Ryan Hall eliminated JUNK MILEAGE

good points here. and notaustin, have you been racing at all? feling better/faster on easy days doesnt mean youre in better shape. using my logs, i can tell you that i run slower on average when i'm fitter.

longjack has some nice points here, especially regarding recovery days.

i'd like to add that the difference between training at 8000-9000' can have a profound influence on 2,3-BPG levels versus training at significantly lower altitudes. one month isn't very long, but for someone who grew up at altitude and lived for several years at 8000' (Mammoth), the increase should be quicker. at least, that has always been my experience after living at altitude for years; much quicker re-adaptation.

that he did all of his long tempos alone is a little bit worrisome, as is discounting the pace of his runs. 4:45 at sea level (running alone) is about on par with 5:10 at 9000' for an adapted individual, so hopefully he was around that pace for some 20+ milers.

Micheky Mouse wrote:

Ok so I read all these articles on Ryan Hall. What kind of IDIOT is he?

Being asked how difficult the last two years were for him he answers that those were the best years of his life.

He's delusional. :)

Very good points and analysis. If I had a hat sir I would tip it in your direction.

But to add, it is logical that variables aside, everyone needs a specific type of training to do their best. For some its low mileage, some moderate, some high. Some need to do that mileage super slow, some moderate, some fast, some a variety of paces. Some need to do intervals very frequently(Jim Ryun). Some need to avoid speed work as long as possible (Brad Hudson). Some respond well to racing frequently(Bill Rodgers), and some don't.

Aside from the stuff like diet, life stresses, etc. There are countless variables that come into play. To do our best we just find out what they are for us as an individual. I haven't found my perfect system yet, but I've had enough trial and error that I keep getting closer. But I think it is fair to say, plenty of people wouldn't respond well to the variable of high volume/mileage and equally fair to say that there are plenty of people that respond exceedingly well to high volume/mileage(like Bill Rodgers and Frank Shorter).

I guess i understand that you have an hard time to accept that someone that maximise his run potential with rich performances but he didn´t train properly.

I also agree that is speculation and subjective that someone with run success might do better with other training.

But the question here is different one. Since you bring to the debate that Ron Hill got 2 phases, one the early one until 72 with more training more mileage, more fast pace training, and the late one with less training, less pace, i bring the question about the kind of training might able the delay of the runner performance at his the very best performance zone.

There is where it comes to the debate the training of Ron Hill. Before 72 Ron Hill training did consist of going to the job laboratory where he worked and back home the evening. You say 120-130miles but remember Ron was not one professional runner, there the recover it´s as someone that is one professional runner. However he did that home-job-home as "fast as he could". That is wrong training. That´s the kind of training that also killed Derek Clayton.

Later, after 72 olympics Ron found his own sport brand, namely the famous british flag shorts and he got no time or interest to train so much as as hard as in the past. He told me that is training resumed to 45min once a day. Result ? He did marathon pb then.

To this Ron´s example i extrapolate how the training might be done to delay the runner career and able the runner to be on his top performance zone for a long period. There we got 2 kind of performers. One kind where is Gebre or Bekele, or Steve Monnegetti, Bernard Lagat. But a second kind of occasional top performers as Solinski in the 10000m , Alan Webb , Ritz in the 5000m or Ryan Hall in the HM and marathon. There´s no problem to just run on his best performance zone one single result or just one season. The problem is when the professional runner plan one long career but by training mistakes he is just able to run a great result once or twice.

Coming to my question. Ryan Hall did the right training to be a sub 60:00 HM ? Yes, obvious. Solinski did the right training to be the first non-african born runner to be a sub 27:00 10000m ? Yes, of course. But if we think about the delay of performance neither Alan Webb, Solinski, Ritz or Ryan Hall did the right training. In my opinion the coach of Ryan Hall at that period of the HM 59min is the responsible to the situation that Ryan is actually. He was burn by the training that did lead to both his HM an marathon records.

I don´t know the reasons why Renato Canova didn´t accept to coach Ryan Hall or if it´s the case that was Ryan that doesn´t what to continue to be coached by Renato Canova, or both, neither one or the other they want that coach-runner relationship. Besides the relationship between one coach and one runner is not my business, i simply comment to what is public.

However if it happens that Ryan Hall asks me if i got interest to coach him, i would say i don´t. Ther´s one point of the runner career that the runner moves up to better performances, but it comes one moment that the very best performances can´t be reached be the runner self coached, coached by me or coached by Renato Canova or back to the same coach that did coach up up to the top.

You know as i know that Ryan Hall is just ion the descendent phase of his career, and no one in the world can save him from never be able to perform as he did in the past. This is the reason why i took the right decision to not bet with me about Ryan performance.

This my argument about the proper training to able to delay the performance, makes me to go back in memory where you (and others) did discuss with John Hadd about that runner that did much more than 100miles a week and did 2:13 in the marathon on his debut. On that occasion John Hadd said that his coach did a wrong training start, and then danger of not be able to next performance progress is real with so much training volume. After all those years what that runner did ? Conclusion:if we think about the need of career delay, or performance progress we need to envision the training as something progressive and not too much too soon, that leads to sudden performance with no return.

I truly wish Hall all the best and would love for him to prove me wrong and run lights out sub 2:05 at Boston BUT I think that the odds are stacked against him and he will be lucky to break 2:10 at Boston. Here's is why:

1) This interview or Hall answering letsrun's questions about his training is meaningless. Hall is one of the best in the business at promoting himself before marathons. I don't think there is a single marathon that he hasn't said he was prepared for and is going for something spectacular before the race. Afterwards yes, he has released endless excuses about poor training leading up to the race. Everyone has to remember that his sponsor Asiacs wants publicity. They are not paying him to say "oh yeah things have been going bad the past two years. I haven't finished a race. ect ect." Hall is going to say that he is in great shape no matter what. And to be fair, any elite athlete has to stay positive in order to achieve exceptional goals. However, we should take his comments with a grain of salt. We are only going to know his true potential when he races. It is intriguing to me that his temporary coach last year Mr. Canova emphasized that Hall should focus on quality and yet Hall blamed his injury on the quality sessions Renato prescribed. Has Hall changed his mind?

2) Hall's best performances (although his 2:04 is a whole other argument) were right after his best track performances. 13:16 and 28:07 for the 5k and 10k by 2007,and then 59:43 and 2:06 (legit) by 2008. For some reason he has avoided the track and consequently his marathon/half marathon have most likely suffered from this decision. I may be going out on a limb, but for Hall to go sub 2:05 means that he needs to be able to go sub 28 for a 10k at the very least. He has not shown this capability in the last year.

To conclude my most certainly useless analysis (for which I do not apologize for the length or grammar), Ryan Hall is a white Kenyan of whom I wish the best in Boston. I would love to see him win it in an amazing time. BUT, sub 2:05 will mean that he is actually serious and not just talk.

Continue the pointless talk about high and low mileage...

reed wrote:

notaustin, have you been racing at all? feling better/faster on easy days doesnt mean youre in better shape. using my logs, i can tell you that i run slower on average when i'm fitter.

I haven't raced much because I don't have my license yet. Once I have my license I'll be able to drive down to Eugene and race whenever I feel like it, but until then I'm limited to only being able to do races in my small town that has all of about 4 races a year.

I did however, do a race on Thanksgiving Day, 10 days after a 9 day break kind of spur of the moment. Took 4th out of like 250 or so people with a 30:56 on a hilly 5.2 mile(556 pace) course. With so little training going in and not knowing the race even had hills and having not run hills in over a year, I think I did alright.

Next race we have in our town is some random 5k in like June or something, winning time last year was like 19 minutes, so not sure if its worth it. After that, the next race in town is a half marathon in August that'll probably peak for.

How's your racing and training been going lately? are you on a college team?

Easy enough to say Geb, Bekele, Lagat, etc. did their training the right way and therefore had success and longevity. But the second group of runners you mention have performed very similarly relative to themselves.

Geb, Bekele, Lagat were always the best or just a half-step behind the best. They did not need to strain and try to do anything incredibly heroic with their training volume/intensity. Contrast that with the white guys you mention and they were never the best, but always trying to be. They had to go for the hail mary.

Because of this their peak may have been a bit shorter and brighter relative to their entire career, but most of them peaked at similar ages to when Geb, Bekele and Lagat peaked as well. Because Geb, Bekele, Lagat were a couple percent faster at their pinnacle and didn't have to completely ruin themselves chasing others that were a few percent ahead of them, they've been able to drop off in performance and yet still be among the best.

The difference between all of them is not so great if you look at it relative to themselves.

J.R. wrote:

Micheky Mouse wrote:

Ok so I read all these articles on Ryan Hall. What kind of IDIOT is he?

Being asked how difficult the last two years were for him he answers that those were the best years of his life.

He's delusional. :)

You're delusional and everyone hates your posts.

:)

Antonio, that's a great post with important ideas to consider, certainly for myself. Thanks for sharing.

get off LetsRun wrote:

You're delusional and everyone hates your posts.

Translation, I'm jealous of J.R. and wish I was like him but I'm not.

Whatever.

When you say "delay" I'm taking it that you mean "extend." Otherwise I'm not sure what you mean by delay. If Hill told you he got a marathon PB from a single 45 minute run each day he told you something very different than what he's written or told me when he and I talked.

His fastest marathon came in 1969 and he was using the routine of 120-130 mile weeks in the 3 months or so before that race and then did the same thing before Boston in 1970. He got away from this routine before Munich adding a third run most days and going to altitude for an extended time. In retrospect maybe he overdid it then and wrecked his Olympic race. And he did mostly easy runs going to work and back with two or three "effort" sessions, 10 x 70 seconds, "number stride fartlek," and usually a race each week. He kept to two runs a day every day except Sunday for 26.2 years, he's been very clear about that in a number of interviews as he was when he and I spoke. As he started that streak in December, 1964, he would not have gone to one 45 minute run until early 1991.

At some point if you train "correctly" you run as fast as you possibly can for a given distance. Once you've done that you start going downhill and the best you'll manage is an extended time, delayed time you might call it(?) when you can remain close to your best performances. I think Hall is at that phase and can extend it for a while yet as long as his training and career management is reasonable. It will never be possible to say for sure whether or not an athlete's training is correct because it's never possible to know what s/he would have done on other training at that phase of their career.

Antonio Cabral wrote:

That is wrong training. That´s the kind of training that also killed Derek Clayton.

Later, after 72 olympics Ron found his own sport brand, namely the famous british flag shorts and he got no time or interest to train so much as as hard as in the past. He told me that is training resumed to 45min once a day. Result ? He did marathon pb then.

Ron Hill ran his marathon PB of 2 h 09 min 28 secs at the Edinburgh Commonwealth Games marathon in 1970. He was 32 years old at the time and was still working at a chemistry laboratory as he had been since the age of 25. He had been building his up high mileage (~100-120 miles per week) of mainly fastish paced running to work and back over those last 7 years and this led to his marathon PB in 1970 and also a 2h 10 min 30 secs win at the Boston Marathon the same year. Not bad for basically having done the "wrong training" (as you see it) for his entire running career up to that point.

After the 1972 olympics Ron quit his regular day job to focus on developing his sports clothing business. During this time Ron ran less mileage for three main reasons according to his autobiography: 1. He was no longer running to and from work so his morning runs became shorter 2. Starting up his own business was stressful and time consuming for him 3. He was picking up more frequent injuries, in particular plantar fasciitis. He still ran twice each day but he did not make the 1976 olympics (he just missed it with a 4th place finish in the British trial race) and his career was on the downside as it would be for virtually any athlete in their mid 30s after competing a high level since their early 20s.

It is therefore not really clear at all how Ron Hill's running career fits in with your argument about "proper training" but everyone has their own opinion I suppose...

Certainly interesting today with the Hall interview.

Instead of speculating on his chances on Monday, I'll throw in an observation:

It would be a major bonus for US distance running if Ryan Hall runs really well Monday.

I have a great deal of respect for (the flawed genius) Salazar and the NOP, but it would be a breath of fresh air to see a great distance race from another quarter by an American runner.

Obviously there are great US distance runners outside of the the NIKE Portland worlds of Al Sal and Jer Shu, Lagat and Martinez come to mind, but I want more.

HRE wrote:

When you say "delay" I'm taking it that you mean "extend." Otherwise I'm not sure what you mean by delay.

Delay means to delay the end of the top performance zone.

Extending the zone, is to delay the end of it.

Hall was nearly ruined by overtraining. He has now learned from his mistakes, adjusted with maturity and is a happier wiser runner... just no way to spin that downturn or his revival to give mega miles the credit for his success.

I'd happily ruin myself to a 2:05 marathon.

Eliminating a section of training is wrong. He eliminated speed for years- after a while, it hurt him. Train all facets.

My opinion on mileage is that, yes, all other things being equal, the training plan with more miles will make you faster, and it is necessary to compete at an elite level, but ...

(1)

You can still get decently quick ("elite hobby jogger" level: 4'00/15'00) on 30-40 mpw. Many people on this forum have done it. I'm getting close to doing it.

(2)

The performance benefits of cranking out 80 mpw have to be weighed against the increased risk of injury. The average person is not built for running 80 miles per week. Even 50 mpw at a pace above a jog is pushing it. We don't all have gazelle-like bodies like the Kenyans do. The average person who tries to be a distance runner will be perpetually injured, despite trying to train perfectly (smooth form, buying new shoes, calcium supplements, 10% rule, etc.).

(3)

Oftentimes, the only difference between a high-mileage and low-mileage runner is in the number and distance of easy runs. This amounts to a trivial difference in performance. Whether you do easy runs of 4 miles or 9 miles doesn't make much of a difference, assuming that you have a decent base already.