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Nice fast long run by DR this past weekend.
It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.
Yes, it did go rather well considering the belligerent breeze that besieged all three northbound segments (i.e., half the run). Back over the summer when I first started getting my steady states to average <6:30/mi, it was my ambition that my aerobic threshold would be <6:20/mi by the late fall --- so I feel like I'm right on track.
Saturday's run might've been a bit too satisfying, however, because it's given way to a stretch of undedicated days. I was OK with taking Sunday off, as my legs really needed a rest. But then I ran a mile less than intended on Monday because I couldn't get it going before 5 a.m. Then yesterday was a fairly unintended day off --- first because I didn't want to deal with the icy cold rain in the morning, and then because I got home late and lost all motivation (I didn't even do the elliptical alternative I'd considered). I'd hoped to get back on track with a run this morning, but staying up until midnight, plus the threat of a freezing cold morning, ruled that out. I'll have no excuse not to run this evening, of course. And then the really important thing this week will be to make it the track tomorrow evening for the final 5k workout.
P.S. Perry has had a curious habit lately of logging one day before he logs a previous day. This always creates suspense over whether or not the streak endures.
I did see Crystal briefly last night at the track (though I could've snuck right past her in the dim twilight, as I was running incognito with my sweatshirt hood up), but she was out of there by 5:30 p.m. Meanwhile Perry was pubbing (or at least running in the general vicinity of the Pub), Joe was perhaps at home attempting desperate resuscitation efforts on his dying Forerunner, and Phil might've been far off wandering the woods of Noland. Thus, with the exception of a mother and son who were walking and jogging around the track for awhile early on, I ended up having it all to myself for my 1600s set. I must say that I became rather forlorn upon thinking back to this time one year ago, when my 3200 - 1600 - 800 set (also in preparation for Jingle Bell) was attended by a veritable track party featuring Perry, Crystal, Joe, Phil, and even some surprise guests (namely that girl from the rowing team who teamed up with Phil to shame me in the final lap of my 800 interval). My 3200 (in which I strived to break 11:00 but ended up with 11:05) was of course the main event, and amidst this Joe ran alternating 400m intervals (before running all of the final 2 laps, I believe) whilst Perry was the lead off and Phil the anchor of their 2 X 1600 relay (except Phil wasted the 5-second lead --- 5:21 vs. 526 --- that Perry had afforded him and instead waited until I commenced lap 5 of my 3200). And Crystal got in on the excitement, too, by jumping in with a few 100m sprints. It's been quite awhile since so much fun has taken place on that track.
P.S. I didn't finish my detailed logging until very late last night (or very early this morning, I should say).
DR, I think your training plan may call for one or two extra long runs than are necessary. You may want to add a few weeks of just really high consistent volume and give your body a better chance of handling it by not going overboard with too many individual long runs. Gabriel Rosa used to have his athletes run 1:15 every morning and every evening. This duration of a run gives you many of the benefits of long distance running, but stops you before you're likely to suffer much dehydration or fatigue. If you did this once in a while you could probably get 7 miles in the morning and 7 miles in the evening to total 14 miles on a day. Having some weeks where you did more daily workouts like this to get a consistently high volume would make your body a lot stronger without so many highs and lows in wear and tear. I'd recommend something more like:
Mini Cycle 1
Week 1
off
easy
1:15/1:15
workout
long between 2:00 and 3:00, never over 3:30, and better if closer to 2:00
Week 2
steady of duration between 1:30 and 2:00 (NEVER LONGER)
You would likely get 70-80 miles per week easily with that schedule structure, even with the day off. This isn't even very different from your suggested schedule, but puts more of an emphasis on consistent weekly mileage.
Yeah, upon looking at my schedule draft again, something has got to go. Three steady state long runs and a half-marathon time trial is starting to seem too excessive. So I should probably reduce the SSs to 2 --- perhaps 16 and 19 rather than 16, 18, and 20. And I definitely ought to break up that long streak of significant weekends with a relatively easy weekend or two mixed in. I have actually considered the option of doubling on both Tuesday and Thursday in a week, which would reduce the necessity of a weekend long run.
MTA: I just made a fairly significant revision.
Joe,
You might enjoy the Hansons vs Pfitz thread in the general racing forums
DR, What's a 3200 - 1600 - 3200 fartlek run?
It will probably be a continuous 8-mile run in which there'll be a 1.5-mile warm up phase, 2 miles at intensity, half-mile recovery, 1 mile at intensity, half-mile recovery, 2 miles at intensity again, and then a half-mile cool down phase. All in all the Fartlek format should serve to make the workout less significant than it would be if translated to a traditional interval set on the track (and this is intentional, as it'll be an early workout in my training cycle --- I don't want to things to get too severe too soon).
So what do I need to do in order to break 3 at LPRM?
I need to start doing some long runs. At this point, its fair enough away from the marathon and I am out of shape enough for the LPRM taht I am not looking for specific long runs, just long runs at jogging pace (9 minutes per mile). From my last marathon cycle I found where I started out of shape, but got to 3:19, those long jogs are a great way of getting back into shape early in the marathon training cycle. As the marathon gets closer, I do think there is a benefit to getting more specific in your training, but early on those getting back into shape long jogs are great to get back endurance. In fact they are probably the quickest way to increase endurance when coming back from being out of shape and they are easy enough on the body you can do them back to back weekends (I am talking like 15 or 16 mile jogs).
I'd say do whatever you did last year --- when you ended up with a 3:06:00 PR --- except do it a bit faster. But I really do think that 2013 could be your year to break 3:00:00, based off your improvements in the 5k, 10k, and 10-miler.
Phil needs to find some consistency. Since moving to VA his running days have typically fallen into isolated bunches --- little islands in a sea of off days. Thus he needs to make sure that he gets in 3-4 running days every week, even if they're brief runs. Just as long as he avoids these regular stretches of off days. Meanwhile I haven't a clue what's going on with Joe. It would seem that he's still sidelined by a foot bone injury.
Like Phil I will be focusing more on ramping up easy volume in my return than I will be on any intensity of workouts.
To break 3 hours you should build up to medium-long runs at a 7 minute pace or so. Do real long runs a bit slower and short workouts a bit faster.
The four main workouts that always worked for me:
-long run
-medium-long steady run
-repeat 5ks
-repeat miles
Also total weekly volume has to be over 70 miles in my opinion, but I think Perry will do that without any trouble.
My foot is 95% healed if I do say so myself. The only remaining problem is how a bone heals. When bones heal they send a bunch of material to the area and the result is the spot heals to a slightly larger volume than before. So instead of just fixing the inside of the fracture my bone has also gotten a little thicker in the surrounding area. This would hardly be noticed in the middle of an arm or a leg, but the spot here is on the bottom of my foot, so during foot contact with the ground I can feel foot rolling over the spot. This makes it so that during ground contact I'm more acutely pressing on that spot of my foot rather than rolling smoothly through. So, although it has healed, it has done so in such a way that emphasizes my ground contact in that same spot. I do not find this ideal, so I waited a while longer, but at this point I think I should be able to roll right over that bump without much danger to the old fracture. I'll probably return to running at the end of this week. LPRM will be my clear target.
Both plans have their merits. I'm a bigger fan of the Hansons methodology because it's less likely to injure runners, easier to accumulate total weekly volume, and more repeatable. The Hansons way allows a runner to train pretty evenly over the entire year. The Pfitzinger plans rely a little more on periodization. I think some of the Pfitz workouts are fairly epic to undertake and could yield big results, but they are also more likely to cause injury.
I think both plans equal out when in the 60 or 70 mile range. The question I'd ask is what happens in mileage rangers higher than that? I think the Pfitz plan begins to become a little ridiculous, as some of the workouts become gargantuan. The Hansons approach would more easily absorb the mileage into the weekly easy runs while the Pfitz plan would absorb them largely into the workouts. The Hansons runner would probably be less fatigued, adapt to the load with less strain, and consequently get more return on their investment.
I have a daring design to attempt to amass close to 350 miles in January (the vast majority of which, of course, would be easy and/or aerobic mileage), but then be less concerned about mileage come February.