Arne Gabius EZ and LR pace: 5:50 min/mi - WHAT????? Never runs slower...

He's not a 13:20 runner. He ran 7:34 - 13:12 - sub 28. That's quite a big difference. And he never ran 1:01. He ran 1:02low. I hate to say it as I really wish everybody well - but I feel like he gets worse with longer distance (7:34 is far better than 1:02:xx in my book).

Pikachu

sry... sent my post too early.

So it seems, his training is better for shorter stuff?!

But we will see in Frankfurt. Should be exciting!

Pikachu wrote:

He's not a 13:20 runner. He ran 7:34 - 13:12 - sub 28. That's quite a big difference. And he never ran 1:01. He ran 1:02low.

You're right. He only ever ran one HM though and that one was in NYC which is not necessarily the easiest race (hills, wind, time change from Europe etc.) also early in the season.

Pikachu wrote:

He's not a 13:20 runner. He ran 7:34 - 13:12 - sub 28. That's quite a big difference. And he never ran 1:01. He ran 1:02low. I hate to say it as I really wish everybody well - but I feel like he gets worse with longer distance (7:34 is far better than 1:02:xx in my book).

Pikachu

2:09:32. I would argue that lines up perfectly with his other PRs. But to do that in his first Marathon is impressive.

GermanGuy2 wrote:

2:09:32. I would argue that lines up perfectly with his other PRs. But to do that in his first Marathon is impressive.

That's really very impressive. Fastest german debut ever; fastest german fpr many, many years; 3rd fastest german ever. For a 5000m specialist and after just 9 weeks preparation.

said88 wrote:

3rd fastest german ever.

4th fastest. But nevertheless very impressive

Hessian wrote:

said88 wrote:

3rd fastest german ever.

4th fastest. But nevertheless very impressive

Thanks, you are right. I forgot how fast Christoph Herle actually has run!

With such a debut even the NR (2:08:47) should be in consideration for him.

crazy, even most Kenyans do the bulk of their running much slower. I've always thought the key to success was to go very easy you completely recover and then balls to the walls in workouts, making every workout count. Gabius makes every run count, getting him used to running within a minute of marathon pace all the time. Wonder if this will work long term.

A German Dude wrote:

Arne Gabius is a 13:20 5000m/1:01 HM runner from Germany who currently trains for the Frankfurt Marathon. He is self coached as far as I understand but advised by Renato Canova.

He posts his training on his homepage and also comments on Facebook. This is his Marathon training (part 1):

http://www.arnegabius.de/downloads/training-35-39-kw-2014.pdf

You will notice that he hardly ever runs slower than 3:40min/km (~ 5:50min/mi), including Long Runs and "easy runs". He doesn't do "recovery runs", that's what a massage is for.

On facebook he commented about this: he argues that if he runs slower then his legs will feel "dead" the next day, because it isn't his natural stride anymore.

Apparently, Canova told him that's a valid point.

Wa? Canova has posted on these boards his own physiological justification for he recovery function of SLOW recovery runs. He didn't make exception for the Kenyan elites he coaches. However I think if running slow hurts, try going for long walks. Helps biomechanics and structure strength and may have a minor recovery purpose, beside being good for the soul--smell the roses. PaAvo nurmi is purported to have done long walks.

Edward Teach wrote:

I've always thought the key to success was to go very easy you completely recover and then balls to the walls in workouts, making every workout count. Gabius makes every run count, getting him used to running within a minute of marathon pace all the time.

There do seem to be conflicting philosophies on these approaches. Guys such as Ron Clarke and Derek Clayton ran most days moderately hard with relatively little specific work. Gabius is already into his 30s and has had a long career so he seems to have no problem about recovery with this type of training. Every athlete seems to respond to different training approaches but one possible problem for some with the "run hard workouts and just do recovery jogs in between" is that you may not be developing yourself as well aerobically and the slow recovery days may be "wasted" training days.

no "Wa?" needed. Canova did not contradict himself as he says to go slow, but not too slow: For every event we have different speeds of REGENERATION, but normally the right speed is about 60-70 % of the speed of the Threshold. So, in case of a top Marathon runner, having a Threshold about 2:48 per km, we can speak of Regeneration when he runs slower than 3'40" / 3'45". In this case, 3'45" or 5' have the same effect, but many times running too slowly provokes mechanical problems.Instead, for a good 800m runner (1'44") coming from 400m, and having a Threshold of 18 km/h (3'20" per km), Rigeneration is running slower than 4'10" / 4'20", but, because the biomechanical difference between the speed of the race (13" every 100m) and the speed of regeneration is very evident, sometimes is better to use other systems (pool, sauna or other situations not involving wrong running technique).Read more: http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=2959804&page=0#ixzz3HHc2A5jl

slow but not too slow wrote:

sometimes is better to use other systems (pool, sauna or other situations not involving wrong running technique).

I love Canova but what's taking a sauna going to do for your running?

Run on the spot at maximum heat until you pass out.

GermanGuy2 wrote:

Pikachu wrote:

He's not a 13:20 runner. He ran 7:34 - 13:12 - sub 28. That's quite a big difference. And he never ran 1:01. He ran 1:02low. I hate to say it as I really wish everybody well - but I feel like he gets worse with longer distance (7:34 is far better than 1:02:xx in my book).

Pikachu

2:09:32. I would argue that lines up perfectly with his other PRs. But to do that in his first Marathon is impressive.

Yeah, VERY good debut... 2:09:xx for the first marathon is insane. Looked after him - he seems pretty new to longer distances... Congrats for that monster performance!!

When I read the interpretation of my training phylosophy, analyzing the programmes my atlete REALLY carried out, I smile.

The most important point of my training philosophy is the INDIVIDUALIZATION.

I never prepare training plans longer than 2 weeks. This because a coach is like a taylor who has to make a good cloth, and for doing this the first step is to MEASURE the client, analyzing his body.

Following this idea, the first step is TO ANALYZE THE ATHLETE : his morphology, his specific attitude, his career, his mentality, his motivation, his running technique, his previous adaptation.

Only after this first step I provide for making a plan OF TWO WEEKS, because every plan has to produce some variation in the body and in the mind of the athlete, AND I HAVE TO BUILD THE NEXT PLAN STARTING FROM THE REAL SITUATION at the moment.

This means that every athlete is ALWAYS in the first day of his training plan.

This means that IS THE PROGRAM FOLLOWING THE ATHLETE, NOT THE ATHLETE FOLLOWING THE PROGRAM.

In many cases, training is HOW TO FACE SOME EMERGENCY. For example, in 2011, before WCh, Abel Kirui had 17 days off training (including some day with 30’ easy jogging only) during the last 41 days, because he had a problem in one knee, and in my opinion the only way for being competitive was to carry out some tough specific training (long and fast run, several times with variations of speed, NEVER SHORTER THAN 24 KM and frequently LONGER THAN 32 km) alternating with total resting days, for having therapies twice per day without stressing the body with some activity useless under metabolic point of view.

Of course, THIS WAS AN EMERGENCY, and to try to deduce my training philosophy from what Abel did is not possible (or can bring to some big mistake).

Coming to Arne, the analysis before to prepare his training plan was as follows :

1. Athlete 33 years old

2. Career 16 years long (he started in 1999 running 5000m in 14’26”)

3. Athlete with good PB on track, reaching his best results during the last two years, when already changed his type of training becoming “more Kenyan” : 7’35”43 (3000m) and 13’13”43 (5000m) in 2012 (with an ecceptional 8’10”78 indoor in 2 Miles), 13’12”50 in 2013, and in 2014, in spite to look at longer distances (HM in 62’09” on 16th March), his PB in 1500m (3’41”17 on 7th June), meaning that his speed was still at the top

4. Starting the real preparation for the Marathon after a full track season, including 2 competitions of 1500m, 3 of 3000m, 7 of 5000m, 1 of 10000m and one HM (last competition on 21st August in Stockholm, 13’31”91).

With these previous situation, we had only 9 weeks before the Marathon.

The technical goal was to try to maintain what he already had (a high level of Aerobic Power), growing under the side of long endurance.

The first choice was to have all the training at sea level : there was no time for going altitude again (that in my opinion is not something so important for the last part of training, for a marathon), because Arne could not spend some time with the adaptation.

Technically speaking, the goals were essentially two :

1. To adapt his body to stay long time “on his legs” (training for the body structures)

2. To extend his specific endurance at a well identified pace

We decided to start with a target of 3’06” per km, for a final time of 2:10’50”, looking at possible arrangements according to the training’s results.

In order to adapt the body structures, we planned the first 4 weeks looking essentially at volume at middle intensity.

Supposing 3’06” (18”6 every 100m) as 100% of speed, middle intensity is the speed about 80% (in my way of calculation, 18”6 x 2 = 37”2 is 20%, so 80% is 3’06” + 37” = 3’43”). This means the most part of volume was at a pace of 3’40” `` 3’45” per km.

But at the same time, we needed to put in his training some session of specific speed, in order not to lose the aerobic power he already had.

Also, we decided to have workouts in direction of specific endurance with good frequency, ready to open the recovery only if the body could give signals of overtraining.

Here you can see the workouts from 10th September (after 3 weeks of big volume at intensity 80%) :

Wed, 10.09

5 x 5 km (rec. 3’ jogging) in : 15’37” – 15’12” – 15’04” – 15’05” – 15’10”

Sat, 13.09 (Special block, 53 km in the day)

a) 1 hr 26’ at 3’35” / km (24 km)

b) 30’ at 3’20” (9 km) + 4 x 5000m (rec. 3’ jogging) in : 15’30” – 15’16” – 15’22” – 15’40”

Tue, 16.09

10 x 1000m on track in 2’48” %%< 2’49” (rec. 400m in 2’)

Sun, 21.09

Competition of 10 Miles in Amsterdam (Dam to Dam) in 46’59” (2’55” per km)

Tue, 23.09 (Mixed special block, 45 km)

a) 30 km in 1 hr 43’ at 3’26”

b) 20’ warm-up + 5000m (track) in 14’33”

Sat, 27.09 (total 36 km)

a) 30’ at 3’20” + 17 km fartlek (10 times 2’ fast / 1’ moderate + 10 times 1’ fast / 1’ moderate)

b) 10 km in 38’

Sun, 28.09

Competition of 6.4 km (Biberach Cityrun) won with 17’39” (2’45” average)

Tue, 30.09

20’ easy (5 km) + 4 sets of (3000 / 2000 / 1000m, rec. 2’ jogging) recovery among sets 6’ jogging, in :

9’10” / 5’51” / 2’50” – 8’55” / 5’52” / 2’53” – 9’08” / 5’52” / 2’52” – 9’02” / 5’53” / 2’53”

Thu, 2.10 (35 km)

a) 10 km easy

b) 1 hr 11’ progressive (last 10 km from 3’30” till 3’10”)

Fri, 3.10

42 km in 2 hr 32’20”, using easy pace of 4’ per km for 25’ + 5’ at 3’, for every 30’ (it means at the end 5 times 5’ at 3’ inside an easy pace)

Tue, 7.10

30’ at 3’20” (9 km) + 24 km alternating speed every km (2’55” / 3’25”) in 1 hr 16’ (3’10” average)

Sun, 12.10

Competition of 10 km in Berlin (4th in 28’08”) at 95% of effort

Fri, 17.10

30 km with first 20 km at 3’30” and last 10 km in progression till 2’55”

Mon, 20.10

1 hr fartlek (4 times 3’ fast / 2’ moderate + 5 times 2’ fast / 1’30” moderate + 6 times 1’ fast / 1’ moderate + 11 times 30” fast / 30” easy) for a total of 18.9 km

How it’s possible to see, approaching the race we decided to have more recovery, while during the period of September there were more session of specific marathon speed-endurance, since Arne had to use in the most aggressive way th short time at his disposal for preparing the race.

After the 10 km of Berlin, looking at his feeling, we decided he could run a little bit faster (starting at 3’05” with the possibility to run at 3’04” at the end), and he was perfect in the interpretation of the competition.

I think Arne can look for running under 2:08’ in 2015, because has a great feeling with his body, great personal maturity, and very good knowledge of physiology due to his studies : an athlete and a person like him can always produce big joy and satisfaction for somebody with the fortune to collaborate with him.

Hey German dude, what are some key points taken away from this interview with Arne post-race in Frankfurt?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ci5aFEqNsk

Was he running alone most of the race?

Would be interesting to find out how he felt in the latter stages and if he felt he could go faster in the future.

If he starts running 2:07s, he can be on the podium in many of the big marathons.

Wow

I listened to the first half of the interview and I didn't catch a great deal of content there other than that the conditions and organization and so forth were all great, that he felt good and was hitting his pace, and that, I think, it got challenging somewhere after 30k. Regardless, fine debut on his part and excellent job by Renato coaching him and letting us know the training in such detail. It is always an exercise to figure out what the km pace means in minutes per mile, but I get reasonably close by starting from the fact that 3:20/k=5:20/M. Basically, there is a reasonable pace on easy and long runs, a pace not particularly fast for a 13:12 5000m runner (that's close to 4:15/M, so he's doing easy pace at 5k pace + 95 seconds/M or roughly 1/4 to 1/3 slower than 5k pace, which is roughly like a 16 minute 5k runner (5:07ish) running 6:40-7:00 pace easy, about normal. The key to the training, however, seems to be high total volume in long reps at marathon pace or a bit faster.

fast debut wrote:

Hey German dude, what are some key points taken away from this interview with Arne post-race in Frankfurt?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ci5aFEqNsk

Was he running alone most of the race?

Would be interesting to find out how he felt in the latter stages and if he felt he could go faster in the future.

If he starts running 2:07s, he can be on the podium in many of the big marathons.

Not a German dude, but I think he says he had 3 pacers plus a group to run with and goes on for a while at what a great job they did. He says he got advice from marathoners such as Grete Waltz on how to feel/run at 25, 30, 35 km. When asked if he would be a track runner or marathon runner he just replied "long distance runner" / heart still lies in the track. He wants to go on vacation to Florida and take two weeks off. Anways I missed some in there including his coach Dieter Baumann's comments about what his focus will probably be.