reed wrote:
don't think Ben is looking to hire a coach. he stated that before
But some smart people make it easy for them and hire a pro coach to get better results. Why waste time
that is so important nowadays with all busy people ?
reed wrote:
don't think Ben is looking to hire a coach. he stated that before
But some smart people make it easy for them and hire a pro coach to get better results. Why waste time
that is so important nowadays with all busy people ?
Ben Barrows wrote:
The situation would likely be training at altitude for most of June and July and then racing much later in the fall or winter. In that scenario, is there any long term physiological benefit to training at altitude vs just training at home for those months?
No but you will train better in a cooler climate and enjoy the mountains.
BB fan wrote:
Don't even waste your time replying to these people Ben. Weed through the information that you are looking for and get it. The trolling on this site is unbelievable and it just goes to show how truly nice you are that you take time to respond to them. I have a friend who is close to the Olympic Trials qualifier in the marathon and his half marathon time is not that close to yours. Honestly, I think you should stick to what works for you and give that first marathon a shot. You seem like you could be the next Brian Sell or Nate Jenkins on the American marathon scene. I think you have a 2:17 in you if you run Chicago or Cal for that first race. Perhaps even think about giving Indy or Minneapolis a shot! No need to do dramatic moves to altitude yet.
Except that there have been about a dozen more Brian Sells and Nate Jenkins at this point . They already inspired the next wave of blue collar marathoners who have run between 2:11 and 2:17.
I don't have any training advice but wanted to chime in and wish you good luck! I also wanted to suggest that it could be a mistake to do this large buildup for fall as you have planned and not race because if your training is off track you are going to be spending a very long time in between races and might not be able to make adjustments that you would if you run a fall marathon and realize your training plan is deficient in some area. Just something to think about, I'm no expert.
Think smart wrote:
reed wrote:
don't think Ben is looking to hire a coach. he stated that before
But some smart people make it easy for them and hire a pro coach to get better results. Why waste time
that is so important nowadays with all busy people ?
Nothing like poor, stilted English and self-serving message to reveal the "Spamming Swede" by another handle.
Ben- As cool as your Houston run was, my favorite story is your conference runner-up performance in the 5000. Very inspiring. Keep doing it your way!
Ben, you should become a brand ambassador for one of the shoe brands. You have a YouTube channel with great content. Those videos are really helpful for even runners who are not as good as you are. Therefore it makes sense for the brands to work together with you. Besides, you have that funky superhero running club, which needs sponsors :)
I know Ben wouldn't post it here but I'll gladly post it.
Here's his recap of his training for his half marathon.
I could post a bunch of stuff about 100 mpw and long runs. Stuff that you already know. I have never ran a sub-2:19 marathon myself but I did find a blog from someone who has. All credit goes to Nate Jenkins.
http://nateruns.blogspot.com/2017/12/canova-sondre-moen-and-lack-of-marathon.html
byteherder wrote:
I could post a bunch of stuff about 100 mpw and long runs. Stuff that you already know. I have never ran a sub-2:19 marathon myself but I did find a blog from someone who has. All credit goes to Nate Jenkins.
http://nateruns.blogspot.com/2017/12/canova-sondre-moen-and-lack-of-marathon.html
Nate Jenkins is a wise man.
heyyo wrote:
byteherder wrote:
I could post a bunch of stuff about 100 mpw and long runs. Stuff that you already know. I have never ran a sub-2:19 marathon myself but I did find a blog from someone who has. All credit goes to Nate Jenkins.
http://nateruns.blogspot.com/2017/12/canova-sondre-moen-and-lack-of-marathon.htmlNate Jenkins is a wise man.
I wish he was a better writer. Some of those blog posts are hard to get through.
I've run a pretty comparable half marathon (1:07 low) and ran 2:22 for the full (in bad weather). Here's some training advice from someone that got somewhat close. Looking back, these are the things that I think contributed the most to having a successful performance on race day.
-Accumulated fatigue will impact your training a lot more than it did for shorter distances. The really long runs and workouts will have an effect on how you feel in training and racing longer than you are used to. Allow more days to recover after big workouts and long runs than you have in the past, and allow your body to guide you in terms of when you're ready to hit it hard again. And since you'll have more accumulated fatigue...
-Whatever "marathon specific" workouts you choose to do, loosen your notion of what pace is "specific" to your goal. When I obsessed over trying to run 5:15 pace or whatever, the training and racing never went as well. When I regarded "specific" pace as 95-105% of race pace, it was a lot easier, both physically and mentally, to run the workouts properly. I still paid attention to pace, but I let the margin of error get bigger so I could run the right effort.
-I alternated between two types of long runs: One weekend I would run long at a normal easy run (not recovery run) pace for 1:45 at the low end to 2:30 at the high end. The next weekend I would do a ~16 mile progression run (plus a 2-mile cooldown) where I increased the length of the progression as I moved through the training cycle. It went something like running progressive for the last 4 miles, then last 6, then last 8, then last 10, and then back to only the last 4 as a taper 2 weeks out. These were tough, I was really getting after it the last few miles on some of these, running HMP or faster towards the end. If I did one of these on a Sunday, I often wasn't ready for another workout until Thursday or Friday (and it would be a low-key workout at that) - but that was just how I responded to them.
As others have said, there's lots of good info out there. Good luck!
Nate Jenkins has run ONE good marathon.
I've run under 2:20 six times, but under 2:19 only three times. As many already know, I've also failed most recently at Houston (2:19:50) and my best performance since starting ultra marathons was Boston (2:19:12 in 2015...not an ideal weather day and only 6 weeks after a 2:20:02 at LA).
Nate Jenkins has some great advice on his blog (re: Canova style) and you already seem to have a good grasp of what training it takes as well as your progression in the 5km/10km half marathon.
Full marathon is a very different ball game though and one must respect the distance. There is a reason most of the guys who qualified for the 2012 and 2016 trials did it with a sub 65:00 half instead of a sub 2:19. Now that the standard is sub 64 that may change though. A sub 64-min is a heck of a lot harder than a sub 65:00. On any given year only 50-70 American guys may hit a sub 2:19, although races like CIM have shown a slew can do it all at once.
In any case there are tons of guys who "under perform" in the marathon who may have half PRs of 65-66-min and they never even crack 2:20.
You seem to get better as the distances get longer though so it may just be a matter of stringing together some consistent months of 110-125mpw and marathon specific workouts (picking the right course and the right weather conditions can also greatly help!).
From Hansons training to Canova, a lot of common themes with guys that I saw go sub 2:19:00: Lots of workouts/volume in the 6-12 mile range that was either right at M.P. or about 5-15sec/mile faster than M.P. The great thing about having a half PR close er to the 60-min range is that it is essentially your lactate threshold pace. However, any long session of repeats (i.e. 3 x 5km or 5 x 2miles or even 2 x 5-miles) can be done between half and full marathon pace (with a short rest). That and quality, negative split long runs in the 20-23 mile range where you get very close to M.P for at least 6-12 miles at a time in the second half. It could be a mixed speed "alternating fartlek/timed-intervals" or a steady uptempo acceleration into MP. You need leg strength and very specific endurance or the marathon. Running these workouts on high mileage/tired legs and dialing your nutrition plan is also key.
When I first ran Boston in 2010 it was my first marathon at Hansons. I averaged 7-8 weeks of 130mpw and was hitting a lot of big workouts at 5:10-5:00 pace... 20-milers in 1:55 with miles 15-18 going in sub 15min. It was too hard and I couldn't handle the recovery from those sessions with the high mileage at the time...I felt overtrained and flat and "blew a gasket" on race day. On a perfect weather day at Boston I ran 2:24 that year...the second slowest marathon of my career by far. When I finally ran my PR of 2:16:52 in 2011 I had dialed things back to 115-120 mpw. I didn't smash all the 20-mile long runs as hard...but still had a lot of the typical Hansons workouts of 3 x 3-miles in 14:55 and 2 x 6miles in 30:40-30:30 etc.
Nowadays I'm an old and slow ultra runner who jogs around in the mountains with a fanny pack full of gels, but I still have a goal of hitting another OTQ for the experience and seeing where I stack up against our nation's best in what is essentially a big national championship. It's an amazing race to take part in and obviously very competitive (in 2012 I ran like 2:18:32 in Houston and finished mid-pack around 44th place or so). Still a great goal for those of us that know we can't make the Olympics...plus getting to toe the front of the starting line in races like Chicago and Boston is also a blast.
In short, keep doing what you are doing. Keep progressing and gaining experience. There's a good chance you are going to have to lower that half marathon PR to around 66:20-66:00 flat or faster as a good first step as well.
@YMMV - That conference 5k race is very special to me. From a best time standpoint, Houston is definitely my best race ever across all standpoints. From the standpoint of just racing with some balls and surprising people, that 5k is probably still my best race ever, even with how lackluster the time was.
@Sage - Thanks for chiming in with your experience. I ran right by your left side somewhere in the first mile or two at Houston. I thought about saying something, but I wasn't 100% positive it was you so I decided not to risk being an idiot on that small chance that it wasn't you. Is it possible that the period before running 2:24 in Boston had a lot to do with your success after you dialed it back? I think about that a lot in my long term development plans. I was racing some cross country last fall off of some pretty major training compared to what I was used to. During my heaviest 3 consecutive weeks, I averaged 114 mpw and had a hard 10 miler in each one of those weeks right at 55:00. The couple cross country races that I did were ok, but nowhere near worth the training that I was putting in, but I was expecting that. After regrouping with a little time off and then building to Houston with a much lighter max weekly volume, I was able to knock my race out of the park. So even though my Houston-specific training wasn't as heavy, the difficult fall training definitely played a role in helping me physically and psychologically adapt.
@everyone else - As always, thanks for offering your input and experience and your encouragement.
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So going forward, here are some more general thoughts from me. A lot of people talk about running at goal marathon pace for portions of long runs. I don't like training specifically at goal pace for any race distance. Training at goal pace just doesn't make sense to me. What if I said my goal was to run under 2:10 for the marathon at the end of 2018? I'd be an idiot. What if I said my goal was to run under 2:16 at the end of 2018? Well, I'm still an idiot, but just less of an idiot than the prior example. My point is that there is a physiological best method for me to train. Whether I know what that method is, it sure isn't changing just because my goal changes.
I do plan on incorporating lots of training at half marathon and marathon effort, but that will for sure be slower than the actual pace that I could run in those in almost all situations. For example, as Sage stated, with a half marathon PR relatively close to 60 minutes, that pace is very close to LT pace. In my case, that's around 5:06-5:07 per mile. The closest that I ever got to that in training for a LT workout was for 6x1600m with 1:00 rest in which I averaged 5:14, and it was on a track on a nice day. All my other LT workouts were around 5:20-5:30. So even though I do have a goal pace of 5:15-5:18 in the marathon, I'm never going to force myself to run at that pace, but rather at an effort that I think is appropriate for any given workout.
Here's what I've been thinking for a short term plan. I do want to focus on a running a good 10k on the track in late April. I'm going to be gradual with my adaptation to marathon training. The only thing I'll be looking to adapt this spring will be running a consistently higher volume long run than I'm used to. I'd like to try to be pretty consistent with 20 milers. I think that if I try to change too much too soon, I won't be able to race as well this spring, and that is important to me. It's just pretty challenging to adapt to an entirely new workload during the school year with classes and coaching, so I'm waiting until the summer to start consistently hitting high volume weeks. I think if I stick to the LT work and other training that I'm familiar with while adapting to the long run, I should have no issue running some good PB's from 1500m to the 10k this spring.
When people talk about marathon pace training they aren’t talking about “goal pace” they’re talking about marathon pace for that day. Sure for elites goal pace and pace for that day converge but for the clowns around here they are very different. The true challenge of the marathon is surviving the last 10k. To do that you need the fuel. To have the fuel you need to teach your body to use more fat at marathon pace. Hence training at marathon pace. Not goal pace. Good luck.
So to be clear no one in the right mind is talking about training at marathon goal pace during long runs. You've misread that. Because as you point out that means nothing. Like what does "goal" mean. It could be anything. Honestly you should stop assuming you're so much smarter than other people. If what you hear or interpret sounds stupid, perhaps that's not what was said, and instead you simply are misunderstanding.
If you look through this thread, some people say “marathon goal pace”. Those are the people that I was referring to. I think it’s pretty clear what “marathon goal pace” means.
If people say “marathon pace” and leave it at that, then yes, most will be talking about marathon pace on the day, but that can still be taken in different ways.
Ha! No one is this thread has said the words "goal pace" together other than you and mean in this last page. You're projecting bro. My favorite part about this thread and your posts in general is the "advice appreciated". You're general response has been to disregard nearly all advice given to you other than the advice that aligns with your current thinking. Sage took the time to give you very detailed advice and it appears in your response that you've completely disregarded. I'm just here for the show honestly.
No hard feelings from me. There was one person that specifically said “marathon goal pace”, so I was misremembering that as plural. My bad. That doesn’t change my thoughts on the subject. There are tons of people out there that try to train at goal pace for any given race, and I just don’t think it’s a smart way to train.
I totally did not disregard Sage’s advice either. I just posed a question to him and am curious to know his thoughts on it. The common factor that most are suggesting is just more consistent high volume and more focus on the long run. I’m just not trying to do that all at once. I want to do it in a way that makes sense for me depending on the time of year and when I’m able to focus more or less on training. I’m getting plenty of ideas for my own training from sources that people have provided here.
Fair points. We are in agreement. Training at goal pace always reminds me of my HS teammate whose strategy to break 10:00 in the 3200 was to progressively run further at 75s pace each day. Needless to say he did not achieve his goal.
High mileage and big long run days does seem to be a big component of everyones advice. When training for the marathon you can't get around high mileage. It's just part of the distance which is silly long. Hard long runs are key too, but I think what differentiates poorly designed training from good training is that people with smart schedules to big long run workouts every 2 weeks at most.