OTQ marathon training advice

You say you are not a troll,but I doubt it. "Cruise 1.11-1.12 at half in training? Hahaha!

Anyway, a runner with that very good talent just have to find a magic wizard coach to show him how to improve.

Is there any magic coach you come to think about? Just contact him if you are for real . Easy done on 80 mpw!

2.22 within a year, 2.18 in two!

Thanks wizard not a troll... I promise.

I’m sort of an odd duck. I have a reasonable aerobic base from cycling so I have transitioned to running and 1:12 half is really honestly comfortable.

I ran a 1:11:30 and 1:12:30 last fall both under control ..... but I lack much more speed to believe i can run 2:19 ever. I went through the half at Chicago this year in 1:11:30 and was definitely way over my head and had to back it off...for fear i would be walking around mile 18 if I wasn’t careful.

I cruised In at 2:26 so I’m far from being able to run 2:19 .....but very curious if I spent the next 2 years working on it how close I could get? I’d be be very happy just getting close..... I felt pretty good at 1:11:30 but wasn’t quite fit enough yet to continue that crusade. I think 2:24 was possible in Chicago with better pacing and lower temperatures.

In all seriousness curious what avacados number did on the uphill treadmill runs?

Pace,time,grade...heart rate?

3 months post Chicago I've been doing about 75-120 minutes....every day mostly Cross training or treadmill.

I'd say around 70mpw in effort, but a few weeks significantly more. Lots of Nordic skiing. I'm getting back to actual running slowly now and am going to spend the next 2-3 months getting my mileage running back to 10-12 hours per week I estimate 12 hours of running regardless of treadmill or road to be around 100+. My heartrate running 6:30s-7 is around 140bpm so I just mimic that on the treadmill.

Most of this is going to be uphill treadmill efforts to lesson the stress and keep me healthy.

Awesome stuff! Glad you re-posted as I missed this thread in the fall, but I am definitely interested in following your journey. I'm over 30 minutes slower than you and this stuff is still amazing for me to read and learn from. So thanks to OP and all the quality posters.

Great post here! I don’t have a coach so I’m always researching and reading. This is one of the few useful threads I’ve came across on let’s run, so thank you guys for the post.

Can’t relate to your super fast times but appreciate the info. Curious on what most runners do in the summer leading up to a fall marathon. I’m a 29 year old woman, running CIM 2018 trying to break 2:50.

6 months of 1-2 hours per day finished.

9 weeks of 90mpw finished(previously I had never run 90 miles in 1 week)

I ran 20 miles yesterday in 2 hours 3 minutes and felt quite good. Probably the first good day since I started.

“ Avocados-number” suggested 120-140 miles and I'm not there yet. Hoping to add some pool running to increase mileage and maybe some cycling.

I also just started doing mile repeats at marathon pace. Hoping to get efficient. My goal is 8-10x1 mile as close to 5:17 feeling smooth before I begin getting ready for a fall marathon.

Otq dreamer wrote:

I also just started doing mile repeats at marathon pace. Hoping to get efficient. My goal is 8-10x1 mile as close to 5:17 feeling smooth before I begin getting ready for a fall marathon.

mile repeats at GMP seems pretty easy. Might that be too easy? Why not get closer to LT pace but do fewer repeats? Couldn't be that hard to run 6x1mi at tempo pace

Have you done any racing since Chicago?

Reed,

I haven’t races since Chicago. I did a dozen xc-ski races which were 1-2 hours each. I’m thinking of doing some of my mile repeats uphill to lesson the impact so I can go harder. Last week I did my first set of mile repeats 6x1 at around 5:10. I think I could drop those to 5 minutes after a few sessions. I was thinking about alternating faster and slower sessions and mixing some uphill 1k efforts for v02.

I feel like I would benefit from some harder efforts, but also fear getting hurt.

I think doing 6x miles at around 5 pace could help I just want to stay healthy. I do wonder if I can replicate that effort uphill and would it achieve the same physiological response?

I’ve been doing some 800m uphills at almost max lately 10x3minutes. This workout feels much harder, but is less abusive. I can alternate this workout with miles every other week?

Also curious if doing 1 hr treadmill efforts on my easy days at 8% grade is better or worse than jogging 1 hour on the roads? It feels harder and I recover quicker.

No one ran 2:26:40 at Chicago last year.

http://results.chicagomarathon.com/2017/?lang=EN_CAP&pid=leaderboard

Check your link again. There were actually TWO who ran 2:26.40.

OP is Sam Krieg.

fyi wrote:

None of the elite runners ran 2:26:40 at Chicago last year.

OP here: 9 months ago I started the thread out of pure curiosity before Chicago. I'm 42 this month so I know realistically this is just an experiment and I just want to try the training. With a 2:26 pr my chances are 1% but doing the workload is achievable.

I've honestly taken the advice given to heart and almost doubled my training volume over the past 6 months. I'm holding around 90mpw which I never thought was possible.

I really just want to try the workload and hopefully absorb the training. I don't have the pedigree or PR's but I'm really just intrigued by the process.

Running the OTQ isn't the actual goal, but doing the training and running a few decent marathons is the plan.

20 years ago in college I knew someone who ran 2:23 and it sounded impossible. Everything about it sounded crazy. I'm only 3:40 minutes away from crazy so that's my first goal.

Thanks for the incredible advice so far. I know there are probably a thousand people thinking about it and only a few hundred will actually pull it off.

I'm so glad this thread is back, I completely forgot about it.

Well, it's been a rough 5 months post CIM. I did exactly what I said I was going to do, which was go out a little faster than my fitness and possibly die. I ran that 1:10:55 half at Altitude and figured I could run about that through the half at CIM and try to hold on or fade a little... well I wen tout in 1:11 low and finished in 2:25 high. It was ok, and I was really happy to have raced liked that and feel the pain of fading again. My training leading up to CIM was a solid 65 miles a week average. I had a few 80 mile weeks, and of course a few lower weeks to bring that average to 65/week avg. I managed to only do one workout a week. On Wednesday, I did a 6-8 mile tempo run depending on how I felt. Being at 5000' I usually ran those around 5:30-5:40 pace, so about threshold effort as suppose to MP being at altitude. Sunday, myself and the group I run with ran a long run of 20-24 miles. No workouts in them or anything fancy like that.

But, after CIM I had some pathetic motivation. I managed to only run 60ish miles a week and not once cracked 70 miles. I attempted to do some "shorter" speed sessions and traveled out to a sea level 5000m to see what I could do. I ran 15:09, so was pretty happy about that, but after that race I lost some more motivation and the mileage dropped. I also felt exhausted, even though I wasn't training much. So I cancelled racing a full marathon and have been pretty pathetic lately. It's great to see the OP running some solid miles and kicking ass. I'm excited to start back up again, but I think it's time for an official break here in May, and then ramp up the mileage over summer and shoot for a fast fall marathon time!!! I really needed this post to come back, so thanks and good luck with training.

Any fall marathon plans? I'm looking into Philly and building that mileage up in singles. I feel like the singles will keep me a little more recovered between runs, and less stress on my body, especially after a few stress fractures I've had in the past. Also, before I ran 2:17 back before the 2012 trials, I was doing some long run workouts, which I'm thinking of doing for this next training block. A couple tempo repeats in those long runs followed by some moderate running and another tempo at the end of a 20+ miler.

Onepiecetoe,

You obviously have the talent and experience so the wind is at your back.

Well I did the same pacing as you in Chicago I was out in 1:11:30 and finished in 2:26:40.

It was pretty hot and lonely the last 13 Miles in Chicago so I’m still very proud of my effort. I wasn’t in 2:23 shape but I went for it.

I’m taking The let’s-run advice and trying to crank up the mileage for an attempt at Chicago and Cim this fall.

I’ve done a few 20 milers the past few weekends and I’m pretty blown away how fatiguing they are. I’ve never run past 16 miles before and most of those were interval sessions. The 20 milers have felt empowering and i can see how they might be key for building deep fitness for the last 10k. I normally crack pretty hard at 20 miles.

Please keep the thread alive. I know there has to be lots of runners out there chasing this time.

Nice. With plenty of those 20-24 milers under your belt, you will soon see those times drop down. Keep the training simple and to the point where you can start to recover from a solid sunday long run. Good Luck in Chicago/CIM. I hope to bring this thread back in a few more months as the thick of summer training gets underway.

Love threads like this! Thanks for sharing your progression guys. Best of luck to OTQD and OTP. I'd love to see others chime in with their plans to chase the standard, too.