Skirt Runner
Does anyone have any literature on why exactly runners should follow the "10% rule" for increasing weekly mileage and why the long run should not be more than 30% of the total weekly mileage? These theories are touted often here and the reasoning is generally for injury prevention but does anyone have any information as to how and why, physiologically, this helps prevent injury? I ask because there is another running group I post on that is for women (not associated with RA or RWOL) someone was looking for advice on a half marathon plan and wanted to know what people thought of Higdon Novice 1 (where at the peak week the LR is 50% of the total weekly mileage) and I advised padding the weekly mileage a bit to bring that down to 30% or finding a plan that has a better ratio of total mileage to long run percentage. And several ladies on that group basically jumped down my throat claiming that my advice was misguided and that 20mpw with 12+ mile long runs was perfectly fine and really criticized my advice. I said it was for injury prevention reasons (building up the tendons, ligaments, and bones to handle the stress of the pounding) but realized I was only going on what people on here have said time and time again, but I cannot find any literature on this. I would like to share literature with the ladies on this other forum in hopes to help some of the women in this group consider other training methods. And if there is nothing to back this theory of 10% and/or LR being 30% of weekly mileage, who came up with this theory? Thanks!!
PRs: 5K- 28:16 (5/5/13) 10K- 1:00:13 (10/27/13) 4M- 41:43 (9/7/13) 15K- 1:34:25 (8/17/13) 10M- 1:56:30 (4/6/14) HM- 2:20:16 (4/13/14) Full- 5:55:33 (11/1/15)
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Are we there, yet?
They should NOT follow the 10% Rule, at least not in the way it is incorporated in so many canned programs. I think the current thought is that it takes 2-3 weeks for adaptations to new stress levels to happen, so increases shouldn't be made any more frequently than that. As for the amount of increase, that can range from 5-20% depending on the individual, not counting outliers. I think that and the LR being 25-30% of weekly mileage are based on interpretations of Daniels' Running Formula.
2024 Races:
03/09 - Livingston Oval Ultra 6-Hour, 22.88 miles
05/11 - D3 50K 05/25 - What the Duck 12-Hour
06/17 - 6 Days in the Dome 12-Hour.
I think that and the LR being 25-30% of weekly mileage are based on interpretations of Daniels' Running Formula.
He does address in his book Daniels Running Formula. The 3rd edition by the way, is due any day now.
Wcrunner where is there information on the "current thought" about the no more than 10℅ increase rule? Whose thoughts are they?
LRB/wcrunner..... Know of anything that concisely sums up why Daniels Running Formula does it that way other than telling these women to buy the book?
Super B****
Check out this site...
http://runnersconnect.net/running-training-articles/weekly-mileage-progression-10-percent-rule/
chasing the impossible
because i never shut up ... i blog
In Daniels as previously stated. He has several suggestions on how much to increase mileage, including adding one mile to each run. From my attempts to find the origin of the 10% Rule, the best I've come up with is an apocryphal story regarding a reporter pressing Lydiard on the matter, so he finally threw out 10% to shut up the reporter. In other words there is no scientific or even pragmatic basis for it, but it's become a commonly accepted rule in the same way that drinking 8 glasses of water a day has. There's no scientific support for that either.
Chasing Muses
IIRC, the 30% rule suggests that running your long runs too long will diminish the quality of your other quality runs throughout the week. So, if you go too far on Sunday, you're not going to be able to hit your paces on Tuesday's intervals. 30% is an almost arbitrary number since it really depends on what the rest of your weekly miles look like, what you're training for, and what your actual weekly mileage is. If I'm training for a 24 hour, my long runs can be 65% of weekly mileage. If I'm training for a 5k, it's less than 25%, say 12 miles on a 50-mile week. But the pace on the former is almost pedestrian than the pace of the latter.
It was back in the 1970s when Runner's World's Bob Anderson was asking Arthur Lydiard how one should increase weekly mileage. Lydiard never liked to give such "rules" but Bob was quite persistent. "How about increasing it by 10% each week?" he asked. "That sounds about right," Lydiard answered. From then on, this "10% rule" started to spread like a gospel. Of course Lydiard never said anything like; "You shall increase weekly mileage by 10%..." Bob put that into his mouth and he simply agreed with it as "sounds about right..."
Youth Has No Age. ~ Picasso / 1st road race: Charleston Distance Run 15 Miler - 1974 / profile
Interesting. I could have sworn that all this was to prevent injury (I want to say LTH may have said this many times) and always assumed there must be some kind of research. If the LR being 30% thing is just so the other workouts can be higher quality I don't think that affects most of these women much. They don't do speedwork.
Lord of the Manor
Thanks to Moth for the history lesson. I find that easy to believe.
If I could make a wish I think I'd pass
Hip Redux
Here's my two cents, based on nothing but my own experiences - when your long run is too much of your total mileage, you don't have enough of a base to support the stress of a LR (same goes for too high a % of speed work). We're talking 12 miles on a total of 20 mpw sort of thing. I've done that and it's gotten me injured
As far as 10% increase every week, I think that's too aggressive also for certain situations (like, first time at that distance, coming off injury, etc). It is safer to do the same mileage for a few weeks, and then adjust upwards.
Of course, none of this helps you in your internet debate Kristin!
I agree with Oski but I'll add my perspective. Most training plans have you running a long run plus one or two speed sessions per week. It takes time to recover from a long run. If you run 50 miles, to use an extreme example, you may have to wait several weeks before your body is recovered sufficiently to do any speed work. If your long run is too great a percentage of your weekly mileage, you'll essentially do nothing but recover between your long runs and you won't be able to do any speed work without either greatly increasing your risk of injury or doing the speed work slower than you should be if you want to derive the full benefits of the workout.
I doubt this is a reason for it but I also think that long runs give a false sense of security. I have lost count of the marathon crash and burn reports I have read followed by the inevitable blubbering, "but, but, but, I ran two 20 milers and a 22 miler I don't understand." (You have to say it in a whiny voice). Yeah, you ran those runs but you were only running 35-40 miles per week and your total mileage matters much more than your long runs.
Short term goal: 17:59 5K
Mid term goal: 2:54:59 marathon
Long term goal: To say I've been a runner half my life. (I started running at age 45).
I just take any damn plan that's suggested to me and I stick to it. No question asked. I'm not a very deep thinker.
PRs: Boston Marathon, 3:27, April 15th 2013
Cornwall Half-Marathon, 1:35, April 27th 2013
18 marathons, 18 BQs since 2010
No more marathons
Look at a couple of extreams:
Case #1 - putting in 100 mile weeks - long run at 30%? - not likely - that would be 30 miles.
Case #2 - casual runner doing runs of 3,4,5,3 - long run of 5 is 33% - too much? Nah.
The 30% is OK as an overall average - but how many of us are average?
Looking at my own data for the past 14 weeks (excluding weeks that really had no long run) I have an overall average of 36%.
My total weekly average is a little over 29 miles (I know - pretty anemic) and my long runs average 10.6 - with the longest being 13.1 (not a race) and the shortest being 8.5. Shit - none of these really even qualify as a long run - just kind of medium.
Boston 2014 - a 33 year journey
Lordy, I hope there are tapes.
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Caretaker/Overlook Hotel
Look at a couple of extreams: Case #1 - putting in 100 mile weeks - long run at 30%? - not likely - that would be 30 miles. Case #2 - casual runner doing runs of 3,4,5,3 - long run of 5 is 33% - too much? Nah. The 30% is OK as an overall average - but how many of us are average? Looking at my own data for the past 14 weeks (excluding weeks that really had no long run) I have an overall average of 36%. My total weekly average is a little over 29 miles (I know - pretty anemic) and my long runs average 10.6 - with the longest being 13.1 (not a race) and the shortest being 8.5. Shit - none of these really even qualify as a long run - just kind of medium.
Pffft.....speak for yourself. I was healthy as a horse on 10-20mpw for years and as soon as I bumped it up to 30mpw??? ------> INJURED!!!
Hardly anemic.
In fact, while I'm typing in here (and I don't want to start controversy) I had a 3rd doc's opinion on running. (he was a student doc helping my PCP) and before my PCP came in the room, he was probably the closest thing to a running advocate I've found so far in the medical community. *HIS* reply to the idea of my running was that he had recently read a study where 28mpw seems to be where bad things can happen. He said that the stud showed every person seemed to have less positive results and more negative results after that mark. And, he didn't even know I ran 30mpw. I thought it quite interesting myself but I'll tell you this.........
Think I'm ever gonna go over 28mpw again if I ever get a regular schedule back on these feet?? NO WAY!! (And, no I'm not kidding)
Just food for thought. (P.S. I was never big on long runs. Overall mileage and speedwork. That's where it's at. Period!)
Randy