Dude seriously? You are the most annoying person on lets run. Youre addicted to stats. All comers race. Look up Bruce Fordyce
Now shut up
Dude seriously? You are the most annoying person on lets run. Youre addicted to stats. All comers race. Look up Bruce Fordyce
Now shut up
Pretty similar wrote:
please explain.. wrote:
What's the difference between ultra running and race walking? They seem pretty similar to me only one is done in the mountains.
They are a pretty similar group of people. Just subsets of runners that weren't good enough to be elite on the track or roads so they chose something with much less competition.
I mean...you really believe this..?
Theoretically, but actual results don't support it, including at Comrades on the women's side this yr and other previous yrs too. Glycogen availability and usage doesn't matter after 40 miles when you've used it all up and start relying moreso on fat metabolism and slow twitch fibers. 40 miles becomes the "moment of truth" when a marathoner finds out if they're enough slow twitch to handle the metabolic shift. Most can't and start to cramp and fatigue. For those who can, they can hold a pace longer and closer to their marathon best or recent marathon times. Marathon speed is only loosely correlated cause it provides an upper ceiling, but more important is the metabolism/fibers to sustain closer to this ceiling. Trying to maximize CHO intake during the race can only help to an extent. Someone who's more slow twitch/fat metabolizer is still going to have the advantage to hold it together better, esp the longer the race.
Burnsy would probably remember more than I do on their en route splits, but I remember them going out pretty hard and bonking for whatever reason. These guys are good marathoners and proven at Comrades. You would think they could easily run under 6:20, right? It didn't happen. Flat road 100K is really hard on your body physically and physiologically. Your feet and legs need to be pretty durable to handle the repetitiveness. I spend a lot of time training in the shoes I race in and do 90% of mileage on roads.
There's a quote that goes something like it hurts up to a point, and then it doesn't hurt anymore. Marathons shred your legs because of the pace. Road 50 mi-100K shreds your legs to the same extent and also your metabolism and testing your mental stamina. Personally I don't train any differently than I did as a marathoner, with only a few tweaks for specificity including a hard mountain session every 2 wks. It's really important to condition your legs for the downhill, but not as much as most people think. You're definitely taking in more fuel and hydration too, which is a learning curve for marathoners stepping up.
One of my grad school professors studied eccentric loading- testing muscle fibers in mice and humans on a downhill treadmill. He always told me you don't need that much hill training to gain the protective effect and last for a while. If you look at it from total stress (volume + vert + quality) vs rest, there's probably some sort of balance that needs to be struck for the individual to optimize performance and not overtrain. I've noticed a lot of the European mountain runners put in less volume but large amounts of vertical training at slow paces. It works for them and seems to strike the right balance. They appear fresh and healthy when racing a monster like UTMB. If you do too much of anything (~big miles plus big vert), the muscle damage accumulates and reduces muscle force/power. There's several "flatlanders" in the States who are doing quite well on mountainous trails and at races like Comrades. I think you can compensate for a lack of vertical training by putting in more volume. Through trial and error, I've found that I feel the best being a balanced athlete with some specificity to the course, conditions, etc..
People should not underestimate the fitness needed to run the Comrades Marathon. No matter you speed (lactate clearance ability/vo2 max), you still need one hell of running economy to win the comrades marathon.
Those who think that 2h32 marathon @ comrades marathon was somehow easy because of the down run (to Durban), must remember that the winner (Mthembu) ran the Two Oceans marathon this year & he passed the marathon mark in 2:21!
Don't be surprised if you see Yuki Kawauchi @ComradesMarathon next year
American Ultra Runner wrote:
Dude seriously? You are the most annoying person on lets run. Youre addicted to stats. All comers race. Look up Bruce Fordyce
Now shut up
LoL
Don't have to. He is a mate of mine. -)
S. Canaday wrote:
Its an ultra. Sometimes the 2:15 marathoner beats the 2:10 guy.
Yes...the point is that we have more runners in the 2:15 + range than below that take Comrades (and ultras in general) seriously...until then we are talking theory
S. Canaday wrote:
Also to what I Am Sam wrote.
No, a faster marathoner may be faster at the marathon not because of better efficiency, but because of a higher Vo2max and lower lacate levels.
Well, I did say 'etc', there are a bunch of physiological aspects making a person a better runner. From what I know however, VO2 max is a less rigid predictor than efficiency and lactate knowledge (as it relates to training and performance) changes by the day.
Again, we have to talk about the same 'sample size' of faster people running Comrades and also absolutely focusing on it like the 'sub elite' marathoners are.
Separately for Burnsy
This makes a few assumptions:
The fast marathoners are doing no Comrades specific training
The human body does not adapt very quickly to training and changes in diet. (surprisingly to most quite the opposite).
A confusion of 'rate' (per time not effort) of CHO vs Fat usage vs 'rate' (per km)...the latter is dependent on your speed but does not mean that the former changes, and also discounts training and diet.
I am sorry, but 'slow-twitchers' when talking about this is an out of date term
Unfortunately, yes...we have to look at not only the entire 20,000 of 2018, but the 100's of thousands of sets of data. Anything outside of that is anecdote and anomalies due to various reasons like 'preparation', 'PB at same effort/conditioning', 'experience' etc etc.
One person (eg Thys) taking one attempt and blowing up at suicidal pace, does not make a counter argument.
Ashworth running Comrades at exactly the same pace as Two Oceans (even with the extra 34km and hills), is in fact a reason why 'specialists' like that have unrepresentative data.
People like American Ultra Runner (whatever that handle is supposed to imply) may think it is an obsession with stats, but the fact is stats don't lie and peoples recollections are skewed.
...and how many people did Fordyce race (and on more than one occasion if there are any), that were quicker than 2:17 at the time?
If you go back to my initial post, I agree that elite marathoners won't do well, but for quite different reasons.
One thing I do know, having been in both camps, that because Ultras (and trails) are dominated by 'sub elite' marathoners, like somehow it is purely because of their ability rather than the 'depth' of the pool, whenever the argument comes up there is a lot of defensiveness. Almost like "we found something we are the best at, don't take it away from us". Sorry, more reality from a 2:30 (male) marathoner required.
In fact, despite Ashworth's 'non correlation' , she herself is on record with her elite squad of females as determining that she would like them to run 2:40 to do well at Comrades. Why would that be if she can run 6:10 off 2:48?
At the end of day we are only as good as the competition we are up against, no one is taking anyone's glory away.
Weekend got in way, but just wanted to add the following facts- whether you find them relevant or important or not:
1) The CMA (organisers) pay huge value to marathon vs finish time outcome, and use that to benchmark qualification and start groups.
2) Ashworth herself pays huge value to the marathon performance as a predictor and necessary to Comrades training, given her desire that her elite squad attain 2:40 in marathon, which also implies that she 'knew' her own marathon PB of 2:48 was soft. That she went into Comrades as pre race favourite, implies that others knew that too.
3) Fordyce himself (since he was referenced) valued the marathon performance and generally shorter distance performance and speed training. From his own training records and comments, he worked hard on getting his speed better in order "to improve cruise speed", which he directly attributes to ability for late race speed maintenance (not mileage). In fact his average mileage in 7 months post Comrades was 'only' 61 Miles/week and 5 months pre Comrades 'only' 86 miles per week
He specifically worked on speed before ramping up mileage (mile 4:10, 5km 14:28 , marathon 2:17 etc)
This sort of mileage (only 3,750 per annum) is unheard of now.
4) For what it is worth, even the poster who disagreed most with the marathon-Comrades correlation (Burnsy) , had a Comrades finish almost exactly correlating marathon PB ;-)
For you guys in prime, hopefully the above give an idea of what is possible and the little changes that can eke out improvement next time.