Why does weekly mileage matter so much? (Read 3293 times)

Nobody is every going to get fast if they never push themselves. On the flip side you are an idiot if you think running as hard as you can every day is going to make you fast.

 

I used to be a football player and my sophomore year I started running cross country. I was the 2nd slowest kid on my team and overweight. That winter I progressed to 35 miles a week and continued increasing volume and by the time I was a Senior I was at 60 miles a week and by far the fastest person on the team.  I'm the kind of person who pushes runs because I can. I love to grind out long runs. I also was the person who obsessed over mileage. I remember doing a 7 mile cool-down (I was only running 55 mile weeks) after a 5K just because I needed to hit my mileage. I remember runs when I missed miles at a time because of heat exhaustion, or passing out once I got back. I worked to get into shape, but it was unrealistic to continue training like this. I didn't realize it at the time, but I was tired 9 months out of the year. By the winter of my senior year I came down with a hamstring injury. Training had finally caught up to me. I came back slow and continued to train for my college career. I didn't make the team, but kept training. By spring I was injured again. I came back slow and trained for a few months. I failed to make the team again. Wouldn't you know it I was injured 2 months later.Every time I didn't make the team I would get pissed and start training stupid. Grinding every run and running race pace during some intervals, completely missing the purpose of the workout..

 

The point is, right away you can pound out the miles VERY easy. Your body might not be in the best shape, but you recover fast. You just have to be smart about your training and increase mileage slow, remembering to take a rest WEEK every month or so. Everybody needs easy days, but if you are constantly doing workouts and long runs your body gets run down. If you listen to your body enough you know when you are tired. So taking down weeks of 70% of your max weekly volume isn't a bad thing. If you are like me and pound out miles you will get injured soon enough. But if you listen to your body and take easy days when you need to you will be fine. I have seen this happen here at college SO many times. Healthy runners= faster runners.

 

The other thing is consistency. Anybody can put in a big week, but it is putting in the miles week after week that makes you fast. Also, any idiot can run. It's the people who do strides, core work, strength training, and workouts that make good runners. If you want to be fast you have to work at it. If being fast was easy everybody would be fast. That's why I love the sport, if you want to be good you will be. You just have to be patient with running and let the speed come to you. It takes months and years to get fast, so trying to get into shape 5 weeks before a half marathon isn't going to do much.

 

P.S. Cross training is a great way to add volume and recover at the same time. If any of you guys have roads bikes or swim you will know what I'm talking about.

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Nobody is every going to get fast if they never push themselves....blah blah blah

 

 

how you doin'?

So... no surprises.  We all want to run more this summer.  Nice. Let's hope it translates into smokin' times in Autumn.

Depending on what you're training for, there is a balance.  There are guys on this site who can roll off 100 mile weeks like they're just walking to the bathroom and back.  They run marathons or ultras.  If you're training for a 5K you will need some harder training in there but there is a line.

When I was younger I was like Jacob.  I pushed a lot of runs and partially that was due to the coach and the peer pressure of being on a highly ranked team.  I might not have had the mileage (I hardly ever topped 50 in high school) he did but you'd see ridiculous things in my log like 7 mile recovery run in 45 minutes, 5 miles in 31 minutes two days before a race, anything slower than 7:30/mile was considered "slow/BS run" and I wasn't breaking 17 minutes.  When I got to college I upped the mileage and increased the pace.  10 or 11 weeks in a row of 60+ miles, had a streak of 40 days, took one day off, did another 30.  10 miles in the mountains in 1:02.  8x1200 in 3:49 average (I couldn't move the next day after that one).  I was constantly exhausted, got a lot of infections and nagging injuries.  My college coach yelled at me once for praticing too hard, I backed off the pace and all of a sudden I set PR's.  But not for long, I was right back to it because I was excited I was doing so well.  Finally I tore my hamstring multiple times (trying to come back on it too soon).

 

Running is not a sport where trying harder automatically means you'll succeed.  You have to extend the limits of your body and then retreat to recover.  You'll come back stronger the next time but it does take patience.

 

Now I'm a little smarter.  I don't run every run hard.  I might push one of them a week if I am feeling good, add some striders in to keep turnover up.  I'll run 3 weeks at a higher mileage in a row at most and then back off the 4th week.  I feel much better and am not injured.  I know that if I got my mileage from 30 to 50-60 I'd see results and I could go out next week and run a 50-60 mile week but I'm smarter than that.  Instead of doing it next week maybe its July or August before I see a 50 mile week.

 

As far as the question of why it matters so much is people can write a number down and go "wow I did a lot" or write a smaller number down and be disappointed, and maybe not look any deeper into what the numbers mean. 

have a nice day

Been out for a while (running and playing tennis).  I'm surprised by all the people offended that I asked why some people run alot and never go beyond 9 to 10 minute miles.  Clearly my goal isn't just to finish a race, but to finish with a certain time.  Its about the competition to me, finishing in a high percentile.  If people can't handle that, they shouldn't read the thread.

 

Running is not my main passion, but its secondary and I only have so much time to dedicate to it.  I don't have time to follow the typical generic training program you find on the web.  I was simply looking for an 'efficient' program to help me reach my goals (based on where I'm currently at) that requires less training time.  I realize that it requires a bit more dedication to run 5, 6 minute miles so I won't even go there.  But when I'm already at 7:45-8, I was thinking it wouldn't require 'that' much more effort to reach 7:30. 

 

Why do so many people on message boards actually look for a fight?  I mean someone accuses me of being a teenager when in fact I'm married with a toddler and we all couldn't be happier.  I mean I'm this terrible person who can't have a family of my own because I'm trying to run faster without spending all my time in training? Wow!

 It's fine if running is your secondary passion and you don't want to prioritize it, but what people are telling you is that there is no "magic bullet" that is going to allow you to reach your goals with an "efficient" program.  You seem to think people run high mileage just because they enjoy doing it.  There is nothing that enjoyable about jumping on the treadmill so I can get a run in while watching my 2 young kids but I do it because I understand that volume is necessary to run faster.  You seem to be looking for some shortcut around it and I'm sorry, but there isn't one.

 

I used to run nearly double my current volume so I will never see those times again.  I now have a family and prioritize time with and supporting them over running.  I made peace with the fact that I will have to settle with trying to maximize my performance of what volume I can fit in.  Trying to reach another level of performance while seeking to shortchange your volume (especially when your volume is pretty low) are not compatible.