Help CoachB Break 6:00 For the Mile Before Age 50

Bad Wigins wrote:

training too slow to be efficient at 90s pace! Only way that's gonna work is if you lose 10-20 pounds.

On the bright side, if you can lose 10 - 20 pounds and stay healthy, that may be about all you need to do.

You’re right about the weight and the efficiency at 90 second 400 pace. I’m going to start getting strides in 1-2 times per week. I’ll likely have to hold off on other types of more intense running for now.

Coming up on 2 months injury free, so I’m knocking on wood and just trying to be really careful.

As far as the weight, I stepped on the scale this morning hoping to see a couple of pounds having disappeared, but instead the scale read 189. ?‍♂️

Nice job on the progression coach! Those will pay dividends in getting you strong and ready to run faster. Be patient and build the aerobic system and get your legs in running shape. Bannister started his 400s @ 66 and worked them down to 56, so don't be in a hurry to run goal pace, think 5k first (1:35), and build your Vo2 Max and strength with a slightly slower (1/2-5K) pace first. He used 5k pace for endurance too, and only ran about 28 miles a week according to this article.

I do 8-10X 400s in 1:40> 1:34, 1-1:30 JR, and could probably break 6 if I had to. My goal is to break 20 for the 5K now that I'm 60. Got 20:09 in a 4th of July race, so maybe next year? Slow for the pros on letsrun, but we work with what we were given. :)

https://www.peakendurancesport.com/endurance-training/training-structure-and-planning/sub-4-minute-mile-training-programme/

Mon: AM 3.4 First 1.4 super slow with my tired old dog. Next 2 easy pace. PM. 19 mile road bike. Took advantage of a favorable wind to go after a strava segment. 2 miles of false flat uphill with a little bit of rolling at the end. 22.3 mph average.

Tue: 4.25 miles at 9:30 pace. 134 avg HR. Felt really good

Wed: Lift. John Day Easy Strength style. Resting up for "Long Run" tomorrow.

Thu: 6.4 miles @ 9:04. HR 146 Avg. This would have been a perfect progression run but we had to stop for my buddy to put his dog back on the leash in the last mile.

Fri: AM Mountain Bike 75 minutes. Pretty fun single track stuff with my son. Avg HR 110 PM. Lifted with my son. Went a little crazy on the bench, but did front squat, dead lift, good mornings, back flies, core also.

Sat: "Speed Workout". 1 mile wu, 0.5 miles worth of drills, 3 laps of stride the straight, jog the turn, 1 mile cool down jog back home. First couple of straightaways were about 22-23 seconds. Last one was 20 seconds. Was aiming for 4-6 laps, but hammy kind of twinged at the start of lap 4.

Sun: 7 miles easy spin on levees on mountain bike.

I'm really pleased with the progress I'm making . 3-4 mile runs used to seem like the limit of what I could do before stuff started really hurting. Now they are kind of the baseline easy run. I was pretty happy with the 6.4 miler on Thursday. Ran a little bit faster than I had planned, but it felt really good.

The fact that I can barely drop below 6:00 pace without my hammy grabbing on me is problematic.

Today was the first of 2-4 planned very easy / off days. Then, I'm going to do another mile TT next weekend, aiming for 6:50-7:00. I went 7:17 at the beginning of October but I feel way stronger now, even if I'm mostly doing SLOW running

As far as progressing from here. I think I'll add some more volume next month. I averaged just over 15 mpw during November. I think I'll try to take that to 18-20 mpw in December. I'm going to start trying to add more drills and easy strides OR short sprints with adequate recovery a couple of times a week. I just can't see averaging 22.5 seconds per 100 when a 100 in 20 seconds almost did me in. Granted, I was pretty tired from the extensive warm up and I was keeping my 100m jogs kind of quick, so I was pretty tired when the hammy tightened up on me. For the next month, I'll just work on being able to run well under 6:00 pace for short spurts with lots of recovery.

Once I hit January, I'll have a little over 5 months left to make my goal, so I'll re-assess at that point and maybe start adding in an actual workout once a week.

CoachB

You did too much intensity for your speed workout if you’re hammy tightened up. If doing the same workout I recommend you do a full 2-3 mins of easy jogging before doing a stride. Also many people tend to drastically change their form when doing strides or sprints and that’s how they hurt their hammy. Stay relaxed and keep your stride compact and efficient. People tend to want to stretch and pull their legs through in strides and that’s how they hurt themselves.

What kind of drills are you going?

Have you done deep tissue massage or gun for calves.

Best of luck!

CoachB,

1.) Get yourself a marshmallow stick to roll-out your tight calves. Have someone else do it because it's going to hurt like hell! I really do think this will solve a lot of your calf problems. You have two muscles on your calves (gastroc & soleus). It's probably one or the the other. But, just a couple sessions with the stick will probably release your calves.

2.) Do barefoot exercises & barefoot running (on a safe surface like a soccer field).

3.) Your cycling is NOT running specific. (I used to cycle a lot before I started running. Two different worlds.) You can't pray to two gods! Choose one. (I know I had to & know running is so much better for you. Look at your cycling buddies with their muscular legs & fat bellies. Sheez.)

4.) Don't worry about pace! Run slower. Run more often. This will increase your time on your feet & your overall mileage. (Go back to some Lydiard & see what he says about miles, not pace.) For right now, I'd rather see you run 45 minutes at 10:00 pace than that same mileage at 8:30 or 9:00 minute pace. Worry about time on the feet for now & keep things aerobic.

5.) Soft surface running only (or as much as possible).

6.) Don't worry about workouts now. Just get miles in. I do think you can do top-end speed work only though. 100's, 150's, Flying 30's. All of these are about good form & neuromuscular training as well.

I saw that you were do ins-and-outs (or straights & curves) or whatever you want to call them. Give yourself more rest. I think Lydiard says to start with striding ONE straightaway (100 meters), then jogging the next 300 meters. This will give you both miles & some top-end speedwork too! :-)

7.) Stop drinking. Those are wasted calories. I know when I take some time away from my nightly pint, I shed weight really, really quickly! Surprisingly fast...

Before you think about the 6:00 mile TT, think about getting healthy & getting some miles on your legs.

Hope this helps.

Pro Hobby and HS coach. Both solid pieces of advice. I've been foam rolling the calves daily and that really seems to be helping. I'm totally aware that the ins and outs were too hard. I'll include more rest for the near to medium term future. I probably won't do anything like fly in 30s. That's just too much for right now.

I am going to TT next weekend, provided my hamstring is feeling OK, just to see where I'm at. It's my reward to myself. It's gratifying to see hard numbers on a page after 2 months of good work and it motivates me to keep going. I'm not going to TT every week or anything. Probably do it more like every 4-6 weeks, just to gauge progress.

I'm going to keep riding. I realize that it's not running specific, but I feel that it gives me the opportunity to get a decent circulatory system stimulus with almost no stress on the stuff that is easily injured. My hamstring DOES get tight sometimes after a ride, but it's not the same as the pulls I get when I run. As I get closer to trying to actually run fast, I'll probably phase out the cycling.

As far as drinking goes.....yeah, I should stop entirely. I probably have somewhere between 4-8 drinks per week. Usually 1-2 drinks 2-4 days of the week. Last night was 2 glasses of wine with dinner. For now, I'll just drop it down to a maximum of 2 days per week. Sometimes it's just really nice to have a glass of wine with dinner.

This week was disappointing. The hamstring issue persists. I can still feel it right now. Had a pretty good ride today and will probably do some circuit style lifting that will be somewhat aerobically challenging this evening

Mon: 11 miles on the mountain bike, easy

Tues: Off (planned)

Wed: Tried to run, aborted after .75 miles because hammy grabbed on me. Walked home. didn't do anything else that day, moped around depressed.

Thur: AM Metabolic Strength Circuit. 20 min of HIIT type lifting and body weight stuff. Got pukey at the end. PM. 30 min spin on the trainer in my garage.

Fri: AM 30 min on the trainer with 6 x 3 min CV type effort, 1 min easy

Sat: 8.6 miles moderately hard on the mountain bike on levees. Busy most of the day didn't have time for longer ride so went kind of hard.

Sun: 15.6 miles on the mountain bike on levees. Windy as hell. Chose a route that has lots of loose sand sections. Doing those into the wind was kind of like climbing. Rode 3 minutes faster than I did on the same route back in early October despite the wind, so I feel like I've gained aerobic fitness

12/7 AM: 30 minute on trainer, with 2 x 8 min Tempo intervals + 1 x 3 min Threshold. PM 20 min of circuit style lifting

12/8 AM 1.5 mile run in 18:00, no pain in hamstring, although it was little more than shuffling. PM 35 min easy to moderate on mtb on levees

12/9 AM 20 min Circuit style lifting, including segments on the rower. PM 30 min on mtb on levees, moderate with a few harder sections.

12/10 AM 2.4 miles easy in 26:07. No pain, hamstring feeling better. Still a little tight though. PM: Circuit style lifting, Nike Training App, shoulder sculpt. This was pretty hard 26 minutes

12/11: AM 2.54 miles easy. 26:07. Hammy feeling better but still some tightness. PM 30 minutes on trainer, easy to moderate.

12/12 AM: 4.5 miles easy to moderate. 43:18. PM. Lifting, John Day Easy Strength Style

12/13 AM: 55 minutes on trainer with tempo efforts of 2 x 8 min +1 x 10 min. Pedaled easy in between until HR came back under 130. PM (planned) 15 min of core type stuff.

Pretty good week. Distance numbers are going to look bad because bike stuff was on the MTB, or on the trainer, but I was able to get a pretty good effort in each time. I've switched most of the strength training to a more aerobic, circuit style.

Saturday's run was good, but it was the first real run I've done in a little over 2 weeks. Hammy got a little tight in last mile so I had to slow down quite a bit, but it felt better after rolling and stretching,

Today's effort on the bike was good. I was going to ride easy for 2:00 to 2:30, but it was pouring rain, so I got on the trainer and got almost an hour of pretty solid mid range aerobic effort.

I should be able to bring the amount of running back up this week. I'm going to keep everything easy to moderate for the rest of the month. No hard strides or anything like that. Maybe some drills and easy strides with full recovery just to keep things interesting.

Pretty good week

12/14 AM: 3.23 @ 9:59 pace. A little tired from yesterday

12/15 AM 4.36 miles at 10:01 pace. (1.5 easy with the dog at 11:00 pace then the rest at about 9:20P PM. Circuit style lifting 28 min. Kind of challenging

12/16 AM 3.52 @ 9:53 pace. Included drills and strides into the run. PM 90 minutes moderate on MTB on levees. 20.1 miles, avg HR 126

12/17: AM 31 min on trainer really easy effort (HR 122 avg.) PM Lift, John Day Easy Strength style.

12/18: AM 4.02 miles. 1.5 easy with dog then the rest at about 9:00 pace, still felt pretty easy.

12/19: AM 5.17 @ 49:10. First 1.5 easy with dog. Then 2.54 @ 8:21 pace (21:11) then cool down at 10 min pace PM. John Day Easy Strength x 2

12/20: 45 min easy pedaling around the neighborhood with my son who is home from school for the break. (7.4 miles avg HR 110)

Really good week. First time over 20 miles in years. Calf was a little twingy after Saturday's run.

Wednesday I discovered that my posterior chain is weak compared to anterior despite all the good mornings and other hamstring exercises I do. Throwing drills and strides into the run left hammies and glutes feeling pretty fatigued.

Saturday was a great run. The tempo effort 2.54 smooth and controlled but the calf did get tight toward the end. 8:21 average. At the beginning of October I went 8:31 for 20 minutes and it wiped me out....felt close to race effort. So, 10 seconds faster per mile with way less effort. I call that a win.

Another good week. Legs feeling pretty worked. Time for a drop week, which works out well because we'll be traveling for much of it.

12/21 AM 4.7 miles rolling hills. 8:58 pace. CV efforts on the uphills, easy/moderate on the rest. PM. Solid lifting session. Bench, squat, clean, incline, pull ups, good mornings, core

12/22 AM 3.43 @ 10:35 pace. Half with dog very slow, then half easy at just under 10:00 pace.

12/23: 4.06 @ 9:37 pace. Calf tightened up about a mile in. Was going to bag the rest of the run but it loosened back up.

12/24: Solid lifting session similar to Monday.

12/25: AM 4.5 miles at 9:34 pace. PM 30 minutes easy spin on trainer

12/26: 6.5 miles progression 8:51 avg. Splits of: 9:25, 9:07, 8:57, 8:48, 8:28, 8:42 (had to wait to cross a busy street), 8:06 for last 0.5. This was really hard. Bagged the weights session after.

12/27: AM. Easy ride on mtb on levees, 9 miles 37:30. I may lift later today.

I feel like I'm making progress, but calf has been a little tight all week. Monday was kind of hard, especially since I had the good tempo run 2 days prior. I was a little worried about yesterday's run, so I did it progression style so that I could sort of ease into the faster paces. It worked out well but I'm really sore right now.

Crappy Week! 12/26 turned out to be WAY too hard. I tried to do some low volume, easy sprint drills while I was taking easy days, but those just served to make me more tight.

12/28: warmed up with 10 min of sprint drills (mach, high knee, butt kick, etc...) then lifted 47 min total

12/29: 1.45 @ 11:17 per mile

12/30: AM 3.5 @ 10:05 PM: Mtn Bike 5.5 miles, some hills

12/31: Mtn Bike 8.5 miles, 870 feet of climbing, muddy, fire roads. Pretty good effort.

1/1: Mtn Bike 11.5 miles, mostly road, 400 foot climb from mile 9.5 to mile 10.5, the rest was flat or downhill.

1/2: 1.5 easy + 4 x 50 uphill stride @ about goal mile intensity. (legs feeling a little better).

1/3: 3.04 Easy @ 9:36 (first time I felt OK all week). PM. Will do some circuit style lifting.

Lesson learned. Just because I've been having a few good workouts and starting to seem some improvement is not an excuse to do a 1 hour run that ended up being nearly all out. 3 more weeks of gradually increasing volume, keep the intensity relatively low. Maybe a few strides and drills here and there. Maybe 2-3 easy tempo efforts during the next 3 weeks.

Almost any road will take one to sub-6. Be active and get body fat sub-15%.

One could train 100% as did Lon Myers, (100 to 200) yard repeats. One could train 100% as did Oprah W. in her Marathon days, (5 to 10) miles jogged at (9 to 11) minutes per mile.

Play hockey, play basketball, play tennis, play soccer &/or Nordic ski., etc. Just be active and do not be fat.

1/4: AM Off, didn't feel well. PM, Lift, John Day easy strength

1/5: AM, 4 miles @ 10:00 per mile (first 1.5 super slow with dog, next 2.5 @ 9:30 ish. PM 7.5 easy spin on mtb on levees.

1/6: AM: 3.53 @ 9:21. Included 5 x 30 seconds @ about 2 mile effort. PM: Core, push ups, prisoner squats, good mornings - 18 minutes continuous circuit.

1/7: AM: 4.5 miles @ 10:10 (1.5 slow, 3.0 @ 9:35), PM Easy spin on mtb, 5.9 miles

1/8: AM 4.0 @ 9:38. PM Off

1/9: AM 3.5 @ 9:21 + 4 x 130m stride @ about mile date pace (6:40 ish), jog back recovery, PM Lift easy

1/10: AM Road bike, 22.8 miles @ 17.1 avg. HR avg 124

Probably will take the afternoon off, maybe I'll do some Jay Johnson SAM stuff just to loosen up.

Wednesday was kind of good. It checked a couple of boxes for me. The accelerations were pretty easy, but I made sure to keep the pace up in between them, so the second half of the run ended up being somewhat of an aerobic challenge as well.

Saturday was really good. I'm cognizant of trying to keep my HR at the low 140s or under. It seems to be keeping me injury free. I'm finally starting to notice my pace getting faster even while keeping the HR low. Strides felt good but hamstrings are still tight.

In general, my posterior chain always feels like it's the week link, whether it's hamstrings or calves. I do lots of stuff for it (good morning, toe touch, etc...) but it never seems to get to the point where I'm not having to baby something back there.

You can never run a 6 minute mile by running at 9-10 minute pace. Run fast first and the increase the distance.

Sham 69 wrote:

You can never run a 6 minute mile by running at 9-10 minute pace. Run fast first and the increase the distance.

IDK about that.

the calculators have my easy pace at low 10s and moderate pace at low 9s based on what I think I could do for 1 mile right now (probably 6:50ish)

I did start "running fast" a couple of weeks ago. See the strides on Saturday and the surges on Wednesday. The plan is that when I can do strides at 6:00 pace without feeling like I'm going to pull something, I'll start doing more of them, or lengthening them out into actual repetitions. So, I'm already working on your suggestion.

1/11 AM 4.26 @ 9:14, PM lift

1/12 AM 4.5 @ 10:28 pace. SORE from too many squats yesterday

1/13 AM 3.53 @ 10:10 (Calf started hurting last mile, practically walked in) PM. Lift

1/14 AM Jay Johnson SAM PM Pedaled around easy on MTB for 5 miles

1/15 OFF, calf sore

1/16 AM Easy 15 min jog to test calf. + Jay Johnson SAM + Weights PM 9.5 miles moderate on MTB (39 min)

1/17: 21.4 miles on road bike with 35 ish minutes moderately hard.

The week started great! Monday's run felt really good. Finished at sub 8 mile pace. Did too much squat / SL dead lift type stuff in the afternoon. Hamstrings really sore Tuesday which sort of slid down into my calf by Wednesday.

Friday's ride kind of salvaged the week with a fairly high end aerobic effort.

Calf still kind of hurts when I walk up the stairs. Probably ride again tomorrow since I have the day off and should be able to spend some time on the bike. Hopefully I'm ready to roll again by Tuesday.

CoachB, this is awesome and all the best in your training.

Here are a few things to consider baking in to your build-up for sub-6min glory. This is from another coach who wants you to succeed.

1. Augment your strength routine to mainly emphasize single leg strengthening and balance and then core (include the back!) but do away with anything that builds mass.

2. Get on the foam roller in the mornings before your run sessions. As coaches we love to tell our athletes to take care of the legs, but when its our turn, we like to start sounding like an 80s marathoner who doesn't believe in self-care other than a post-run can of beer.

3. Find some grass and take your shoes off and run barefoot during warm up or cool down once or twice a week, then throw the trainers back on and remember what its like to have the micro-muscles of your feet firing properly. This might help with your calf seizes too as long as you are super gentle and good on electrolytes.

4. Get in the rinse-repeat habit of sandwiching each run session with carbs (pre-) and then protein (post-), maybe even going as far as to invest in liquid formulas of those like gu or something. Doing this for a single day feels like a waste but doing it religiously for 3 weeks and you realize just how much a difference it makes when targeting a goal.

Reason I emphasize all the things AROUND training is because we often as coaches get desensitized to the framework that makes up healthy stimulus and healing in our own lives. Best wishes, CoachN

Thanks CoachN!

2. I foam roll and stretch after every run and most other workouts as well.

4. Benefits of eating carbs prior? Is there some sort of injury prevention I’m not aware of? Fueling is not an issue for me on 4 mile runs and honestly, running in a fasted state in the AM is probably a win for weight management for me. I usually have plain Greek yogurt with fruit and granola afterwards

I believe there is injury prevention is being generous with nutrition pre- and post- workout. I don't have the time right now to dredge up the propellor hat science on why but suffice to say that you will no doubt, over weeks and months, be more consistent in your efforts and overall training.

I would let your goal inform you training. I am training for a sub-6min mile. Let's train.

Then let your training, specifically being consistent, we're talking weeks and months, inform your gradual weight loss. I have not missed a workout in 2 months. Oh, and I have lost 2-4 lbs.

And then let your weight loss inform your...well...nothing. :)

Let weight loss be a byproduct of a well-formulated hierarchy of priorities. I have found that this ultimately is a healthy and strategic way of tiering priorities so that weight loss does not become an undo preoccupation.

It's like looking at a faint star; weight loss.

You can't see it if you look directly at it, but if you turn your eyes slightly off to the side, there it is.

Just my .02

You are a kind and thoughtful voice on here so take or leave my advice, just sharing.