Anyone ever try to make a comeback after 12 years off?

I'm presuming you're mid 30s like me. I was mid 16s in the 5k at my best. I haven't run seriously (workouts, >20 mpw) in 14 years and haven't run at all in 5. I'm 25 lbs heavier (and not in a good way). Just started up again in April. Ran one mile all out on treadmill in 7:14. 4 weeks later, ran 22:00 for 5K. Now, 2 weeks later, I'm running sub 7 pace for tempo runs. I fully expect to get down to at least 18 min. Right now I'm building up slowly, only at 20 mpw and no workouts. Plan to get up to 40, then add workouts, probably once a week.

tl;dr: You're a 31 min 10K guy. Of course you can run 17 min 5Ks.

Different sport, but George Foreman quit Boxing for 10 years after he lost to Jimmy Young (he said God told him to stop Boxing and open a church, which he did), got really fat some say 400 pounds, then he decided to come back started training, his first few fights back he was well over 300 around 350 pounds (when he had previously boxed he was about 220-230) he got down to about 250 pounds and became World Champion again.

I took a similar amount of time off, and I'm already running in the 18s for the 5K and mid-30s for the 10K. I recently time-trialled a mile and ran a 4:55 alone on the track. I ran a 27 second 200m that same day on the track off of literally zero speed training.

Been back at running for about 6 months now. Smoke half a pack a day. Still weigh 25lbs more than I did in college.

Ran D1, 1:50 / 3:50 mid-distance guy.

Definitely doable. I never took a straight decade off, but from. My early 20's until my late 30s, I took tons of 6 month breaks and rarely put more than a few consecutive months of good training together, especially after my late 20s.

I had also gone from a college racing weight of 135-140 to as high as 180, without adding muscle.

After I turned 40, I used the masters scene to help motivate myself for a comeback. My weight was in the 160s when I started this iteration of the comeback. Got down to the mid to high 140s and ran sub 15:30 for 5k (which age graded out to be close to my open pr of 14:19), sub 26:00 for 5 miles and won the masters division of the Chicago marathon (in an admittedly seemingly weak year).

Keys for me were weight management, healthful diet, consistent mileage, periodization of my training and finding some people in my fitness range to train with. I think as we age, those are universally necessary.

Also, Former D-1 will hate this, but I follow the principles espoused by Daniels, which I think was a big key for me because of the emphasis on not going harder than you need to go to get the benefit of the workout. Picking your spots of where to push your body and when to save your powder for your next workout is really important as you get older.

Smoove wrote:

Also, Former D-1 will hate this, but I follow the principles espoused by Daniels, which I think was a big key for me because of the emphasis on not going harder than you need to go to get the benefit of the workout. Picking your spots of where to push your body and when to save your powder for your next workout is really important as you get older.

Damn I didn't realize you were so old!

I don't hate Daniels. I'm just not a fan of blind adherence to any particular philosophy without trying new things and I really hate math and formulas when we're dealing with running.

Look up John Trautmann for an inspirational comeback:

http://www.runnersworld.com/newswire/after-shedding-60-pounds-1992-olympian-is-chasing-records-again

Not all that dramatic, but I quit running after 2nd year in college (at 19) having done 15:36 5K and 1:13 half marathon, did some lifting for a few years (no running), then became sedentary, gained 60 lb, started running again when I was around 36, off and on, when I was around 43 I ran 59:50 for 10 miles (20lb heavier than college weight).

Yep, 44 and counting.

There is no blind adherence going on here - it is the adoption of principles rooted in physiology that really hasn't been disproven despite being out there for a long while. And notice that I always talk about the underlying principles or philosophy. The VDOT calculator and related paces are all just tools to help folks implement the underlying principles. People get bogged down on whether he is measuring this pace or that pace properly, but if you read his book, he spends a fair amount of space talking about differing ways of determining your pace for a workout, with VDOT being just one objective way of making. That determination.

I ran in HS/College mid-D and hung them up at 22. Stayed in marginal running shape running 0-10 mpw, playing rec sports (football, basketball, ultimate) and doing a ton of surfing. Put on about 20 lbs. 20 years later, decided to start racing again and got back into shape pretty quickly (6 months to flirt with sub 17, 1 year to be consistently under). Ultimately went 16:20 for 5K and 4:18 for 1500 before hanging them up again. I had as much fun with this as I did trying to go sub 4 in college. Get after it.