Forums >General Running>Friendly advice
Believe
So I have heard all the experts, etc. and they say that you train at something like 50-75% of what you race at and maybe that is what I am supposed to do. I am currently running around 6.5 miles three days a week and the last 2 runs have been in the range of 7:38-7:50/mile overall. We start at around 9/mile for the first 2 and them crank it up, but here is the thing. It really is not that difficult for me. When I get done I knwo I have ran that far but it is not draining or anything. I have ran a PR half (1:44:49) this year at 54 and running around a 23 5K so my point is, I am running almost as fast as I am going to run, unless I am a wimp and afraid to push it to the limit in a race. My goal is a half under 1:40, a marathon under 4, (fastest is 4:20) and just complete an ultra at 50K and 50 miles, anything beyond that would be gravy. I figure at 54 I'll run out of time before I run out of miles . Any advice, observation, etc? Thanks.
You are either not racing hard enough or training too fast, I would guess both. Your PRs are similar to mine but if I tried to run 7:40-7:50 on a 6 mile training run I would be heaving a lung by the end, like when I race a 10k. Here is an idea. Why don't you run a succession of 1 mile time trials, see how fast you really are. Then race some 5ks, see how fast you can go. You need to see what it feels like to race fast and hard until it hurts. If you are training comfortably at a 7-something min/ mile you should be able to race a 5k a hell of a lot faster than me.
There are a ton of calculators, this one seems as good as any: https://runsmartproject.com/calculator/ Plug in your race time and it will give you suggested training paces. When you race faster, then you can train faster.
Oh yeah, and run lots, mostly easy, sometimes hard or something like that.
When you run 18 miles per week you can likely run those miles pretty fast but it'll probably catch up to you if you continue or if you add more miles at too fast of a pace. Most probably what'll happen is that as you add more days & miles to your training load you will be forced to slow down to the appropriate pace for your current fitness. And you will race much faster.
jfa
What Joann and Ken said, you should be upping your mileage with easy miles, with some go fast workouts sprinkled in.
BTW, you can't use your age as an excuse as there are plenty of fast peeps older than you.
runktrun
Try ditching the garmin to get a feel for your true easy pace. Time an easy run on a course of known distance, but without mile markers, and just take note of your total time, divide by total distance to get your average pace after the run. Run it by yourself. Note how you felt. eg: you run your standard 4mi loop in exactly 36:00 and felt great and you didn't look at your pace during the entire run. That suggests that your true easy pace is around 9:00 and that maybe cutting down to 7:45s by the end of each run is too fast and will accumulate too much fatigue. Then throwing in a mile time trial or two is a good idea as well, to gauge your race pace, then you can plug your mile race time into a calculator like mcmillanrunning.com to get a good idea of paces for longer distances. Obviously it doesn't not accurately predict everyone's race times, but it will be a good place to start.
Not running for my health, but in spite of it.
You are either not racing hard enough or training too fast, I would guess both. ...... Oh yeah, and run lots, mostly easy, sometimes hard or something like that.
You are either not racing hard enough or training too fast, I would guess both.
......
I'm going with this. Your latest 6.5 mile "tempo" run was 17 seconds slower/mile than a recent race less than half the distance. You can definitely race faster (and, depending upon how much faster, likely you should be training slower).
What Joann and Ken said, you should be upping your mileage with easy miles, with some go fast workouts sprinkled in. BTW, you can't use your age as an excuse as there are plenty of fast peeps older than you.
Dang it! I been relying on the age card. Oh and I should day that I do run what amounts to a long run every other wee. I am averaging slightly over 100 miles/month recently and yes the long run in around 9:15/mile of slower so I understand that.
not bad for mile 25
What they said: lots more miles, lots slower pace. I have a 1:42 half, 3:43 full, and most of my training runs are around 9:30.
Thanks guys. People on RA ARE reall good people. Lot of good advice. I guess I knew I was training too fast, but it just felt so good. I will continue to look at advice. Who know may even try it all. Thanks again.
Moneyman,
You sort of touched on this in your post, but here's my observation with a few of my running friends. Most of them are training way too hard all the time. Not sure hard, but not truly easy either. They say they aren't pushing it (and it feels easy), but it's not easy for me, and when we get to races, I beat them, by a lot. When I look at their 5K race pace, it's only 15s or so faster than what they like to train at. I attribute this to a few factors:
1) they never train at or faster than their no-man's land training pace. It's always that moderate effort. So, their body isn't trained to go any faster for any duration.
2) Since they haven't trained faster, and felt the pain/discomfort of how a 5K should feel if actually raced, they can't and don't push themselves enough. Let's face it. Racing hurts, And the shorter the race, the more it hurts. Those that learn to like that pain, embrace it, expect etc, etc, race at paces they have a hard time doing in practice.
Moneyman, You sort of touched on this in your post, but here's my observation with a few of my running friends. Most of them are training way too hard all the time. Not sure hard, but not truly easy either. They say they aren't pushing it (and it feels easy), but it's not easy for me, and when we get to races, I beat them, by a lot. When I look at their 5K race pace, it's only 15s or so faster than what they like to train at. I attribute this to a few factors: 1) they never train at or faster than their no-man's land training pace. It's always that moderate effort. So, their body isn't trained to go any faster for any duration. 2) Since they haven't trained faster, and felt the pain/discomfort of how a 5K should feel if actually raced, they can't and don't push themselves enough. Let's face it. Racing hurts, And the shorter the race, the more it hurts. Those that learn to like that pain, embrace it, expect etc, etc, race at paces they have a hard time doing in practice.
Good point. When I finish a 5K I am kind of burnt but there REALLY is not any pain or discomfort. I finish drink a couple bottles of water and then I'm fine so maybe in a race I need to push it is what I have heard you and a couple people say? Would that be a fair statement?
Yes, that's a fair statement. However, it's a whole lot easier to do in a race, if you do it in practice. I know that if I haven't done any fast training in a while, and jump in a 5K race, my body is in shock at the pace.
For you, doing some 400's at 5K pace or slightly faster once/week would be a huge benefit. Plus, doing 6 to 10 100m fast strides a few times/week help you get use to running fast.
Like others said, you are either not racing as hard as you can or training harder than you should.
You are training too fast.
Run by time alone on a course you don't know distance. After you run it 23 times measure the distance. That is your training pace.
My teacher says it takes 23 times to make a habit.
You are training too fast. Run by time alone on a course you don't know distance. After you run it 23 times measure the distance. That is your training pace. My teacher says it takes 23 times to make a habit.
That is interesting. Thanks.