2020 Marathon Training and relevant COVID 19 discussion echo chamber (Read 700 times)

Mark, 38yrs old Irish expat living the scientist life in Michigan. Started running 10yrs back and death marched my first marathon in 3:52 8yrs ago.

Count me back on board for the spring season after being sidelined with various life stuff over the autumn. I have signed up for Toledo again where I ran 2:52 last spring. Not sure what my goal is, though I hope to be able to PR, so something under 2:49 and a solid base for an assault on 2:40 at Indy in the autumn is the plan.

All of this is hugely dependent on my body, which has been resisting my efforts to make much progress with various injuries continuously plaguing me over the past couple of years. I'm currently nursing a mildly sore knee after tripping while running in the dark a couple of weeks pre-xmas. Though on the plus side, I appear to have finally gotten a year long bout of PF under control. Of course, this has just been doing mileage, so I've yet to be convinced I can hold up to workouts and such.

Also, huge thanks and congrats to Jack for raising the bar.

Hi Mikkey. Yea, I think it is ambitious but doable. I running with a bunch of alumni from my alma matter who are in the 2:25-2:35 range for the marathon. I was in 2:50 ish shape in the fall and have been just cranking base miles since then. My issue was always not taking easy days easy and red lining all the time. Also going out way too hard. I have learned those lessons and been racing negative splits again. The 2 halfs in the spring should tell me a lot.

I'm Christi and i read through this thread and realized you guys are all of the old sub 3 guys!!! i know you said that all runners are welcome in here, but reading through everyone's goal times is pretty intimidating

I doubt i'll have much to contribute, but I think I'll hang around and try to improve my running at least!

I have been running for about eight years now, I'm a stay at home homeschooling mom of three pre-teen/teenage daughters in Kansas City, age 39. My goal for last year was to BQ but that fell apart with a knee issue in the middle of my training last summer. Goal this year is to BQ and actually register this fall. I have run one previous BQ time but wasn't able to actually run Boston, it was just financially not possible at the time. I absolutely want to run Boston next year as my 40th birthday present to myself. I need a 3:40 but hope to run a 3:30-3:35. My previous time was a 3:27

I'll be running the Lake Wobegone marathon Mother's Day weekend. A friend in MN told me about it and it has a very high percentage of runners able to hit their BQ times, so fingers crossed. I am in week one of my training plan and its been a rough start. Part of the problem was a two week vacation to Florida over Christmas and i lost all of my steam. I tried a tempo run this morning and just got through four miles not even at marathon pace, i'm probably a super low mileage runner compared to most of you, but last summer before i had to stop i was running about 55 miles per week, with the thought i would get up to 60, same goals for this spring. I follow Lydiard training plans for the most part and they generally work out for me.

I'm looking forward to reading about everyone's training, should be interesting!!

Happy New Year and thanks for starting the thread...

56 yo male, living in SE Michigan, married 30+ years with a teen daughter. I've been running (mostly) on and (occasionally) off all my life. I don't race often; combination of laziness, not committing, time, etc.  Marathon PR is 3:28:40-something at the 2018 Detroit Free Press marathon which qualified me for the 2020 Boston marathon. I'm registered and getting to and finishing Boston is the only goal I'm setting for now.

2019 was a mixed year for me. Started fairly well, was training for Boston 2019 (2018 Holland-Haven was qualifying race before coming down with IT band issues in mid-March that persisted and kept me out of Boston (would have been first Boston).  Was a real bummer as that was the first time I've really tried to train in the winter. Seeing a lot of hard work, cold fingers and numb toe morning go to waste was disappointing.  After recovering from ITB, had a really good summer before I aggravated an old hamstring issue (upper hamstring tendon) in early August and spent most of Sep-Nov barely running. I've been doing 3-5 miles a day in Dec and hoping to ramp up in Jan-Mar and make it to Boston. I don't care what my time is there; I just want to finish and buy a jacket!

 

Just popping in here to ask - which asthma/allergy meds are allowed, and which are not? I am at no risk of participating in anything that would subject me to testing, but just curious.

So...if you ever want to check something specific, you can go to Global DRO and look it up.

As for asthma/allergy meds and USADA rules, I'll break it down by type of medication:

• antihistamines (Claritin, Benadryl, Allegra, etc)  - legal
• leukotriene inhibitors (Singulair) - legal
• Xolair (biologic used for bad cases) - legal
• immunotherapy allergy shots - legal

and then we get into the tricky stuff:

• pseudoephedrine (Sudafed, Claritin-D, Allegra-D) - allowed out of competition; banned in competition.  They do have a threshold testing level for it, and only count as a positive if you exceed that threshold.
  
  • corticosteroids - you can divide these into local or systemic.  Local corticosteroids are those that are inhaled (some asthma inhalers, like Qvar), applied nasally (Flonase, Nasacort), rubbed on the body (cortisone cream), or injected into a joint (a cortisone shot).  Those are legal in and out of competition.    Corticosteroids with a systemic effect (those taken by mouth, taken rectally, or injected into a vein) are allowed out of competition, but banned in competition.
  • beta-2 agonists.  As a general rule, these are banned both in and out of competition, whether taken orally, injected, or inhaled.  There are three medications that are conditionally allowed (meaning allowed in limited amounts) if inhaled.  Those are albuterol, formoterol, salmeterol.  Albuterol is what is in those little rescue inhalers a lot of people have - you're allowed up to 8 puffs in 12 hours.  Formoterol is in the combination inhalers Symbicort and Dulera; Salmeterol is in the conbination inhaler Advair.  You're allowed up to 54 micrograms of Formoterol over 24 hours (I don't know what that means in terms of puffs).  For Advair (salmeterol), you're allowed up to 4 puffs in 24 hours.

So....practically speaking, you're fine with your antihistamines and your Singulair.  You have to be careful with decongestants, corticosteroids, and inhaled medications.  Once you get into the combination inhalers (which combine a beta-2 agonist and a corticosteroid) you have to go with Advair, Dulera, or Symbicort.  Breo is not allowed (and people do get in trouble for that one).  For rescue inhalers, you have to go with albuterol (Pro-Air and Ventolin inhalers);  Levalbuterol (Xopenex) is not allowed.

As for whom these rules apply to -- they apply to all of us, regardless of whether we are likely to be tested..  That being said, USADA does divide athletes into different groups - Registered Testing Pool, Clean Athlete Program, Non-National Athletes, Recreational Athletes.  Depending on which group you fall into, there are different policies for when a therapeutic use exemption (TUE) is needed.  Basically the lower your level, the more leeway you're given.  If you are in the RTP or CAP, you need to have a TUE any time you take something that's not allowed.  If you're Non-National or Recreational - you need to apply for a TUE for some stuff, but for others you just take them, and then apply for the TUE if you are tested. (there's a form you fill out on USADA to determine whether you need to apply for a TUE in advance).

All of us on this board (unless I'm missing something) are either Non-National Athletes or Recreational.  Essentially you are a Non-National athlete if you have placed high in your age group in a major race.  You are a Recreational athlete if you haven't.  If you qualify for the Olympic Trials or represent the US on a team, then you get bumped up to CAP or RTP.

 

 

As for asthma/allergy meds and USADA rules, I'll break it down by type of medication:

...

Thanks for the dissertation! This is pretty fascinating to me. Maybe to no one else, so I will not clog up the thread with anything further on the subject. Other than to say that I have apparently raced illegally on occasion, including for my marathon PR last month. Counting it anyway.

 

Are you cheating with your allergy or your asthma medication?  I use an albuterol inhaler for pool-induced asthma, and my understanding is more than 4 hits in a 12 hour period would be considered illegal. 

It depends on the size of your inhaler.  The standard albuterol inhaler is 90 mcg a puff.  The limit is 800 mcg in 12 hours.  So....8 puffs in 12 hours, not 4.    Is yours a larger dose per puff?