks off (this has been a recurring injury over the last couple years). I’ve gotten more diligent with my stretching and have been doing some eccentric exercises to strengthen/stretch my calves and it seems to have helped.

There is a 10k coming up on Labor Day in Lexington (Dam Run) that I am planning on doing an 8-week training plan for, this time from Hal Higdon. I have a few questions/concerns about training that I am hoping someone can help me with:

1. I’ve read that I should be running fast on fast days and slow on slow days, no medium days. The training plans I’ve been doing the last few months don’t seem to be increasing my fitness as much as I would like. My fast days (interval training and speed work) are certainly challenging. And I understand the importance of slow/easy days to recover. But I feel like I could see better improvements if I did faster, medium-paced runs. I am good with doing my long runs slow (8:30-9min/mile), just getting in the mileage, maintaining an easy pace and keeping my heart rate down. But on other ‘easy’ days, I feel like I’d rather run at a medium pace (7-7:30min/mile) and get the benefit of running faster. The concern there would be that I would be detracting from my ability to push harder on my ‘fast’ days.

2. With respect to tempo runs, I run them with the intent to maintain a steady pace for 35, 45, 55 minutes, but I also try and keep my heart rate between 163-182 (Zone 4). I could fairly comfortably run the entire interval at a sub-7min/mile pace, but my heart rate quickly gets into Zone 4 and even into Zone 5. So I either slow down to maintain under 182bpm or I maintain the faster pace and my heart rate goes above 182bpm. Which am I better off doing? My line of thinking is I would rather run a faster pace regardless of heart rate, but I don’t want to do anything that is deleterious to my overall fitness. Is it possible to run tempo runs too fast? Is it deleterious or beneficial to push myself?

3. I'm in SC right now and its 80F by 8a and 100F in the afternoon. Running in this heat/humidity, I know I should expect to run a little slower and my heart rate to get up a little faster, but am I still getting the same aerobic/anaerobic fitness even though I am having to run a lot slower to maintain the proper HR zone? I try and do most of my runs in the morning around 6-630, but occasionally I have to do them in the afternoon and I have to run incredibly slow to maintain my heart rate in the appropriate zone on slow days (I had to maintain a 930min/mile pace for 3 miles yesterday afternoon just to keep my heart rate under 165bpm). I don’t even attempt to do any speed work in this heat.

4. Speed work/Intervals: How hard should I be running these? And how recovered should I be prior to starting the next interval? This morning I did a 10-min warmup (8min/mile) and then 6x400m at a 5:45-6min/mile pace. The last couple I really had to run slowly during the recovery 400m to recover for the next interval (9-9:30min/mile pace). Should I be trying to get my heart rate back down below 165 (Zone 3) and get my breath back before the next interval? Am I running the intervals too fast?

5. Do I just need to be patient, worry less about my times and just build up my mileage base since I’ve only been ‘training’ for a year or two? That would be frustrating, but if I know it will benefit me over time, then I could do it. It’s just tough to run slower than I’d like to be running without knowing for sure that it’s helping me.

6. Does anyone know much about the Cooper Test? I ran it doing negative splits (starting at a 6:40min/mile pace and ending on a 5:20min/mile pace). Did I game it too much and therefore, it wasn’t a true measure of my overall fitness/VO2 Max? Should I have tried running at a steady pace the whole time?

A little bit of data on me:
33yo, 5’8, 165lbs (probably 15% BF). I could probably stand to lose a couple pounds and put on some more muscle, but I like to eat whatever I want and don’t get in the gym as often as I would like due to work, family (wife and 9-month old son), and golf.
Resting HR: 44-48bpm
Max HR: 192bpm…that’s the highest I’ve recorded, which I did during the 12-minute Cooper Fitness Test I ran where I completed 1.98 miles in 12 minutes. So my max is something a little higher than that I would imagine.
Estimated VO2 Max (Based on above Cooper Test): 60ml/kg/min
Current weekly mileage ranges from 25-40miles/week

Current/Recent PBs:
5k: 20:40 (My true PB is 18:28, which I ran during Navy Officer Candidate School training back in 2008, but haven’t come close to that since)
10k: 45:24 (During a 50-min tempo run back in January, I ran 6.2 miles during that in 42:21)
Half: 1:46:29 (Did absolutely no training for it and just ran the Half on a whim because a few guys that worked for me asked me to run with them). I imagine I could run closer to 1:30-1:35, but I’m not logging the mileage right now to do so, and I am okay with that.

Current Goal PBs:
5k: Sub 19-min
10k: Sub 40-min

Ultimate/Eventual Goal PBs:
5k: Sub 17-min
10k: Sub 35-min
Half: Sub 1:20, some day when I can dedicate more time to the required mileage.
Full: Sub 2:45, some day when I can dedicate more time to the required mileage.

I threw a lot of information out there, but I wanted to offer a decent picture of my current fitness and goals, as well as my concerns and reasons for posting to the forum. I think being able to consult with a coach and develop a good training plan that I know will benefit me is eventually what I'll do, as opposed to picking one off the internet and trying my best to tailor to my fitness. Especially when I don’t have any clue what my true fitness is.

Thanks,

AdamBryan

Gosh, you posted a lot of detail which is good but with limited context on your history/overall training it is hard to respond specifically to it all.

In general, forget the noise and the details.  At this point the more you run, the faster you will get.  Volume is way more important than obsessing about what you are doing with your speedwork.  And to throw southern heat into this, just forget about HR.  You are going to just have to go by effort.  Remember that generations of runners did very well without HRMs.

It's not necessarily true that you should have no medium days.  The problem is that newer runners almost invariably run too hard, so telling them to have medium days is just telling them to race even more workouts than they already are.  You have workouts (tempos, intervals, progressions) and easy days.  The fact is that easy days MUST be easy.  No more than 2 workout days per week with what you are doing, and whatever else you are doing has to be easy.  When you get to higher mileage and more runs per week, other options open up.  But you're not there yet.

If Zone 4 takes you up to 182 bpm and you think you can go above that comfortably in a tempo when your max recorded HR is 192...you are wrong.  You are racing the workout.

Tempo is classically defined as the pace you could maintain for an hour in a race, but you are only running 20-30 minutes.  Given your mileage you should focus on this time duration.  Frankly you aren't in shape for 40-55 minute tempos, which would be at a different pace anyways.

In general, without looking at anything, I would say yes, you are running intervals too fast.  Because almost all newer runners do.  As for intervals, smartly, I already detailed this so I don't have to repeat myself.

Great advice above. Right now, your speed interval should be 100-200m or 20-30 sec fast striders. Run these hard but not all out focusing on form. Do 4-8 of these twice per week after your tempo work with full recovery between. One other day you can do some striders also to mix it up. This is plenty of speed work now. You need more miles and more aerobic fitness, no anaerobic fitness. Build the engine with more more and more miles. It is hard to grasp this but it is so true. Do it the right way, have patience and this will also this will help you remain injury free. Also, use the occasional race and true speed work for now. 6 months from now, maybe we can add to our advice.