Running return - training log.

Good luck. Just run baby

I like the idea of taking the time to get your mileage up before integrating workouts, but it strikes me that you are building that mileage fairly fast for someone who hasn't been running much the last two years and who is already near his historical peak mileage.

In 2014 and 2015, I was running pretty high volume, getting up into the 70 mile range for the first time in decades, including two marathon cycles where I regularly ran about 70 miles, peaking at 100 miles.

In the summer of 2016, I had surgery on my foot and was unable to run for a few months. I had registered for the 2017 Boston Marathon, so by the end of September, I had to start training before I was sure that I was ready. That meant I had to be aggressive on the one hand so as to be ready to race the marathon well, but be cautious on the other so as to not get reinjured. My weekly mileage progressions are below. You will see it took me 16 weeks to go from 0 miles until I passed the 70 mile mark, and that was done in an accelerated manner since I felt compelled to get my mileage up to be ready for an imminent race. And that was only possible because I was coming off of a couple of years of having been up in that range already.

Also, what this does not reflect is a substantial amount of cross training that happened (1) in the couple of months leading into this (leaving me better prepared aerobically for the quick build in running volume than I would have been had I been on the couch during that period since I was really just exchanging one aerobic activity for another), and (2) during this build up.

I get that you are not coming off of an injury, so you probably are less concerned about the rate of your build up, but I would still suggest to you that you are on the risky side of the range of options in terms of rate of build, especially since you are already near your lifetime peak mileage.

I would strongly suggest that you maybe take a slower approach, and if you are interested in accelerating your fitness gains, add some aerobic cross training during in place of some running mileage during the build up to offset the negative repercussions of the slower build.

3

14.25

28.25

30.75

35.25

40

45.25

52

56

51

55.5

60

64

64

56

75

I agree with smoove. After taking two years off I have now taken 40 weeks to get up to 60mpw. I was running in the 90mpw+ at university. You want to jump to 75mpw in a month and you have never run over 50mpw?

Yes, which I am aware sounds crazy.

What is interesting is that my goal isn't mileage at the moment. What I have been doing is running so that I feel good - that's it. I am taking rest days when it doesn't feel like I need them, I have forced myself to stop runs when it feels natural to keep going, and if my legs are beat up, I don't run. To this end, I never run with a watch anymore, just so I can "listen to my body". I feel great, and like I'm holding myself back, at 45mpw. That may not last, and if it doesn't I'll cut back on the mileage. I am taking rest days when it doesn't feel like I need them, I have forced myself to stop runs when it feels natural to keep going, and if my legs are beat up, I don't run. The result is that I'm loving running, and chomping at the bit to do more. So since it felt good, I tentatively planned a higher - mileage week next week, fully intending to scrap that plan if I felt less than fresh.

Would it still be a bad idea? Not trying to be a smart - aleck, but genuinely curious!

I made an insane jump recently. 35 35 35 35 60 65 70 75. Going to do 80-85 this week. Haven't gotten hurt.

Hey, keep asking the same question, and maybe people will give you the answer you want to hear!

Kidding, kind of.

Listening to your body is a great rule of thumb. I would say that in the case of building miles, it does carry some risk because there is sometimes a bit of a delayed reaction to the increased volume. The toll of one week's miles may not be felt until a couple of weeks later. Also, overuse injuries tend to come on pretty quickly and from nowhere, and if you muscles and tendons have not been conditioned to high volumes of activity, the risk of those injuries is substantial.

Of course, you may be an outlier, but the conventional wisdom is conventional wisdom for a reason, and in the absence of good evidence that you are an outlier, it seems to me that the safest assumption is that you fall somewhere within one deviation of the bell curve when it comes to workload increase tolerance rather than hope that you are an outlier who can get away with it.

That is not meant to be as critical as it sounds. It is a lesson I have learned the hard way through my own personal experiences and hopeful decisions.

I guess I would close with this, what is the downside of taking a more prudent approach?

(Aside from the fact that you are simply enjoying the fun of running so much, which I am not discounting, but simply think that you will likely be able to run more total miles, and thus accrue more enjoyment, over the rest of the year by taking a lower volume, lower risk approach than you would by getting in higher volumes now with the risk that you are not running at all for some period of time later in the year).

Thanks, I appreciate it. You're right, injury prevention is a big aim. I will be more careful.

OK, end of the week I took off after advice from Smoove, as well as a very very busy last few days.

Overall, the week just gone went:

Monday: 9.3 miles

Tuesday: Nothing

Wednesday: 9.3 miles

Thursday: 10 miles

Friday: Nothing

Saturday: Nothing

Sunday: Nothing

Total: 28.6 miles, all on undulating cycle path

Not a great total, but then I could definitely have gone further, figured there's no point in aggressively going after it when I'm just coming back. The good news is that I'm feeling strong on all runs.

Today, I did 6 miles, thinking jumping into a 10 - miler off a short break was a dumb idea. Will try to rack up a few more 10 - milers, and at least one 13 - miler, this week.

Over and out!

Fairly OK week this week.

Monday: 6 miles

Tuesday: Nothing

Wednesday: 7 miles.

Thursday: 10 miles. This one SUCKED, I left before noon, meaning I ran it in the hottest part of the day, in the middle of a heatwave. Shuffled through it, but got it done.

Friday: 6 miles. Similar conditions to yesterday, but it felt OK since I left earlier and wasn't in the heat for too long.

Saturday: 6 miles. This felt awesome, probably because it's one of the only runs not done right after I wake up on an empty stomach. Felt effortless and fast.

Sunday: This was originally going to be my 13 - miler, but after running the first 1.5 miles, I saw a 5k fun run starting . Made a spur of the moment decision to tempo it, so ran hard across the field to get to the start right before the gun went off, starting RIGHT at the back. Tempoed my way through the field and finished second, intentionally not going past the leader, since winning a race I hadn't entered would be a huge dick move. As soon as I crossed the line I told them I had entered by mistake, so didn't claim anything, and the run was untimed so there were no results to mess up.

A slightly hard workout, nothing too taxing, but my legs were a little beat up to complete 8 hilly miles at a reasonable pace, so jogged back for a 5 mile total.

Total for week: 40 miles

Next week, I want to get a light interval workout, a long run, and a race in. I will try to race the 5k in under 20 minutes - obviously a way off where I was 3 years ago, but if I can do it, it would be a decent starting point. Will also try to hit 50 - 55 miles this week.

Over and out!

Would've been a great week - all went as planned, but illness on the last day scuppered the week a bit.

Monday: 10 miles in the morning. In the evening, went jogging 2.5 miles with flatmate, who is training to complete 10k.

Tuesday: Nothing

Wednesday: Intervals. Ran eight repeats of 515m through a tunnel. In one direction this is uphill and in the other direction it's (obviously) downhill, there tends to be a difference of about 30 seconds when travelling in opposite directions if the effort is the same. Was going for a light workout to avoid pulling something, as I haven't done speedwork for 2 years, so I ran the reps at 5k effort. Did the first reps in 2:02 (uphill) and 1:36 (downhill) - far too fast. Second reps were 2:23 and 1:53 - far too slow. After that, though, I could hit consistent paces at a moderate effort, and settled into reps of about 2:15 uphill and 1:45 downhill. Finished feeling pretty fresh. The idea is to build this up until I'm doing 16 of them of less than a minute's rest, then increase the pace. I'll also run the reps a bit quicker to start with from next week (looking for 2:10, 1:40 rather than 2:15, 1:45), but I was just looking to get back into it this time.

Thursday: 7 miles

Friday: Long run - 13.5 miles. Felt a little harder than normal towards the end but nothing too bad.

Saturday: 6 miles

Sunday: Was meant to be 1.5 miles easy, 5k tempo, 1.5 miles easy, but was had an invitation to a film presentation at the last minute, which went over the only time of the day I had set aside fr running. I had to go to the presentation as if there is paid acting work going, I need to make sure I'm in with a shot - this ended up being a waste of time though, I basically ended up going to a cult recruitment meeting.

Annoyingly, I'm now a little unwell. Normally I'd push on through, but I have 12 theatre performances this week and am working in a job fully dependent on public speaking, so worsening a cough is a risk I'm unwilling to take - I may have to take a couple days off to kill it, which is incredibly annoying, as I'm finally seeming to get ino a groove.

Anyway, total for the week: 45 miles, not including the jogging with flatmate. A slight increase in distance from last week, with some added intensity, so it's still moving forward.

Over and out!

Well, this was a little disappointing - I've had a flare - up of asthma, leading to me constantly coughing like an old woman, and got a bad cold for the past 2 weeks (nearly). I'd normally try to hobble through some miles, but with me being in the thick of a bunch of theatre performances, and also being mindful that I have a history of extended mild illness, I haven't run since the 4th. The good news is that although it's still there, it's almost gone, so I'm going to tentatively return tomorrow.

Thinking since I had to take 2 weeks off, it'll take me 2 weeks to return to training like before (50 mile week with 2 light workouts). Hopefully then I'll be able to push on from there. Irritating setback, but nothing can be done!

I'm back, finally. I had about 5 short runs of like 30 - 40 mins after the last post, but I didn't track them. This is the first week I'll be hitting some reasonable mileage, and it's gone remarkably well.

Monday: 1 hour at 4:39 per km (7:30 per mile)

Tuesday: 1 hour at 4:35 per km (7:22 per mile)

Wednesday: 1 hour at 4:32 per km (7:17 per mile)

Thursday (today): 5k at 4:20 per km (6:59 per mile), then 1.67km at 3:45 per km (6:03 per mile).

This little section was meant to be feel like the first mile of a 5k, i.e.: hard but not too taxing. The idea was to

get an idea of what pace to target, so in my 5k race this Sat, I will target between 18:30 and 19:00 (the course

is slow, so this prediction may be a little quick).

Finished with 6.2k at 4:51 pace per km (7:48 per mile)

Tomorrow: Planning on 30 mins super easy, if I go at all.

Saturday: Planning on a 5k race

Sunday: Will either do a 90 min run and then an hour on Monday, or I'll swap them around.

Mileage for this week will therefore be between 47 (lowest estimate) and 55 (highest estimate)

HM guy wrote:

Monday: 1 hour at 4:39 per km (7:30 per mile)

Tuesday: 1 hour at 4:35 per km (7:22 per mile)

Wednesday: 1 hour at 4:32 per km (7:17 per mile)

Thursday (today): 5k at 4:20 per km (6:59 per mile), then 1.67km at 3:45 per km (6:03 per mile).

This little section was meant to be feel like the first mile of a 5k, i.e.: hard but not too taxing. The idea was to

get an idea of what pace to target, so in my 5k race this Sat, I will target between 18:30 and 19:00 (the course

is slow, so this prediction may be a little quick).

Finished with 6.2k at 4:51 pace per km (7:48 per mile)

Tomorrow: Planning on 30 mins super easy, if I go at all.

Saturday: Planning on a 5 k race

The pace of your easy 1 hour runs seem to be a bit fast for your performance level. Even if you were close to your 18:30 5 k PR, a pace around 8 min miles would be great. Just because you can run 7:20 min miles does not mean you should do every day. Better to run 8-8:30 miles and really save some energy for two or three quality sessions per week (tempo runs, intervals, fartleks, long runs).

I ran the 5k today, and didn't run yesterday.

I didn't run this at top effort. The intention going in WAS to run it at top effort, so I did not run this race as intended. I don't have an excuse apart from being a wimp really, nothing I can do now apart from make sure I don't do it again in 2 weeks (when I will race again).

First km, second km were run as intended, breathing hard after the second km, and evenly paced allowing for the variation in terrain. I then just ... didn't increase the effort, and ran the rest of the race as tempo effort. Gargh. Anyway, splits:

3:45

3:52

4:03

4:08

4:00

I could hear wheezing in my breath slightly in the last half of the final kilo despite not running hard enough to justify it - WHENEVER I've heard that before it's meant that sprinting through it will give me a hacking cough for days (Oh the joys of asthma!), so I strode it in rather than sprinted it in. That ended up being smart, since on the warm down my hamstrings felt zapped initially - possibly an injury would have beckoned with a sprint.

Final time 19:48. I think I left at least 45 seconds on the course today, between wimping out after 2km and not sprinting it in.

It's a slow course too, I've always dropped 30 seconds on this course as opposed to others. I usually hate people talking their times into being faster, but I think it's a good estimate that I'm in 18:30 - 18:45 shape. Of course, that's if I can screw my courage to the sticking place in a race.

I'm doing a semi - long run tomorrow, planning on 90 mins, for a weekly total of about 53 miles. I am planning on time - trialling 5k on my own on Wednesday to see if I can hit 18:30 - 18:45, and also to make up for today's lily - liveredness.

Over and out!

Lol! Keep telling yourself you were in 18:45 shape. You obviously went out too optimistic, started to fade at 2 k already, and just ran a 19:48. If you had not forgotten "to sprint it in" like you said, of course this is worth at least a minute faster. For sure!

I know how it sounds, and you might be right, but it felt tempo effort for the whole way. I know how races are meant to feel, and I wimped out so that it didn't feel that way. I'll have another go on Wednesday, anyway.