Allie O just hit 60mpw this fall. In your opinion she can now start workouts? There are a lot of middle distance runners that will never hit 60mpw.
Okay if we want to cherry-pick people that do a lot of cross training then we can add the caveat of 60 miles per week and the equivalent number of hours cross training.
That's a fair point. Allie runs under David Roche who is doing insane times at the 100 mile distance with a weekly running mileage of only ~60-70 miles. But the quality of those miles (uphill, speed, etc) are what separate him from the pack. I don't know what Allie's training looks like, but I'm pretty sure it's not 60 miles of hobby-jogging every week (which is basically what I do).
The late great Ed Whitlock ran 210 age graded Marathons doing nothing but mileage.
Age grading is dumb. Saying that his marathon time is equivalent to a 2:10 is like Tyreek Hill saying he ran the equivalent to a 2:10 marathon with his 100m time.
The late great Ed Whitlock ran 210 age graded Marathons doing nothing but mileage.
Age grading is dumb. Saying that his marathon time is equivalent to a 2:10 is like Tyreek Hill saying he ran the equivalent to a 2:10 marathon with his 100m time.
What’s dumb is comparing a 100% anaerobic event to a 100% aerobic event.
Of course on “Letsrun” very few actually run in races.
Or the equivalent of only running 6 days a week. Most runners will see big benefits from increasing their mileage up to that point. The next tier of improvements will come from adding workouts at 60 mpw.
To get to true potential, you’re probably right.
i ran 49, 1:52, 4:12, 15:17, 1:12, 2:32 on 50-65 mpw.
Anybody who insists on a training "rule" like this doesn't really understand the sport. There are multiple ways to skin the cat.
60 is an arbitrary number. The point is that unless you’re doing serious mileage, structured professional style workouts are silly.
This just seems contrary to everything I’ve learned up to this point. Are you saying that someone running 30-40 miles per week shouldn’t be doing any threshold work? Or is that an oversimplification?
For mile I would disagree and tend to think the same for 5K, but I do remember best shape I was ever in came off a summer of doing ~70 miles a week of easy to moderate runs no speed and did a sub 15 5k before start of XC season which was a significant improvement for me (about 50 seconds) so definitely some big improvements can be made off mileage increase alone but to sharpen down to optimal times need to add in speed
I think the point that the OP is trying to make is that you benefit more from pushing up threshold with base work than pulling it up with threshold and V02max work. And that pulling up the threshold is more incremental gain than the broad base gains from pushing up threshold.
I kind of agree, but I think its overly simplistic and in my experience it varies significantly depending on the athlete. If an athlete has good speed, but poor aerobic threshold, then I agree - build the base. Pushing up threshold with base mileage is going to bring threshold closer to the upper end limiter. If an athlete has a naturally good aerobic threshold but poor top end (more mature / older athletes often fall into this camp), there are significant gains to be had through improving top end economy and mechanics. It comes down to how close an athletes aerobic threshold is to their v02max and this can vary a LOT - no matter what the basic "zones" will tell you.
Totally disagree. Will use American high schoolers as an example- 60mpw is probably around where most senior boys in decent programs will top out. Should they not run workouts from age 14 till they’re 18?
Parker Valby does not run 60 miles a week. Should she not run workouts?
I get the argument you’re making that increasing volume will have a greater aerobic benefit than workouts while doing less volume, but the right answer is somewhere in between. Increasing mileage is important if you run 30mpw, you shouldn’t just be hammering workouts, but doing no workouts is dumb too.
Or the equivalent of only running 6 days a week. Most runners will see big benefits from increasing their mileage up to that point. The next tier of improvements will come from adding workouts at 60 mpw.
You know who among successful OTQ caliber marathoners might agree with this? Sasha Pachev, the Mormon guy whose family all run races in crocs. He has a simple site with old running advice, and notice as he discusses building mileage that he doesn't say a word about speed anything. On his 2:30 training page he doesn't bring up doing repeats, but presumably he didn't bother with those before he was running 70mpw with 20 mile long runs.
60 is an arbitrary number. The point is that unless you’re doing serious mileage, structured professional style workouts are silly.
This just seems contrary to everything I’ve learned up to this point. Are you saying that someone running 30-40 miles per week shouldn’t be doing any threshold work? Or is that an oversimplification?
In a nutshell, distance running is a mileage game. That’s the cake. Speedwork is the icing.
You can do some speed on lower mileage. It’s just not gonna make you significantly faster in a 5K than if you just threw in some strides, as the limiting factor is aerobic capacity. No workout is gonna make up for a lack of mileage.
Coaches overemphasize “sessions” as it makes them feel more important. Anyone can tell someone to go run for an hour.
Or the equivalent of only running 6 days a week. Most runners will see big benefits from increasing their mileage up to that point. The next tier of improvements will come from adding workouts at 60 mpw.
What is a workout? Perhaps some people are confused. "We just ran miles, wow what a workout!" Indeed for most high school kids that would be a workout, no matter how slow they went!
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