50+ Weekly Training Thread

well, I will be joining this thread now that I am big 50.

Jan 30th, 1960

this weeks training

2 days

tuesday 1 hr supplemental training

thursday 1 hr supplemental training plus 5k on treadmill in 23min's

total wks milage 3 miles

have taken two months off basically enjoying the holidays, hope to start running program soon.

well, I will be joining this thread now that I am big 50.

Jan 30th, 1960

this weeks training

2 days

tuesday 1 hr supplemental training

thursday 1 hr supplemental training plus 5k on treadmill in 23min's

total wks milage 3 miles

have taken two months off basically enjoying the holidays, hope to start running program soon.

29 miles for the week plus 2 sessions on the glide totaling 65 minutes. The hard ones were;

Tues- 12x400 @78-79 with 45 sec rec., and 3 min break after 6.

Fri- 9 total minutes of hill reps between 60- 90 sec long.

I use the Younger Legs site quite a lot. The Plantar exercises are one of the reasons I can now even think of running shorter stuff on the track. If I have a problem with something, it is the first place I look! Pete knows his stuff and is constantly researching for new and better info!

I like the age grading, as I think it lets you compare your own races as you yourself age. It is all in fun. When I was in the early 40s, I thought that it gave you a bit of a break as you got older. Now that I'm older (55)I'm enjoying that bit of an advantage and will hopefully continue to do so! I guess that is one of the perks for being able to last out!

No runs;5 hours X-C skiing on 2 outings.

Taxes are turned in so I'll find some better training time in the weeks ahead.

Age graded; 2007 a 10K in 38:54 @56 and 2006 a 1/2 marathon in 1:24:14@55. Both ranked low 80's by the WAVA table in my old log.

SoCalPete is a huge inspiration. Great training info and I believe he consistently submits the best posts on letsrun.

Drill baby, drill.

AK-51; Hope that knee keeps coming along.

Our 15YO neighbor kid skated 4K sub 10 yesterday. Headed him for the JO's out in ME.

Good week to all.

Managed 42 miles on 5 days running this week. Started easy, worked the middle of the week harder, and finished with a 13 mile run yesterday. Ran a 10k tempo run at 6:33 pace on Tuesday (actually, it was mostly slower pace than that, but I threw in a 5:40 mile in the middle of the run, which brought the average pace down quite a bit). Wednesday was hills again, and the workouts are starting to pay dividends. These past two weeks, we've run faster reps with less recovery, and I felt less tired at the end. So that's exciting. Thursday, ran a progressive 7 mile run starting at 7:30 and working down :10/mile each mile.

Because I had such a long hiatus from running, my times are still coming down, but at 50+ I know that I'm swimming against the tide and will eventually (probably sooner than later) peak out in an absolute sense. Age-grading seems to me the only fair measure to evaluate your personal running fitness. You can only control the things you can control (tautology alert)...and, while we may be able to "tweak" many things a bit in our favor through diet and exercise, unfortunately nature just doesn't seem willing to cede life's basic parameters.

I had a knee scare last Sunday and stopped that run at 6, so I took Monday and Tuesday off. But when I got back going on Wednesday, I had no knee issue, and it's been good since. 44 miles for the five days, including a 15 miler yesterday. But that meant no speed for the week.

Here in NY the storm was just to the south of us; we had zero precipitation.

As to age-grading, I use it. (It's automatically calculated in NYRR results.) Allows me to keep some perspective. My highest was in the 86s.

Good week

M- 7 miles run

T- Bike 20 to ansd from work

w- 800 hard-5 bodyweight exercises, 800m

5 bw exercises, 800 hard

th- 3 miles in 18:11

Fr-10 miles in 74 minutes

St- bike -group ride-40+miles- Ug- Tired

Su- 300 pushups

Also for week 1200 pushups-300 pull/chinups, 400 atlas situps- light bw squats, 300 dips, 300 atlas IIIs pushups.

Isometrics through out week.

High school track starts tomorrow, as head coach things get a little busier, we usually get about 170 kids out, will be good to see the distance kids again, have not seen them since CC.

Monty

Lower mileage this week, cutting back from 94 last week. But it was harder...Monday 8 easy Tues: 11 with 6 x 1 mile Wed: 10 easy Thurs: 10 with 2 x 4 miles Fri: 6 easy Sat: 10 hard Sunday 25 progression run. Total: 81. All hard sessions are faster now that only my Achilles is slightly tweaked. I'm re-learning how to run again...Man, is it tough and painful! Like rlb, I go to Pete's site often, as he has a great drills video which I bastardize and take full responsiblity if I get injured. Also, some of his articles on the daily section are really good. Since I was never a track runner, some of the track stuff is like Greek to me, but rlb helps me understand on Tuesdays when he's jogging around the track at about the same pace that I'm doing my mile repeats...

Age grading is the greatest thing since sliced bread for a 56 year old guy like me. In my training group, I am the slowest and also the oldest. They pity an old man, but it keeps me honest. On the 2 x 4 workouts, they give me a 2 minute headstart on each 4 mile section, and then try to mow me down. I run like a scared rabbit and try to hold them off for as long as possible. It's fun for all of us. After races, I always tell them how, age-graded, I kicked their butts, even though I finished in a different time zone than they did. Years ago, I could beat most of them straight up, but now I have to go to the age grade card every single time.

Mon -55min windtrainer session.

Tue -2.5hr hike with full pack. Kyak session. 10k hilly trail run (2 laps) 26m/23.45.

Wed - 70min steep trail ride (mtb)with 30min climb.

Thu -70min steep trail run.

Sat -30mins kyak, 85mins mtb, 60mins easy trail run.

Sun -1hr 46m run mostly trails, some decent hills.

Also a big fan of YL. I do check age graded tables from time to time just to see what is realistic for me.

Monday: planned off

Tuesday evening: 8 (4x1 mile at 10K race pace)

Wednesday: planned off

Thursday evening: 8.2 (6 mile tempo slightly slower than half-marathon race pace)

Friday: planned off

Saturday morning: 15.3

Sunday afternoon: 10 (8 at marathon race pace)

total: 41.5

Today marks 12 weeks out from the Eau Claire Marathon I am training for, and I did an easier week after a couple hard ones, transitioning from base mode to marathon mode (I'll be gradually lengthening my Saturday long runs and a weekly long tempo run, peaking on the tempo run at 15 miles a couple weeks out from the marathon).

I checked my age graded time for my marathon last year, and it was no great shakes (around 3:20). Hopefully I'll improve that significantly this year.

Saints 41

Colts 24

That's what I'm rooting for, anyway.

sun. 7 easy

mon. 0

tue. 7 easy

wed. 2.5 easy/2.5 @17:30

thur. 0

fri. 5 hard, rained out 2nd half of run

sat. 20x400 in 90, 8

tot. 32

i check age graded once in a while. it's encouraging.

My butt is slowly hurting less, but after my overly optimistic weekend last week ( 10k trail race in spikes and a 14 mi. long run), my runs early this week were so painful that I wanted to cry or vomit - or both. I stuck to the soft stuff this week and it seems to be improving and I've been good about stretching and icing (and also torturing myself with a baseball massage).

Next weekend is xc nationals in Spokane and I am not ready. Right now, I think there's only 2 women entered in my group - but the other one is quite good and of course, Carmen may still enter. I could get last!

Only one "fast"ish workout this week - when I had to run in the dark and rain and my butt was hurting. I did fartlek partly to take my mind off the pain and to change up my stride.

As far as AG, I do think that there really isn't enough data for the older women and that, in general, the performances in the over 50 (and especially the way over 50 crowd) are ranked too highly. (I am sure to get crucified for that remark!) The numbers are growing for the over 50s (this year's club championships had just as many 50s as the 40s and 45s), so eventually I think the data will be better.

As an open runner, my best times were in the 85-86%. Right now, I generally hit the low 80s (80-82s), which makes sense as I'm NOT as fit as I was (even relatively speaking) when I set my PRs. Occasionally, I'll drop into the 78s, but that's only in cross country and apparently there is no adjustment for that (even though xc is almost always slower for everyone than roads or track).

44 miles on 6 runs this week. I started looking at age grading in my mid 40s. Most of my races then were in the neighborhood of 78% efforts. In my 50s I started getting into the 80% level. After 55 I hit some 82% level races, and now at 60 it looks like I am in the 84-85% range. So, even though my times are a bit slower, I feel like I'm improving relative to my peers.

This was a normal week up until Snowmaggedon in the Washington area this weekend. I was going to sneak in some extra miles Friday morning, but needed to make that grocery store run Friday morning so I stuck with the usual 4. I got what I needed, but the shelves were pretty bare. Anyway, only 20 miles and then Saturday and Sunday were 35 minutes on the Schwinn Airdyne and shoveling the two feet of white stuff. Lots of upper body work!

It's probably all for the better as I would be getting antsy to start the harder stuff earlier than I really should. I'll still be on on the bike tomorrow morning as they have yet to plow our neighborhood. Once the plows come through, I'll give running a try.

32 miles this week. I am able to run on my sore achilles and even did a 5X 800m indoor track workout. I have been doing nearly 2 months of physical therapy using something called postural restoration as I have imbalances going back 25+ years. It is working great. Seems my left glute medius was extremely weak, and I use the TFL on that side rather than the hip flexor (as well as other problems). I feel much stronger and level while I run and as my body adjusts. Great stuff. I have tried nearly everything else I could find and nothing else has helped me before. Can't wait to see what will happen as I get more mileage in.

I find the age-graded tables interesting for comparative purposes after a race.

I suffer from severe seasonal allergies, especially in the spring, but normally winter is a great time for me to run, and Nov/Dec this season were great. Unfortunately, with the unseasonable El Nino this year in the NW, we have had exceptionally warm weather since Christmas, and my health has deteriorated to where my 50-70 miles has become a sluggish, often painful 20-25, I have had pretty serious bouts of sciatica and back problems, and longer runs make me literally sick. My only hope at this point is to somehow relocate for a period of time to east of the Cascades, or elsewhere. I'm working on that.

My best AG scores were in the 88% bracket in my mid-late 40's, and at 49 I ran an indoor 2:12 800 time trial with none other than our famous Tony Young, for about an 87%. Needless to say, I was looking forward to busting into the 90's at 50+, since up to then I had slowed rather "slowly", but the best laid plans....

98 miles for the week capped by a 20+ miler on Sunday and some faster work on Saturday.

I check out the YL site several times a week, but haven't checked out any age grading tables since going through a lengthy stale period.

Another tough week with only 17 miles in 4 days. Busy week and mentally tired of winter. Will try running more in mornings. I haven't looked at Age graded times for awhile. Even those are slower than I'ld like. I do read Younger Legs... I try and follow Pete's advice but its tough to do drills during Minnsota weathers. Let's hope for an early spring!

another good week for me, with a bit over 70 miles in six days, all on a thin layer of snow over solid ice, variously on real trails, rail-to-trails, and golf course. my big workout was a 22.5-miler with the first 18 done as a progression run, with the last 4.5-mile loop at marathonish pace, which i expect would have been much faster given some actual ground for my shoes to latch onto midstride. i also did a 12.5-mile progression run later in the week, which started out just as a push-the-short-golf-course-hills run, but i felt better and just picked it up.

now it's time to taper a bit for a trail marathon in two weeks, although i'll be sure to hit some hills, since the race includes four hills with 800-1000' elevation gain each.

indeed, pete has put together a wonderful site. muddy girl, you won't hear any bashing of your comments from me, as i agree. although i seldom race on roads, i usually age grade in the low-to-mid-80% range, but surely don't consider myself national or even regional class; i don't even stand out all that much locally. there are two masters women (one just a year younger than me) who i can't get close to at any distance, on any terrain, although off the track i'll likely take my age group reliably once april (and 50) rolls around -- for a year, anyway.