50+ Masters Training and Racing Open Forum

FYI, Allen, while I have one run marathon at age 35 and had no aspirations to ever run another, a few years ago I was racing our Fall XC series and running stride for stride every race with a young lady who was training for the Chicago marathon. She went and ran 3:00:xx and I ran a 5K at about the same time and ran 18:48, so that is probably a ballpark speed needed to be in 3:00 marathon shape. Quite a few years ago when I was able to run 5Ks in the 17:50-18:20 range I was able to run 1/2 marathons in the 1:26-1:27 range on about 50-55 mpw.

Allen I have a great deal of respect for your efforts and dreams.

IMO the biggest hurdle is not potential but how to structure so you can do the needed training.

Injury prone wineturtle posted his amazing story of how he approached reaching his marathon potential. I could not find the post but it is truly one of the most interesting posts on LR I ever read.

btw

sub 19 according to these guys

https://bridgerridgerun.wordpress.com/2015/03/30/how-to-run-a-3-hour-marathon-a-just-enough-training-approach/

Allen1959 wrote:

But, yeah, with the popularity of marathoning in Japan, I would expect several dozen 3:10 M60-64 results there, alone. I really don't know. There must be some sort of tabulation somewhere?

Here is the result from Tokyo marathon this year. Three runners in 60-64 ran sub 3, led by an Olympian with 13:27/27:48/ 2:10:30 PBs. And nine under 3:10. (If you click the name, their time and splits will show up.)

The other marathons in Japan probably have fewer sub 3:10.

Actually, only seven, instead of nine, under 3:10.

Charlie and OGII, thanks. AG percentages, comparative performance tables and race-time predictors all have somewhat different purposes, I suppose. I think an 18:45 5K is certainly fast enough for a 3-hour marathon. If properly trained.

The last time I went under three hours (2:56:03 age 43), my 5Ks were 17:15-17:30. But I think my marathon goal was way too soft. Even on low training mileage it wasn't very difficult.

RE: WMA classifications. Their site labels 80+ as national class, and 90+ as world class. But as a comparison, an open 5K at 16:00 is 80% on their calculator, which I wouldn't even call "regional class."

I won't mention that at Christmas dinner ...

Going a little further, in order to estimate depth, we have fairly complete track rankings at

https://www.mastersrankings.com/rankings/

The most competitive/complete distance event is the 1500 (in the 3-10K there are lots of guys running roads instead of track, but fast 1500 guys have to go to track). For M60, 85% is 5:01. 42 men last year broke 5:02. This corroborates roughly the figure of 37 sub-3 men mentioned above. So sub-3 typically puts you in the top 40 worldwide each year.

For women, the WR W60 is 3:01, the other records are: 5:06, 5:42, 18:48, 38:56, 1:24:56 (the best record by WMA calc= 2:57)

Since I was nowhere near the top women in my 20's, I would say if you are faster than the women's AG WR at 60 you are moving very well.

Allen1959 wrote:

RE: WMA classifications. Their site labels 80+ as national class, and 90+ as world class. But as a comparison, an open 5K at 16:00 is 80% on their calculator, which I wouldn't even call "regional class."

I won't mention that at Christmas dinner ...

Allen- from my experience in track in my earlier days, if you wanted to make the finals in middle distance at nationals, you had to run at least 85-87% most years if there was a decent turn out. And top 40-50 in the world is national class in my book. 90% is for sure elite across the board.

As for Christmas dinner, jut saying you ran an entire marathon at our age is "world class" for most folks :)

RF reader wrote:

Actually, only seven, instead of nine, under 3:10.

RF, thanks for that link. More stats to ponder. These days, with no running, I ponder a lot. Elliptical work starts in January. Three months off. Fifteen pounds on!

Reference Guy wrote:

I would say if you are faster than the women's AG WR at 60 you are moving very well.

I was pondering that, too. At Boston '83, I was 20 minutes behind Joan Benoit. Hmmmm ...

Allen1959 wrote:

The last time I went under three hours (2:56:03 age 43), my 5Ks were 17:15-17:30. But I think my marathon goal was way too soft. Even on low training mileage it wasn't very difficult.

If you want to be cheered up, I was running marathons well under 2:50 when I could only make low 18's for 5K. However, I think I was a freak. On that other "List your PRs" thread I could find only one person who was anywhere near as slow at short distances, relative to the marathon, as I. There's one guy who lists 17:0x for 5K and 2:41 for the marathon. But otherwise the guys on that thread who have marathon PRs somewhere near mine were all running under 17 for 5K.

amkelley wrote:

... the guys on that thread who have marathon PRs somewhere near mine were all running under 17 for 5K.

My marathon PR is nearly identical to yours, and I ran a 16:05 5K a week before. It's amazing that you could run a full marathon so close to your 5K pace!

For me there was just about a minute per mile difference (5:10 vs 6:06). That was 1982. In 2017, there was still about a minute difference (6:06 vs 7:09).

Hmmm ... somehow over the years marathon pace became 5K pace.

In reference to time correlation and distance you may want to look at Daniels’ VDOT chart. My young man bests and masters bests line up with VDOT number from 1500m to marathon.

Sub 3:00 marathon falls between VDOT 53 and 54; 5k equivalents look to be close to the times mentioned by several posters.

https://www.runnersworld.com/workouts/threshold-training-finding-your-vdot

I believe, if you were more slanted in your training intensity versus volume, it would also be reflected in the VDOT correlations. More balanced training across components results in greater equivalence of racing distance VDOT. I would assume racing experience with different distances increases the same. Again reinforcing the concept “you are what you train to be.”

Igy

Igy -- Yup, Daniels VDOT calculator is my go-to reference. For me, as a low-mileage guy, it tends to be a little optimistic for the longer distances. But I'm thinking it would be dead-on accurate if I could ever maintain a consistent 60 mpw.

Allen1959,

Taking Daniels’ to his marathon training plan, a consistent 60 miles would look more like this: 40-45-50-45-55-40-50-60-45-55-65-50-55-70.... You get the picture.

Igy

Last year I picked up Running Formula and Pfitzinger's Advanced Marathoning. Wrote up a plan based on Pfitzinger. Will take another look at Daniels. All the years I tried to run 60, 60, 60, 60, etc., it ended up looking more like your Daniels quote. Minus 10 or 20 mpw ...

Interesting discussion on sub 3 and all. Good luck to anyone going for it! It's out there for sure (on the radar), but my primary goals for 2018 are at shorter distances (roads/XC).

A sub 5 mile at 60 is also a big one--and probably even more difficult than sub 3. But that would require miler focus for many months. Ima gonna leave that to the speedier guys. However, if the opportunity arises might try a mile TT or race at sea level over the summer. All that said, rested and getting ready to roll into a higher volume phase for for the first few months of 2018.

I have a high school kid who's had a promising career in distance running so far. He's in his junior year. I haven't run seriously since a couple of years after high school.

A few years ago I started running again after constant nagging from my son to start again. I started running about four months before entering a mile track race. I couldn't believe how painful it was. I had none of the float or ease I felt when I was in high school. I got injured a month before the race and didn't run at all that month but still managed a 5:29 in the race at age 50. I quit running after the race.

Last August I decided to start running again with the goal of entering a 5k cross country race in the fall. My training consisted of running every other day exclusively on a flat bike trail or a treadmill while I was traveling for work. I worked up to 8 miles for some of my runs. I noticed that I really enjoyed the health benefits of these efforts. I actually never enjoyed running but I liked being on the CC and track teams and I loved racing.

The race came up this fall. I wasn't expecting much, I got injured again about a month before the race and was just trying to hold on. The cannon went off and here I was, back in a cross-country race, the first one since my senior year in high school at the State meet! All of the old feelings came flooding back as I went through the course over the grass, up and down the hills, through the woods, etc. It was great! A lot of my son's friends from other high school teams hung around to help cheer me on in the open race, I had to keep pushing! I managed a sub 20 minute time and was blown away! The icing on the cake was running a cool down with my son and his buddies!

This time the running has become a habit. I've continued to run and look forward to entering more races next year!