What's Happened to runners these days?

I agree with you.

The excuses in the recent thread "high mileage is easier..." are very funny.

People waste hours every day on Facebook, Instagram, let's run, watching BS on TV etc but claim they don't have 3-4 extra hours a week to run doubles because they have a job or a family. They are often also very arrogant towards those who commit to training a lot with their "get a life" sort of thinking.

Besides, running is a very cheap sport and doable everywhere in the world. You don't need a soccer field or a swimming pool or any sport facilities. (a track is helpfull but not mandatory)

There is no excuse. The only reasons someone cannot do 10 hours of training are :

1 - the person is quite new to running and is building towards 10h/week

2 -the person is not motivated enough/lazy which is fine but don't say you can't because of this and that.

What would you call 12 hours of dedicated time? 1 hour of strength three times a week? Thats 9 hours of running left. Foam rolling and other injury prevention 30 minutes a day? thats 3.5 hours off. 5.5 hours of running left. Sleeping 9 hours a night (which is at least an hour more than the average person?) that's 7 hours off. -2.5 hours of running left. ~15 minutes of changing and warming up before runs x 7 days = 1:45 hours off.

-4:15 hours of running left

Thing is, running takes more time than just the running if you want to do it right. I agree with you that running 10 hours a week on top of those little things is possible for the average person. But most people just don't want to dedicate about 25 hours a week towards running faster, especially not when they don't have a chance at going to the Olympics and are over collegiate age.

Probably because they spend 10-12 hours a week trolling this forum?

Yep, spot on. that thread was a real highlight but i've noticed on a few general training advice threads lately people bashing the additional mileage. I just think it's common sense with every sport out there that the more time you put into practice, the better you become. Running is no different and is probably one of the best ones out there for seeing a return on the time you put into it.

I agree that new runners need to take a fair bit of time to gradually build to that 10 hour mark but i'd argue it's probably the best thing they could do long term. Big fancy workouts off 40 miles per week don't bring much to the table and yet you see loads of runners bragging about how fast they can nail a training session during the low mileage but will never get anywhere near their potential as they simply do not dedicate enough time to running.

Running as a sport for the masses has continued to increase. There are more people running as a hobby, social activity, or main sport than ever before. There has been an explosion in the number and availability of running events. There are an abundance of events for every category of runner, and there appears to be a growth in membership of Running Clubs.

However the times from the leading pack are not as fast as say 30 years ago, and there does seem to be more injuries.

There has been talk on these threads about how elites do not record all of their easy miles. Back in the day, it was normal, to run to school/college and home, run to work and home, run to the shops/meet friends etc. None of this mileage was recorded as training mileage, but over a week it could be substantial, and must have had a training impact. We now have the opposite extreme, where walking the dog is being recorded on Strava!

It is obvious that most runners are not reaching their potential. There are many reasons including lack of committment, but many are totally sold on the idea that all they have to work on is speed, and endurance comes from the one long run per week. A typical week, for a recreational runner, is 3 to 4 runs, all run too hard, and no easy runs. Some do achieve decent times from this approach, and then they get injured.........

My issue is more with the people who think doing stacks of miles at 9-10 minute miling is actually beneficial. Nope. Your 2 hour 10 miler is junk.

trollism wrote:

My issue is more with the people who think doing stacks of miles at 9-10 minute miling is actually beneficial. Nope. Your 2 hour 10 miler is junk.

It depends on the level of runner. There are many doing stacks of miles at 7-8 min/miles who would be better off doing more miles at 9-10 min/miles.

Your 10 miles in 2 hours is junk, granted. but doing an easy 10 mile run in 90 minutes has plenty of benefit to a lot of runners. I know a 2:20 marathon runner who runs no quicker than 8-9 min/mile on all his easy runs. And i also know a 20 minute 5km runner who runs all his easy runs 7-8 min/mile. His easy miles being too fast = junk.

Alfie wrote:

However the times from the leading pack are not as fast as say 30 years ago, .

This, at least until covid19 hit, was because there were so many freaking races. Competition has become so diluted. There might be 5 races in any given city on the same weekend, maybe more for big cities. There are more fast runners and a whole lot more slow ones than 30 years ago.

_________________

10 hours a week is a minimum, but those who are there and still not seeing the success they wish for, should move to 14, then 17 if they're still not getting there. This requires cutting out all the dumb stuff people do outside of running.

trollism wrote:

My issue is more with the people who think doing stacks of miles at 9-10 minute miling is actually beneficial. Nope. Your 2 hour 10 miler is junk.

You say 9-10 and then use an example with a 12 min/mile pace?

very eays for me to take the opposite stance that people afraid of running 7 minute miles are the snowflakes

flvmmox wrote:

very eays for me to take the opposite stance that people afraid of running 7 minute miles are the snowflakes

It is not the pace of easy miles that is important, but the effort/intensity.

Most would agree that the majority of miles should be at an intensity of, say less than 75% of max hr. For some that may be 6 min/miles, fine, for others that may be 9 min miles, also fine.

For the record here, i'm not calling out peoples easy run pace. More the fact that most aren't running a sufficient amount each week. If your easy pace is 7:00 and you're running 10 hours a week and doing a mixture of paces, terrains distances etc. then good for you. But if you're not running that much each week then you're better off addressing that element before anything else in my opinion.

You may find you'll need to slow down a bit to add more volume in the beginning.

Tim.12345 wrote:

What would you call 12 hours of dedicated time? 1 hour of strength three times a week? Thats 9 hours of running left. Foam rolling and other injury prevention 30 minutes a day? thats 3.5 hours off. 5.5 hours of running left. Sleeping 9 hours a night (which is at least an hour more than the average person?) that's 7 hours off. -2.5 hours of running left. ~15 minutes of changing and warming up before runs x 7 days = 1:45 hours off.

-4:15 hours of running left

Thing is, running takes more time than just the running if you want to do it right. I agree with you that running 10 hours a week on top of those little things is possible for the average person. But most people just don't want to dedicate about 25 hours a week towards running faster, especially not when they don't have a chance at going to the Olympics and are over collegiate age.

Yikes, why waste 3 hours a week on strength training? Not needed if you run more and vary the surfaces and paces and run hills.

Why spend 30 minutes on foam rolling, there is no proof it actually does anything to prevent injury?

Run more, stop being a poser.

+1

You get better at running by running. Don’t waste your time doing all that crap. Hit the hilly trails once or twice a week to build some strength. Get an hours massage in once a fortnight and you’re good. Slow down in training if you’re getting injured all the time.

10-12 hours just for running alone each week is a lot.

Probably a lot of world class marathon runners are not doing more.

Chances are that Joe Average will get injured.

But hey, keep running 10-12 hours a week and report back.

You’re a classic example of what the OP is on about. World class marathon runners are doing 120mpw at least and they’re probably doing it in 10-12 hours. Average joe could do 70-80 in 10 hours and do pretty well.

Its less than 2 hours a day. You think an hour a day with a long run on the weekend is too much? My guess is you spend double that watching Netflix.

lol wut wrote:

Its less than 2 hours a day. You think an hour a day with a long run on the weekend is too much? My guess is you spend double that watching Netflix.

But Netflix watching is not that hard on the body. You forgot that little detail.