I think this was me. Initially very dismissive like @harpoonz post suggested. What is frustrating is reading the thread in late 2023 and early 2024 and keeping with my tried and tested formula. I say that, but keeping with my tried and tested formula that kept being in a perpetual cycle of boom and bust, with the odd good performance sprinkled in.
Thankfully sirpoc proved me wrong at London - I was someone who posted he would be "lucky" to break 2:40, otherwise I would have just accepted my dismissive nature was warranted. Obviously, looking at last year's results, the 2:24 was possibly even stronger than we realise given much more favourable conditions this year and most people running faster.
To not drag out this post too long and bore people, drank the NSM koolaid from May last year and never looked back. I am not the first and last to post this, but the frustration is I didn't train like this in my earlier years. I'm pushing 40 now and have less time than ever with a wife, three kids and 50+ hour work weeks. Yet even with reduced peak weeks, I've managed to run my fastest lifetime marathon twice in the space of 3 months, culminating on London. No big weeks, but no down weeks. This is the cycle I have broken and no doubt why it's paying off. I'm just a better and stronger runner. I don't pretend to understand all the science from it, although I feel surprisingly educated given the excellent details sirpoc included in the NSM book.
To my shame, I even posted "this sounds like EIM", which in retrospect is obviously embarrassing and miles off the mark.
The hardest thing that people have coming into this thread, or even those who haven't tried this but just reading about it, is accepting or the realisation they likely have sub optimally trained most of their good years away.
New FODcast with Sirpoc just dropped, looking forward to getting stuck into this one!
This was an incredibly good episode IMO! Obviously lots about the NSM marathon build, but also many things on ramp rate, cross-training doubles, scheduling, bike training, load management and so on. A lot of it have been discussed in Sirpoc's book, but I think the extra nuance here added even more depth.
I would still be listening to my old coach attached to my UK athletics club who insisted 12x400 5k pace down to 3k pace twice a week was the magic sauce i needed to break 20. Spoiler: I didn't really get close.
If jma had never have posted, the chain of events would likely be I would have quit running. In a sliding doors moment I found this thread and have now ran 18:41 which for me seemed like the idea of was on another planet 16 months ago.
Athlete I coach just dropped 30 seconds off of their 5k from about 2 months ago. Vanilla NSM over 5 days/week, with two quality days, two easy days and a long run. Aside from my own success, those I coach are getting the exciting performance drops as well. Best thing, is they anecdotally noted that this is the best they have ever felt about training and the ease and flexibility of fitting everything in. Kudos to you, Sirpoc.
Re including biking and cross training etc. Over the last 50 years, I have known people who seem to get a lot of benefit from this, and probably more who swear they get no crossover benefits. I have known a lot of triathletes who have cycled hundreds of miles each week plus ran lots of miles. Some are good runners, others are mediocre given the volume of their training. With a very few exceptions, the leading pack in every age group in races are runners, not triathletes or runner/cyclists. Sirpoc appears to be a good responder, but could it be that not everyone will benefit from adding cross training/cycling?
Re including biking and cross training etc. Over the last 50 years, I have known people who seem to get a lot of benefit from this, and probably more who swear they get no crossover benefits. I have known a lot of triathletes who have cycled hundreds of miles each week plus ran lots of miles. Some are good runners, others are mediocre given the volume of their training. With a very few exceptions, the leading pack in every age group in races are runners, not triathletes or runner/cyclists. Sirpoc appears to be a good responder, but could it be that not everyone will benefit from adding cross training/cycling?
Even if a runner was not a good responder to cross-training/cycling, including it made still benefit them in terms of load and fatigue management. My guess is that if you replaced one ST sessions with a cross-training/cycling ST session you would feel fresher over the course of the training week. So some may need/benefit from that to achieve continuous repeatable weeks.
I would still be listening to my old coach attached to my UK athletics club who insisted 12x400 5k pace down to 3k pace twice a week was the magic sauce i needed to break 20. Spoiler: I didn't really get close.
If jma had never have posted, the chain of events would likely be I would have quit running. In a sliding doors moment I found this thread and have now ran 18:41 which for me seemed like the idea of was on another planet 16 months ago.
God bless jma.
I went back and read my Pfitz and Hanson's book and realized how much intensity they really had. I liked the cumulative fatigue idea of 16 + 10 for Hanson's but sirpoc's 5x5k etc. in his LRs seems to be more Canova-like and "train long and train fast" within the NSM framework. Hanson's seemed to be too much of a balancing act even more than NSM. And Pfitz just looks like a recipe for pain.
I would still be listening to my old coach attached to my UK athletics club who insisted 12x400 5k pace down to 3k pace twice a week was the magic sauce i needed to break 20. Spoiler: I didn't really get close.
A few weeks ago, Bakken did a Swedish podcast where he actually described why such a session (12x400, 3k pace, 40s rest) will not work well at all.
That NSM is about about load management is repeated often enough, but IMO one other important concept is that NSM (and the Norwegian method in general) separates load and fatigue so clearly.
I think this was me. Initially very dismissive like @harpoonz post suggested. What is frustrating is reading the thread in late 2023 and early 2024 and keeping with my tried and tested formula. I say that, but keeping with my tried and tested formula that kept being in a perpetual cycle of boom and bust, with the odd good performance sprinkled in.
Thankfully sirpoc proved me wrong at London - I was someone who posted he would be "lucky" to break 2:40, otherwise I would have just accepted my dismissive nature was warranted. Obviously, looking at last year's results, the 2:24 was possibly even stronger than we realise given much more favourable conditions this year and most people running faster.
To not drag out this post too long and bore people, drank the NSM koolaid from May last year and never looked back. I am not the first and last to post this, but the frustration is I didn't train like this in my earlier years. I'm pushing 40 now and have less time than ever with a wife, three kids and 50+ hour work weeks. Yet even with reduced peak weeks, I've managed to run my fastest lifetime marathon twice in the space of 3 months, culminating on London. No big weeks, but no down weeks. This is the cycle I have broken and no doubt why it's paying off. I'm just a better and stronger runner. I don't pretend to understand all the science from it, although I feel surprisingly educated given the excellent details sirpoc included in the NSM book.
To my shame, I even posted "this sounds like EIM", which in retrospect is obviously embarrassing and miles off the mark.
The hardest thing that people have coming into this thread, or even those who haven't tried this but just reading about it, is accepting or the realisation they likely have sub optimally trained most of their good years away.
Congrats! How did your marathon builds look like, I'm in a similar boat to you and there's no way I can find more than 6 hours a week with work and family and have a marathon coming up in 6 months.
I would still be listening to my old coach attached to my UK athletics club who insisted 12x400 5k pace down to 3k pace twice a week was the magic sauce i needed to break 20. Spoiler: I didn't really get close.
A few weeks ago, Bakken did a Swedish podcast where he actually described why such a session (12x400, 3k pace, 40s rest) will not work well at all.
That NSM is about about load management is repeated often enough, but IMO one other important concept is that NSM (and the Norwegian method in general) separates load and fatigue so clearly.
What was Bakken’s explanation for why such a sessions will not work well?
I am doing Valencia marathon in December, and am looking to use a modified version of the NSM as my build, beginning start of September (last triathlon race is end of august) for Valencia race day at the start of December. I will pretty much only focus on my running in the 3 month building up to Valencia and may just use swims as easy extra recovery sessions when possible.
I have success as a sprint/Olympic distance triathlete and my hope is that by shifting to a running focus for 2 months building up to the marathon I can prepare well. I already incorporate subT running into my week with 2 SubT sessions 2 easy and one medium long run as my running foundation. On top of that I swim 3/4 times a week and (attempt)to get 3 rides in with one long ride.
I have been playing around with different NSM models and will probably end up changing it again before I start the marathon build but wondered if anyone has come at the approach this way before and has any advice?
I would still be listening to my old coach attached to my UK athletics club who insisted 12x400 5k pace down to 3k pace twice a week was the magic sauce i needed to break 20. Spoiler: I didn't really get close.
A few weeks ago, Bakken did a Swedish podcast where he actually described why such a session (12x400, 3k pace, 40s rest) will not work well at all.
That NSM is about about load management is repeated often enough, but IMO one other important concept is that NSM (and the Norwegian method in general) separates load and fatigue so clearly.
3k pace is very aggressive, but I imagine there is a place for this workout at ~10k pace
A few weeks ago, Bakken did a Swedish podcast where he actually described why such a session (12x400, 3k pace, 40s rest) will not work well at all.
That NSM is about about load management is repeated often enough, but IMO one other important concept is that NSM (and the Norwegian method in general) separates load and fatigue so clearly.
What was Bakken’s explanation for why such a sessions will not work well?
Background: One of the podcasters compared the feeling he got in the legs from the session mentioned above with a progressive 30x45/15 (starting at MP on treadmill, raising with 0.2 each time, ending at a much much higher pace than the other protocol). The 45/15 session gave him really great legs the day after, while the 12x400 gave him extremely stiff/dead legs.
Marius said that the 400m session used a high intensity for way too long (for a single rep). The tone just raises continuously when the muscles don't get a break at high intensity. With 45/15, there are micro breaks that are frequent enough and long enough to reset the muscle state. Another reason why the progressive 45/15 session didn't produced fatigue was that it spanned such a big ranges of speeds, so different "motor units" was used for each rep.
Maybe. The intensity is undeniably quite high compared to NSM. But I actually had good results from Pfitz without getting run down by making a few schedule modifications (to 18/55-70) and carefully managing recovery (averaging a little over 8.5 hrs of sleep, almost never getting below 8). Some of the modifications were just “listen to your body” stuff and others were common-sense adjustments to do things like base certain runs more on time than on stipulated mileage (if a guy at 5:15 LT pace could run that 7 scheduled miles of LT, I’d adjust mine to 35-37 minutes instead of 7 miles; in a week with 11 and 15 mile midweek runs, I’d just go 105-110 min for the second). His long run and medium long paces are really dialed back, though. He cautions against letting pace speed up on those when you’re feeling good, and I took that to heart. I also didn’t follow the tune-up race plan as heavily.
Some of the principles I followed for adjustments were more explicit in “faster road Racing” than in “Advanced Marathoning,” although there’s still some good guidance throughout the earlier book. I think it also helped to have gone into that plan after having had a marathon cycle averaging almost 60 mpw and peaking near 70, a standard 4-5-week recovery/rebuild mileage post-race, and then 5 weeks around 52-60 mostly easy and general aerobic, with strides on 2 days, a moderate workout, and a long run around 2 hours or so. Ran a 5k to gauge fitness and freshness. So when I started the Pfitz cycle, I generally had pretty good fitness but was adequately refreshed, and I wasn’t trying to force significant mileage adaptation alongside absorbing that intensity (he cautions about that in earlier chapters in a way that the schedules may not fully reflect).
You could say, then, that I wasn’t really running a Pfitz plan, but nearly all adjustments I made to the cookie-cutter schedules were based on principles set forth in his books.
But then, I had a better result the next cycle after modifying Pfitz further to transfer some mid-week intensity to some faster work late in long runs 4 times over the cycle. Not sure if I would’ve raced as well if I’d just stayed as close to his schedules as I had the previous cycle.
So yeah, NSM is clearly a much more manageable intensity, but I think a lot of the standard older plans offered some context to help runners avoid getting overcooked, but that probably involved a lot of reading between the lines. It looks as though NSM is not only based on principles that are more lifestyle-friendly for the average hobbyjogger (faster or slower), but that the method seems to have better built-in guardrails that are also more visible or beneficial to runners.
Anyone have any feedback on fueling the easy runs? I’ve been feeling great during sub-T sessions with 40~60g carbs/hr, but have never fueled during easy days. I usually run right before lunch so I get my calories in soon after, but I’m thinking of trying gels during my 45~60 mins easy to see if I feel any different (better?). With the cost of the ones I actually stomach well, I want it to be worth it so if there’s any science out there to help me save a few bucks…
Help us build the best running shoe review site for a chance to win a LetsRun t-shirt.Help us build the best running shoe review site for a chance to win one of 10 LetsRun t-shirts.