RE: I had to stop and tie my shoe laces during my long run. How much fitness did I lose?

I don't wish that on my worst enemy. You should shut the season down now because it happens again your running career is toast.

If you are able to come back from this you should write a book and have the brojos will promote it.

How long did you stop for approx?

Lol - you lost some aerobic fitness, but this was offset by the amount of anaerobic fitness you gained.

Yeah, I hate to join the others in sharing the obvious truth, but I think your season is over, if not your running career. Perhaps you can take up wheelchair racing, where tying shoes won't hinder your ability as much.

What I need to know, as far as my own training is concerned, is that I recently held my breath (between breaths) during a Olympic-level 10,000-metre race. How much fitness did I lose? Please, I need to know.

To the OP: my apologies for pilfering this thread; I understand and appreciate that yours is a more serious situation than mine.

Sorry, I don't mean to derail your questions, but I recently step on a little pebble that slightly caused my foot strike to change, a slight pronation of 0.0000001% I would guess, compared to my regular foot strike. How much fitness did I lose?

OMG. woe is me

22 seconds I had to stop (I was doing 11 miles). I could've done it quicker but I first tried tying the darn thing while jogging in place. Thought maybe I'd be able to salvage my career if I could avoid having my HR drop by too much. It ended up dropping by 12bpm. What do you think, is there hope?

BTW, should I include those 22 seconds when I record my average pace and time in my journal? 6:55/mile if yes, 6:53 if not

A 12bpm drop? Are you kidding? I really hate to be such a Negative Nelly, but I've never, ever, heard of ANYONE overcoming that. But you might pull through, if the stars all align for you. I mean really, who's to say?

As far as average pace in your training diary: NEVER, EVER record elapsed time if you're not actually running. That said, running in place, especially while at busy traffic intersections, clearly counts as part of the workout.

I'm sorry about your career loss. Best of luck in the future deciding what to do. I'm in the same sinking boat, alas.

Joggernaut has been brave enough to be honest, your season is done. Don't dwell on it, just learn from it. I lost a season once this way - but never again. Ever since my "lost season", not only do I double knot my laces I also put a strip of duct tape over the laces, completely covering them during my long run. Yeah, sure, a lot of people make fun of me - ridicule me even, call me names etc. I can't pretend that the names don't sometimes hurt, because they do. Mostly it's not even clever - just stuff like "you're and idiot" and "how stupid are you". Anyway, I'm never losing a season that way again. Ever. Ok. Feel free to use my tip for next year.

How can we be expected to answer this question on the limited info provided. For the love of god, please provide your running resume so we can opine appropriately.

Thanks for the encouragement, Duct Tape. As we're beginning to see, there are so many of us suffering from these drops in fitness and loss of our running careers, for seemingly insignificant reasons.

Hopefully we can all learn from our past blunders, as you clearly have, and may we share such wisdom as we continue to heal.

PS: I'm sorry about the name-calling; you're clearly a strong individual for persevering during such trying times. Best of luck to you as well...

94%. But it only lasts for 11 milliseconds.

You got off easy. My last long run was interrupted by a case of the runs. Lucky for me, I was able to make it to a bathroom. However, instead of ruminating over the potential lost fitness, I made the best of the situation and turned the long run into an interval run with a long rest. Just like that, I salvaged my season and even got an extra quality workout in for the week. I expect to PR at my next race now.

Lydiard said that a break of more than 10s during a long run stopped capillary development dead in its tracks.

GastroIntestinal Distress wrote:

You got off easy. My last long run was interrupted by a case of the runs. Lucky for me, I was able to make it to a bathroom. However, instead of ruminating over the potential lost fitness, I made the best of the situation and turned the long run into an interval run with a long rest. Just like that, I salvaged my season and even got an extra quality workout in for the week. I expect to PR at my next race now.

The extra abdominal work no doubt helped with your core strength.