NorwegianSinglesMan wrote:
Hey, I read your post from around 10 months ago where you discussed breaking your PR set at 41 at age 50 with an 18:29. So inspiring. I'm curious where you are now? How have the last 10 months been?
Nothing too remarkable. That's the thing about this. You likely will get gains and stay healthy, but you just chip away. I have scraped sub 18 now and I ran a 1:22 half a couple of months ago. I'm very happy with that though at my age and if you had told me that 2 years ago, I would have laughed you out of the room! Maybe it is remarkable, just doesn't seem it as it's been a slow process.
I'm healthy, totally understand how the system works and I find it very hard to believe I could have got to what I'm doing now, any other way. And I can say that because I have tried just about any other way. This is the only training I've unlocked the next level in my running. But, it wasn't overnight. But it's set and forget with a few tweaks here and there for individual circumstances. At the end of the day, if anyone was to buy the book it would probably give them the tools to understand and make the most of their own training, but also understand this is very much long term thinking.
If you are in a rush, or can't check your ego in to slowly ramp up (or keep the easy runs very easy) then don't bother with it. That's not a negative, but you really only see the benefits if you are all in. Two club mates of mine fell into two traps:
One of them made every Saturday session a hill or vo2 track session. The other did all their easy days at 75%+ max HR, often nearer 80. Both completely burned themselves out, like we have all probably experienced in other systems. One of them also went from 5 hours to 6.5 in about 6 weeks. Again, far too aggressive in my view to absorb this sort of training with minimal risk.
I'm just going to continue. Will run London and think I have a shot at sub 2:50. Will start the sirpoc marathon plan in the new year. Other than that, I'll just continue to chip away. As I say, my view is there is almost 0% chance I could have even dreamed of a target like that, with previous coaches with super aggressive boom and bust blocks, or following canned plans from books with no real thought about recover as a hobby jogger.
My view having been in running for a good amount of time now is if you are a hobby jogger, this is just about the most logical starting point for everyone. Does it guarantee success? Absolutely not and I don't think sirpoc would claim so. But IMO if gives the general semi serious running the best chance to unlock their talents or at least get close to their potential, given their age or time constraints.