Competitive Jerks Racing and Training - 2023 (Read 574 times)

 

Hash/Dave the top 5 in the 50 to 59 age group were all sub 1.20 in that race.

That’s crazy.

Warning: Long Post. tl/dr: Rehab is going well; getting old sucks but injuries and sickness are poison; running IS great for being in shape but I'd love it even if it weren't; my g-g-g-generation; MY music is older than yours!; Thoughts on a marathon plan; DNF's at Western States.

Update on my rehab (ruptured quad tendon, surgical repair June 1st). 
I'm now walking without crutches, but with an ankle to mid-thigh brace for all but a few cautious steps around the house. The brace is very high-tech; it  sets the flex angle for the knee -- 0⁰ for normal walking, 30⁰ and up for PT exercises. I'm now up to 50⁰ for exercises, and am supposed to get to 60⁰ by week 6. I'm monitoring my daily step count, which is now up to 2,500-3,200.
I have a detailed PT program with patella mobilization, a variety of leg lifts, and now hamstring curls (lying on my stomach, to 50⁰) and more. Twice a day for certain critical parts like knee flexion and extension, once a day for the rest. Surpirisingly tiring. 
It's never been particularly painful unless I try to flex more than the brace allows. 
Fortunately, it's my left leg, so I can drive, although getting in and out of cars is a challenge with a completely straight left leg.

Overall good progress, maybe even a little ahead of schedule, but I'm being pretty careful    

Random comments on the thread from last three(?) weeks:

CAL was asking if I'd noticed any particular ages I've felt a dropoff. No particular ages. BUT the times with major injuries or illness resulted in big drops in running performance. Sometime I may have recovered a bit in subsequent years, but never to the same level. Achilles tendon rupture in 2012, recovered somewhat by 2014. A-fib diagnosed in 2018 (but was likely there in 2016 or earlier), recovered after an ablation in 2019. Then got hit hard by long COVID symptoms from April 2020 to 2022; they've finally faded away now. Moral of the story: Don't get injured or sick (duh!). Do as I say, not as I've done recently!

Running as a poor way to stay in great overall shape? Maybe, but it's done a great job for me over the 30 years that running's been my primary sport. Much healthier than preceding years when I played different sports (always competitively). I've only done strength training sporadically, usually when I can't run. Now, compared to 99% of 74 year olds, I'm stronger all over, much lighter, and leaner. The 1% is probably othr runners!

I think running and coaching has helped keep me in shape mentally too. I'm participating in a medical trial for prevention of Alzheimer's because I have some risk factors for that. Tests for that study confirm only normal memory lapses, no signs of abnormal mental deterioration. I credit running for a lot of that. 

On top of that, even if running benefits topped out at 20 mpw and declined after that (they don't), I'd still want to run 50, because, damnit, I LOVE the feeling of a good run and the boost to my metabolism after running. 

Pleased to see my boomer status was eventually recognized! 1949 for me; I think George (wcrunner) is 1948. My kids are late Gen

X (1980) and Millenial (1983). We're celebrating the younger one's 40th birthday this Friday. 

Discussion on generational trashing the kids... enjoyed that. And loved Steve's Mike and the Mechanics quote. When I coached high school cross country, I heard a lot of crap from adults about "kids today", when I had 20-40 kids who were for the most part absolutely wonderful (and when they weren't, I listened, and worked with them). 

I learned to find knowledge by looking in Encyclopedias, sometimes reading entire sections until I was satisfied.

My music was first from AM radio. My "Can't Beat This" story: I was born in England and moved to Canada at age 6. My English grandfather keep gifting me subscriptions to English childrens/teens magazines -- which were wasted on me until... You can't beat knowing about the Beatles (and all the other British groups) months before North America was even aware of them... and having Pops mail me some 45's*... in 1963! And finally my English accent, which had gotten me into trouble for years in Canada, was cool.

Mark - Glad your new baby is doing well  -- and that you're able to get some good runs in.

Steve: I puzzled over your last marathon result; your training seemed so solid.  Eventually, I concluded that your best plan if you want to get the monkey off your back would be to up the mileage to as much over 120 kpw as you can tolerate, for the cycle to ~6 weeks out. Much less fast running than usual during that cycle.  Then sharpen with a couple of very testing workouts or races and a long taper.

I'm drawing that partly from my own experience: I had a two-year period when I couldn't buy a decent marathon race despite "decent training" (90-100 kpw, 2 workouts/week). I got cramps, pulled muscles, hit the wall for no apparent reason! I was ready to give up.
I eventually decided that this training was stressing my body to the point it would not tolerate the marathon distance. The load didn't seem excessive as I trained (I'd done 90kpw for years), but no matter what, I wasn't prepared on race day. Cumulative fatigue, micro-damage to the muscles... call it what you like... maybe mental fatigue as well. I'd kept doing the same thing, expecting different results.

Eventually I came up with a plan. Prepare the base first so I'd be ready for the cycle. Be able to up the mileage in-cycle, but de-emphasize speedwork and the long run. First phase, I slowed everything down, ran "truly easy" every day (some doubles) for ~10 weeks, hitting 120 kpw at the end. No runs longer than 16k. At the end of that, I felt healthy enough to start a marathon cycle.
That cycle had the usual daily variety and long runs, but little speedwork (a few tempos). Initially volume dropped, but came back to 120-125kpw as I still felt fresh. I added a fair bit of MP (such a no-no!), especially in long runs. Averaged 116 kpw over 9 weeks, until 6 weeks out. Never felt really tired. Sharpened with a 10k and a all-out half. Nailed the marathon.
Two years later, I coached a youngster who turned to the marathon after HS (a mid-pack XC runner). He had very difficult experiences with his first 3 attempts despite reasonable conventional training. We built base miles before the cycle. In cycle, kept the speedwork low-volume and relatively slow, then intensified it before the taper. He knocked 30 minutes off his marathon time, and another 12 minutes in marathon #5.

I feel that higher mileage could get your breakthrough. 130kpw may actually be overkill, but if it is, you'll be SO ready for the race. Run conservatively, get your 3:10 or 3:15. After that, stay healthy and I wouldn't be surprised to see you continuing to improve well into the 2:50's, maybe faster. 

Western States: Brutal race this year! Some great runners among the DNF's: Camille Herron, Gene Dykes, John Loftus... (irunforbeer on the old forums). John got in for the first time this year after many years not being drawn in the lottery... gotta be difficult to take!

- - - - - 
* Just in case I need to explain: 45's are vinyl records played on a turntable at 45 rpm. 

 

CAL was asking if I'd noticed any particular ages I've felt a dropoff. No particular ages. BUT the times with major injuries or illness resulted in big drops in running performance. Sometime I may have recovered a bit in subsequent years, but never to the same level. Achilles tendon rupture in 2012, recovered somewhat by 2014. A-fib diagnosed in 2018 (but was likely there in 2016 or earlier), recovered after an ablation in 2019. Then got hit hard by long COVID symptoms from April 2020 to 2022; they've finally faded away now. Moral of the story: Don't get injured or sick (duh!). Do as I say, not as I've done recently!

 
Western States: Brutal race this year! Some great runners among the DNF's: Camille Herron, Gene Dykes, John Loftus... (irunforbeer on the old forums). John got in for the first time this year after many years not being drawn in the lottery... gotta be difficult to take!

 

- - - - - 
* Just in case I need to explain: 45's are vinyl records played on a turntable at 45 rpm. 

i'm comparatively only a youngster at 58 but very much agree. people ought to be more inspired by the older runners. at the finish they crowd around the elites as they tell their stories but the ones who last the years and are still out there giving their all have had to deal with so much more...if it's about grit anyway and not genetics

i think there are a lot of surprise dnf's among elites at WS and other super long races because it's less about just finishing and more about certain goals and not getting hurt. just like the older runners, the ones who slogged it out through something horrible and finished DFL have the grit. wish i could regain some of that. my two attempts at 100M were fails due to mental stuff

JMac I'm fully aware I'm a millennial. I embrace it. Cell phone and the Dewey Decimal system. I am just one of the ones who was fortunate enough to have a computer at home in 4th grad e (1994) due to where I lived (Bay Area California Kid) so technology was introduced early while I also learned the "old ways" of doing things like writing checks and using cash. I lived through the Great Recession (fun times to graduate college) and the Covid 19 thing. I'd have my cash in a coffee can in the back of the freezer if I bought coffee in a can.

Now...I'm focused on Generation Alpha. My time has passed. I look down on people for what they do/don't do instead of their age. I take my kids outside, deny they television, and let them learn numbers looking at metric wrenches. My oldest is now tall enough to ride some of the bigger slides which is WAAAAAAYYYY cooler than organized sports, screen time, or video games. Heck, the other day he saw some kids in the neighborhood and told me he was going to go say hi, and made a new friend. Yesterday he was in the driveway for a while and when I went to check on him the kid was standing there talking to my son. "Hey, what's his name? cool."

 

Gesearch from 2021 suggested that British children were allowed out to play without adult supervision almost two years later than their parents had been. The study of five- to eleven-year-olds suggested that the average age for a child to be first given that freedom was 10.7 years old whilst their parents recalled being let out noticeably earlier at an average of 8.9 years of age. Helen Dodd, a professor of child psychology at the University of Reading, who led the study commented “In the largest study of play in Britain, we can clearly see that there is a trend to be protective and to provide less freedom for our children now than in previous generations... The concerns we have from this report are twofold. First, we are seeing children getting towards the end of their primary school years without having had enough opportunities to develop their ability to assess and manage risk independently. Second, if children are getting less time to play outdoors in an adventurous way, this may have an impact on their mental health and overall wellbeing.” The research also suggested that children were more likely to be allowed to play outside unsupervised at an earlier age if they were white, the second or later born, living in Scotland or had better educated parents.[96]

I didn't pace at Western States this year. I decided to be stupid and rip the track bar bracket off my shitbox Jeep. The track bar is what holds the axle under the vehicle laterally. So when you turn left/right the vehicle will turn, except in my case it didn't turn the wheels. then I drank even more stupid sauce and broke the temporary fix my expereinced buddy created to get me home, and made a bad situation worse. "It's only money." I got home safe. I was glad I DIDN'T have my kids with me because kids would have made things ahrder due to their inability to sit around and do nothing for hours just because they understand things are broken. OH yeah.....smittybuilt winches aren't worth the money. They earnt the nickname shittybuilt for a reason. Buy once. Cry once.

I'm still on the fence about CIM. I don't feel like training at Marathon level, but I want to. I want to go try some speed work and make myself feel slow and out of shape again. To get that "damn I was in great shape after Boston. I should have kept training. This is why people train all year long." feeling back.\

SteveChCh Gen y IS the millennials. Whoever creates these names just stopped coming up with new names after Gen X. We just create a new letter, and apparently they're going Greek now with Alpha/Beta/Gamma/Delta/Epsilon. I'm sure this will trigger someone into being offended.

Flavio yeah, when I started having health insurance cover the tests I decided to try and get an annual exam and have blood work done. It's weird to see the increase over time for some things.

Marky Mark bro....snake and bum nuts. I will need to avoid the fairy floss (LOVE this term).

dakrwave trail running? YOU?!?!?!??! 

mmerkle I have the 3rd edition of The Bible so I don't see an A/B/C option. I see 2Q (JMac's favorite) and a few others. Even a 12 week program. I agree with JMac though. Increase the long run, and get tempo/marathon runs to be the focus. Essentially it's what Hanson's does (copies JD2Q) and fill in the weekly mileage goal with easy runs once you pick the long run distance. I believe the "standard" chnage to a week is to skip a workout, run a race, and take 1 day per 3k race distance from hard runs. I enjoy marathon pace during training. It gives me the confidence of being able to succeed, and a lot of time to think about how it FEELS to run at this pace. Oh and JMac once said I could 2:4X a marathon and I'm kind of starting to believe him too. I would just need to train all the time. aint nobody got time for that. I think you have MORE than enough 5k speed right now.

Also consider doubles. With the heat and humidity TDP conversions we're about to have an early morning run, then another at night isn't the worst. It is just a lot of laundry.

Now I'm wondering if the A/B/C was changed to "Blue/Red/Gold" training in the later versions. Etiher way. burnout can happen, but it's part of marathon training. It's why I take lots of time off AFTER a race. Training gets so demanding when it's ALL I do sometimes. Although, I do enjoy it at times.

piwi - I think I'd rather gravel than smooth asphalt with a coat of ice on it!  It looks like being about -1C (30F) at race time which probably isn't cold enough to freeze all the puddles.  I'll need a long warm up though.

Longboat - Thanks for your very thoughtful post.  That is one of the approaches I considered and have discussed it with my coach.  He seems less keen on the idea than me but will go in the direction I want.  We do have 4 months of short racing before the base build could conceivably start so I'm sure we'll have some back and forth.  He did say going high volume would require more discipline (slower easy runs).  He's definitely wanting to increase hills too.  I pointed out to him that 120km per week at peak is only 13km more than my last peak.  He's been talking to his coach at High Performance NZ about my situation too so there's a few brains working on it.  Your post is the first solid backup to my thinking so I like it!

Great news about your recovery.  It sounds like you're moving forward and have a really good plan.  I have a mate going through some serious health issues who just refuses to try anything to get moving again, which is very frustrating.  It does seem like it's only partially a physical issue at this point.

Western states is a hard race to get in to unless you are super elite. I got luck and ran in back in 2019. Amazing course and volunteers on the course. I would say it is harder to get in than Boston. You may qualify but not get in. Right now it takes about 4-7 years to get drawn in the lottery. A few wait wait longer like 8 years. Every year you have run a 100 miler to keep your tickets and every year if you don't get in our tickets double. I am still trying to get in again.

Is there any subject that darkwave isn’t clued up on.

Is Western States the race that Cal has been trying to get into for about the last 20 years?

 

Guess which band I’ve got tickets for next month!  Really looking forward to seeing them…even though they’re pensioners now.  

I saw them on their “Farewell Tour”…about 35 years ago.

Steve - For what is worth, I agree that more mileage could help.

Longboat - thanks for your post. It's very inspirational to see you and Wcrunner out there running, in very good shape, as opposed to literally all the other 70+ people I know.

WCRunner - bench pressing your body weight is VERY impressive!