the perfect 120-mile week

Why run 18 Sunday AM and go 4 in the evening? Make it a 20-23 miler and nix the PM run.

I saw in other threads your trying to run 2:19. Whats your workouts going to be? What is your current tempo pace? Whats your mileage history for the past 4 years?

The Hanson's runners usually do something like 12-14 am, pm 4-6. Getting tired after 70 minutes is not a good sign, I would suggest getting your 8 mile run to 10-12.

keep it up... whats your pbs?

Why?? wrote:

Why run 18 Sunday AM and go 4 in the evening? Make it a 20-23 miler and nix the PM run.

Why ask why? Leave it at 18, and hit a 22 miler every third week.

I like his plan.

Yeah, I will do some 22-milers during the last 3 months before a fall marathon. I don't like to run over 2 hours all year round; only during the marathon buildup. And I am planning to just run one marathon per year. For the next two years I am periodizing like this:

November - April: base training. main workouts are hills, threshold, and fast distance. cross-country and half-marathon races.

May - early June: run only 90-95 mpw, run 5k/10k track workouts and races.

mid June - October: marathon buildup

Oh, and I will always do that 4-mile shakeout on Sunday afternoon, whether I ran 18 or 23 in the morning. I like malmo's philosophy: double all the time.

Last 4 years: 55 mpw in 2004-05, 70 in 2005-06 and 2006-07, this fall I started doing 70-85 per week in singles and by December I was doing 90-110 in doubles.

PRs: unfortunately they suck (low 15/low 32/low 71), but to be fair I haven't run in a time-trial type race since 2005 (didn't race track or road in 2006 or 07). I beat a pack of five low-31 guys in a 10k a couple weeks ago, by :20-:40. Not saying that's the same as being a low-31 guy myself, but it convinced me that my fitness is at a 14:50/31:00 level (if that doesn't convince any of you that's fine; I'm trying to prove I can run 2:19, not prove I can run 5k/10k times that aren't even that good for a girl).

Oh, you have some other questions. Don't know what my current tempo pace is. In March I was hitting 5:20's for 6-milers and that was comfortable. But I've had some altitude training and speedwork since then so I'm guessing I could hit 5:15's now.

When I say I get tired after 70 minutes it's more in the context of the week (it's dark outside; end of a hard day of working/studying; it's the day between two hard workouts, etc.) On Sundays I run for 2 hours and often 70 minutes is when I start to feel good rather than bad.

Workouts I do: all kinds of stuff. Threshold, hill reps, hilly tempos, fartlek, marathon pace runs, intervals at 5k pace, 400s at mile pace.

I usually did a 105 mi week for many years, but for a one month period I did a genius-plan 140 per week. It took plave on a "vacation" to Maryland in August to in-laws--her parents and demonic family. What the genius part was that I got up every morning at about seven, grabbed a banana or something and a bottle of water and hit the road. Ran along some sort of back roads out to the country to some lake and resort area--ten miles. grabbed a snack, got a swim in the lake, girl-watched and lolligagged for a bit, then grabbed a bottle of water and headed back to the in-laws dark abode.

By then it was just after lunch and the family had all eaten and gone their separate ways. Hardly saw hide or hair or fang of them at all.

By gad running duties can work wonders for interfamily relations.

I'm kind of in the same boat, low 32's 10k guy trying to get serious, bump up mileage and go for a good marathon debut this fall. You basically described the exact same yearly schedule that I had come up with. I like the weekly schedule too, what fall marathon are you building up for?

how did you break it down when you did 90-110 mpw?

My 105-110 mile week is the same structure as my 120-mile week, only I cut some or all of the runs short by 1 mile.

That doesn't sound like much of a difference, but it really helped me survive in January when I was getting used to the volume. Running 12 instead of 13 on Wednesday, doing 7 instead of 8 on Monday or Friday, or even doing 4 instead of 5 on the secondary runs helps me feel a lot better rested.

A slightly reduced schedule like that also helped me in April when I was living at altitude. I went through a phase where I did hill surges, fartlek, and/or steady progressions with a good chunk at threshold pace pretty much every day (sometimes twice per day). When running at altitude, esp. over steep hills, even hard efforts produce rather slow paces, so it's possible to put in daily hard efforts without beating up the legs/body too much. Don't know if any of the science supports that idea but I found it to be the case for me. However, when doing that kind of quality I was a lot more comfortable running only 105-110 per week.

For a week in the 90's I cut everything in the 120/week schedule by 20%. That is every 3rd or 4th week during most of the year, for recovery purposes. During the racing part of the track season (3-6 weeks) I do that every week; so I can maintain my endurance but still get the springy feeling of doing low mileage that helps me run good races and interval sessions. It's good to be at the point where a 96-mile week feels like a joke, because it means I get the best of both worlds (endurance benefits of reasonably high mileage, but also the freshness benefits of what feels like low mileage).

13 miles for each of your workout days is fine if you're doing long sessions (6xmile with jogs and a 3mile warmup and cooldown, 8mi tempo with 2.5wu/cd) in winter but once you're doing shorter, more intense track sessions (totalling, say, 3 miles), don't be a slave to the numbers running huge warmups and cooldowns just for the sake of getting 13 miles in. If you really want the mile totals on those days, add a little onto the AM runs, say 6-7 instead of 5.

I think having 1-2 days (like you have) where you run don't run over an hour in either run is a very good idea, keeps you fresh, I've worked well to a system like this.

That's a good point; thanks. I do feel a little silly doing 5-6 mile cool-downs after my track sessions. I should be taking the opportunity to get in an extra 8-miler on those mornings, which will be way better for my fitness.

Why should you feel silly? Malmo gave the plan his blessing and you're going to listen to some schmo's advice.

Coming from another schmo, long cooldowns are a great way to build strength and maintain your mileage. I wouldn't change your plan at all.

this is what I did and it worked well for me

M 10

T 13, 4

W 13, 4

T 18, 4

F 13, 4

S 13, 4

S 20

I know its repetitive but there is something easy about doing something similar each day. On my 90 minute runs I used to break it up into 30 minute section. First 30 easy (7min or so) , second 30 at normal pace (630 or so) last 30 picking it up (615 to 6 minute with last one or two miles fast.

I actually used to always feel bad on monday and that was usually one of the hardest days to run.

This summer I might be aiming for something more like htis

M 10

T 13, 5

W 14, 4

T 18

F 10, 5

S 14, 5

S 20

thats only 118 but I think another easier day (friday) and no 22 mile day might be better

any suggestions

7 days of am: 5, pm: 13. That puts you at 126. Push it hard on the 13 miler every other day. Cut it to 10 instead of 13 a couple days a week if you are feeling rather tired. Combine into an 18 mile long run once a week, sometimes go longer.

Alan

that 18-miler midweek looks brutal man. I can do a 20-mile Wednesday, but it's gotta be split into 14/6. Maybe I could do 15/5. Even 15/8 (the Hansons seem to love that one, during their marathon buildups). 18/4 would be rough for me though.

But again, we are talking about the marathon here, and this is an event that takes endurance. And like I said, I haven't actually raced one yet, so I have no idea if my training is anywhere near sufficient. What are your PBs?

I'm not malmo, or a runner of that quality, but I'm sure malmo would agree with me in saying number chasing isn't everything.

From my own experience and the experiences of the runners I know, long cooldowns are counterproductive in most cases. They don't do a lot for your fitness, and they tire you out more than doing the miles in a morning run or in the warmup would. Something tiring you out isn't the same as something making you strong.

What's more, running long cooldowns on muscles that are tired the way they are after a workout is inviting injury in my opinion - I know myself that my form isn't as good, and it seems like some of the 'shock absorbing' capacity of my muscles is gone. If you have to do it, better to do a long warmup.

which marathon are you running this fall?