Worth trying a Canova-style plan on 50mpw?

Sorry by this year I mean 2021

It will not be a Canova-style on 50mi/week.

What you can do is include Canova-style workouts.

Pfitzinger has a plan for a minimum of 55 mi/week for marathon runners. Might be worth having a look.

PS: watch out for Canova's "special blocks". They are extremely hard.

Not to be rude, but it won’t be a Canova style plan with that much mileage.

His workouts are designed for athletes who have undergone many years of training at a high level.

To do workouts that Canova has designed without the proper mileage history and current weekly mileage that his athletes do will not be Canova training.

Canova’s training is extremely hard, sometimes deceptively so.

My advice is to find yourself a knowledgeable coach, whether online or in person, and work towards your goals with a long term approach in mind.

This is coming from someone who has tried to do a self designed Canova inspired training plan in the past. I wouldn’t recommend it.

hehe )) wrote:

It will not be a Canova-style on 50mi/week.

What you can do is include Canova-style workouts.

Pfitzinger has a plan for a minimum of 55 mi/week for marathon runners. Might be worth having a look.

Thank you I have just ordered the book from Amazon, have heard of Pfitzinger and wondered if it might be worth a look.

Kenaneeser Beckelay wrote:

Not to be rude, but it won’t be a Canova style plan with that much mileage.

His workouts are designed for athletes who have undergone many years of training at a high level.

To do workouts that Canova has designed without the proper mileage history and current weekly mileage that his athletes do will not be Canova training.

Canova’s training is extremely hard, sometimes deceptively so.

My advice is to find yourself a knowledgeable coach, whether online or in person, and work towards your goals with a long term approach in mind.

This is coming from someone who has tried to do a self designed Canova inspired training plan in the past. I wouldn’t recommend it.

Not rude at all, you answered exactly what I asked. It was the mileage history bit in particular that made me think I might not be able to make any of it work (without injury) I don't want to waste my time trying to create something quite complicated that won't work if something more simple and frankly, safer, will do the job! Thanks

This is how I adapted Canova principles for a hobby jogger's marathon and HM buildup, along with results and notes.

https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=9053627

Canovaquestion wrote:

hehe )) wrote:

It will not be a Canova-style on 50mi/week.

What you can do is include Canova-style workouts.

Pfitzinger has a plan for a minimum of 55 mi/week for marathon runners. Might be worth having a look.

Thank you I have just ordered the book from Amazon, have heard of Pfitzinger and wondered if it might be worth a look.

Great decision Pfitzinger can lead you to the promised land.

Interesting question. I’ve done some thinking about what amateurs can take away from Canova, partly just as a thought experiment, and here are some things that Canova says that I think are worth looking at with respect to the kind of question you're asking. The quotes below were collected from a document that somebody else compiled from Canova’s comments on a series of Letsrun threads. Thanks to that person and apologies for anything that I may have inadvertently misquoted. My comments are just that, my comments.

First, a caveat:

“A coach good for every athlete and for every kind of age and of value doesn't exist. I have problem, now, when I speak about the activity of very young people, and also when I speak about the activity of an amateur, because in my mind the normal level of talent, of training-sessions, of professionalism, and so of intensity in training, are very different from the level of basic activity, and it's not possible to do in miniature the same training of a champion for a normal athlete.

“Simply, they are two different things.”

That being said:

“Many of you look at training in the specific period of a season, and when the career is already well defined. Instead, the problem is to look at the beginning of their activity.

But the problem is: how we can prepare our body for working so hard in that direction ?

Under this point of view, an aerobic base is indispensable.

You must learn running very slow for running very fast.

But the real problem is: how much was the mileage and, better, what was the system of training when he was very young, in other words, how did he build his "aerobic house" ?

Every man needs from 10 to 12 years for building his "aerobic house". If you are Gebre, your house may be a skyscraper 60 floors high; if you are a non talented amateur, may be a small house of only 2 floors. But, in any case, you need more than 10 years for changing your attitudes, your physiology, your mind. After this period (I repeat, 10-12 years), also if you don't train more with big volume you don't lose your qualities, that are CONSOLIDATED.

When you arrive at that level, the best road is to reduce the volume of general training (that cannot give you any advantage, but can increase the wear and tear of your body and the risk of some injury) having the focus of improving yet a little in the volume of "specific training".

For example, speaking about a marathon runner, if you want to build your base for a big future race, and you are 18y old, you can increase your weekly mileage (connected with "general training") in this way (attention, is only an example) :

18 years : 60 miles (80% general + 20% specific)

19 years : 70 miles (80% + 20%)

20 years : 80 miles (80% + 20%)

21 years : 100 miles (75% + 25%)

22 years : 120 miles (75% + 25%)

23 years : 140 miles (75% + 25%)

24 years : 140 miles (70% + 30%)

25 years : 150 miles (70% + 30%)

26 years : 150 miles (65% + 35%)

27 years : 150 miles (60% + 40%)

28 years : 160 miles (60% + 40%)

29 years : 150 miles (55% + 45%)

30 years : 140 miles (50% + 50%)

32 years : 120 miles (40% + 60%)

35 years : 80 miles (20% + 80%)

We must look at the period good for putting hay in the farm, not at the period during which you use this hay.”

Note: Canova is talking about the development and career training arc of an elite athlete starting from the age of eighteen. That being said, I think the upshot for an amateur who wants to draw on Canova’s approach is that you should start by focusing on what Canova considers “general” training, which is primarily, though not exclusively, directed toward “building the aerobic house.” You can do a modest amount of what Canova considers “specific” training – i.e., what people are generally talking about when they talk about “Canova-style” training – but that shouldn’t be the main point of emphasis. Looking at the arc that Canova lays out, moreover, the initial progression appears to emphasize increasing the volume of training, not the proportional emphasis on “specific” training.

So, if the OP has been running 50 miles a week over course of the past year, the primary goal might be to run 60 miles a week over the next year, and 70 miles a week over the year after that, while doing some “specific” training but only as a distinctly secondary emphasis. (It’s not entirely clear what the %s mean, but I think it makes the most sense to look at them in terms of relative emphasis. So, over the course of those first three years, you would be 80% focused on “general” training and 20% focused on “specific” training.)

Of course, there’s a big difference between what this progression would look like for someone who is starting as an eighteen-year-old aspiring elite and someone who is starting as a mid-30s amateur! Those two paths are definitely going to diverge. Still, I think the underlying point holds: until you have fully “built your aerobic house" - something that most amateurs probably never do! - the most important and beneficial training is the “general” training that contributes toward that end. That being said, there will be a point in each training cycle where it makes sense to take the fitness you have been able to develop and sharpen it with an appropriate amount of “specific” training, and a similar point will probably come in your running career, too.

Finally, one more quote from this thread

:

“Personally, I never met a scientist that was good coach, because they want to use athlete in function of training, not training in function of the athletes. Don’t forget that the most important problem to solve is to make easy what is difficult, and for this goal we need to be very simple, natural in our approach, bringing our athletes to train more without too much pressure from hard workouts. That’s the reason because too much hard training is a mistake, because athletics become a continuous examination, no more a pleasure. You can train hard preserving the ability of enjoying training, instead too many times athletes think that training is a must, and lose their nervous energies in fighting in training. Many runners leave good result in practice but have little energy for good result in races. Under this point of view, we have much to learn from African runners. When we are able to learn from them, we can teach our runners not to train too hard and have gas in the tank for races. I teach my runners that gas must be in the tank for you to drive the car. If the athlete is always taking gas from the tank then he will be on empty soon and not be able to run fast when it is the time to do so. That is why my training puts gas in the tank and progression is important. Yes, it is true that at the end of season my athletes use gas with ‘el medio’ workouts and other hard tempo tests. But it is after the gas tank is full that we can even start to think about this type of training.”

As others have said, it won't be Canova training on that sort of mileage but I took some of his ideas when doing 60 mpw marathon training.

The idea of a funnel, starting with high speed and long easy runs and gradually moving to race specific pace training (coming into the funnel) as the target race approached.

Double session days. I felt these were really beneficial and as I was doing relatively low mileage I could always allow adequate recovery. Often these were a hard session in the morning (e.g. 10x 1km, 10km tempo) and a MP fartlek in the evening (getting used to running MP on tired legs). This isn't really like Canova sessions but just the idea of a double session day.

Anyway, it worked for me. I'd also done a few cycles of Pfitz previously, which I think is a great place to start.

If you think about what “Canova” training is, think about how it differs from other coaches.

He takes a different approach, but many of the ideologies are similar at the top level.

I’m doing 50-60 mpw for 1500 races this spring. I would say I’m following a Canova inspired plan, although translated that is more recognizable to American runners

Base phase: 8 weeks, 4 two week cycles. One threshold workout per week. Alternate marathon paced tempo run and a faster (5k-10k) pace workout every week. Medium long run on the weeks without tempos, long run that gets progressive when you feel good. Hill sprints strides etc.

This is pretty much what Canova recommends, paces might be a little faster or slower, but very very similar.

If you want to train for the half marathon and marathon the base phase is going to look very similar if you are running the same volume. Maybe do a tempo run every week, it’s hard to say. The key comes in shifting from the fundamental phase to the special and specific phases.

If the fundamental phase is working extremes of paces (hill sprints and long tempos) then the special phase is narrowed slightly, and the specific phase even more so, but narrowed doesn’t mean less volume or cutting things out, just higher volume of paces closer to race pace

Hobbyjogger here,

One thing I’ve adopted from Canova’s post are “quick” long runs during base training. I use a “85-90%” of goal pace for these workouts... so convert your realistic goal pace to seconds, then multiply by 1.1 and then convert back for your 90% pace. They end up being a moderately hard effort (though, some of that is b/c it is hot summer weather while I’m doing base).

My laymen’s summary of the philosophy:

1. Base/intro phase: build mileage, do aerobic work, do some neuromuscular stuff (eg strides / hill sprints)

2. Support phase: converge your different types of workouts to more directly support you goal race pace. Eg do some 10k/hm type workouts at paces ~”105%” of goal pace (multiply by 0.95), get long runs in with a good volume of 90-95% race pace mixed in.

3. Specific phase: emphasize workouts @close to race pace. A workout series from another thread starts with alternation workouts that avg ~mp (e.g. 5 sets 5k @ 100% mp then 1k @ 90%mp). Later workouts are longer continuous pace runs, e.g a 30k @ 100%mp closer to the end of the buildup. I can’t manage these specific workouts with the moderate mileage I do, they’re much harder than the peak workouts from the various running books I have (e.g. a Pfitz plan has 20miles w/12@mp as one of the peak workouts). I wouldn’t attempt Canova’s special block/specific block stuff unless I had a few years of high mileage under my belt.

Thanks all for the info, really interesting and has given me a lot to think about. The faster long runs is definitely something I'd like to explore . Absolutely no special blocks though! I think my legs would fall off.

OK, so I've read what the other responders put and it doesn't surprise me. Thing is (the annoying JS plug aside - does this guy have any shame?), they are recommending exactly what you are tending to be skeptical of: short intervals with long runs. That's what Pfitz is - actually, it's what JS is too, now that I think about it a moment. Find Nate Jenkins discussion of Pfitzinger vs Canova on blogspot. It should be easy to find and it will get you to a variety of other well-explained discussions about marathon specific work.

What I'm about to write disagrees with most of the posters above. They suggest if you're not over 100mpw, or really 120, it's not Canova. But what Nate Jenkins and, largely through his explanations, myself realized is that the one most significant difference between the modern training developed by Canova and the training popularly used by Americans the last few decades, is marathon specific work.

That's why that particular post was what I told you to find first. It shows why typical American training, of which Pfitz is a great example is less than ideal.

What you CAN do without getting the mileage up to something unattainable for you and I is to incorporate the most important marathon specific workouts from Canova. You're overall mileage won't be what the pros do, but that will largely be because the easy days will have less volume. If you read through one of the complete training cycles Renato has posted here, you'll see Mosop et. al. are getting close to 20 miles on their easy days - i.e., days with no specific marathon focused workout but rather days that are in between such hard workout days. But your hard days will be similar to what they're doing. Slower, to be sure, but if you add a couple minutes per mile to those big workouts, I can do them. I'll do 5 and 6 mile easy days in between, some medium-hard days with strides or some faster running, and end up with around 60mpw. By the way, I'm similar in ability to you.

So here's the kind of thing I'm planning for my next marathon cycle:

1 mile warm-up.

15 X 1 mile at MP, 1/2 mile easy in between each.

1 mile cool-down.

24 total, could slice off 2 of those for 21 total, 13 MP.

3 X 8 miles.

1 easy, 2 moderate (~7:30 for me), last @ MP (~7:10)

Short WU + CD for close to marathon distance.

1 mile warm-up.

6 X 3 miles at MP, 1/2 mile easy in between.

1 mile cool-down.

22+ total. 18 MP.

1 mile warm-up.

12 miles @ 7:30

1 mile easy.

6 @ MP (7:10-7;15)

1 mile easy.

3 miles @ 7:00

1 mile cool-down.

25 total.

17 at MP.

20+ with WU + CD.

Now, these are very hard workouts. They will be 10 days apart minimum. Hopefully I'm not mocked for my paces. I am quite a bit older than you and perhaps most of the readers of this. I could go under 3 as a teenager, but, you know how age is! Like I said, I'm in your ball park talent-wise and trying to get what I can out of myself. This is all during the last 10 weeks.

I you take goal MP to 5:00 or 4:40, this resembles something the best of the best might do. Of course, they will have more easy running in between. 7 is about what I can do now and have it be truly an easy day, which is to say, I'm stronger the next day as opposed to needing more recovery. I don't doubt plenty of Kenyans at 60 years old wouldn't be the same! And they will be ripping off some less marathon specific track work in between those very long sessions such as I described. I will do something like:

Long, hard, marathon specific workout.

5 easy days.

Hill sprints or strides with a little bit of HM pace tempo running befor and/or after.

3 easy days.

Another marathon specific day from the list above.

Some will say these workout aren't EXACTLY what Canova prescribes. Some will say they are close, and are very specific, but overall it's not that similar because the mileage is lower and there are not that many hard days. Some will ridicule the paces and ability of those like us and say this has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with one of Renato's superstars.

Nevertheless, and again, Jenkins is who convinced me of this and put it in a way that made sense to me, this type of work is what sets the new wave of East African stars apart from the generations before. Folks used to train for a 10k with a 20 miler thrown in here and there. Pfitzinger's book actually codified this American-style system as well as anyone does. Do I really need a bunch of short intervals at 5k or 10k specific paces? Or do I need hard running after having run 20 miles already? We can all take from Canova.

Good luck!

This is what I mentioned he adapts a typical American schedule (Pfitz) to be more Canova-like. Exactly what you were wondering in the OP it seems. What he comes up with is still a little too condensed, which is to say, too many hard workouts too close together for me, anyway. He addresses that down in the comments: as you age you need more time in between. I certainly noticed that about the time I turned 50.

One of Nate's most entertaining stories. Very inspirational.

One last on the same topic we've been discussing. It's about a very good pro runner, not you or me, but it's also about the good Americans and how they're not training like the very best East Africans, i.e., more like Canova suggests. In the comment is a brilliant post in which the writer wonders whether American marathoners train like they are getting ready for a shorter track race because it's the type of training they learned in high school, college, or earlier in their careers. Does this explain the notion of doing a set of hard quarters on the track when what you really need is 8 miles of hard running 18 into a run (just to throw out a more marathon-specific example)?

Remind me of Gregg Lemos Stein from Cloud 259.com, who had hired Nate Jenkins to make him a sceme for his sub3

I agree with a lot of what you say. I think Canova's principles can be adapted to hobby jogger-level talent and mileage, and that some of the most important principles include extension of speed, and high modulation of hard and easy efforts.

But the workouts you list seem to be beyond what a serious amateur runner could complete or even should attempt. I've done similar workouts, but 4 x 3 miles at MP and 14 miles at MP were the limit for me on my last few buildups. Trying to go beyond that was too big of an injury risk (and 5 x 4K did results in injury on one buildup).

If you've done similar workouts in a recent marathon buildup, what workouts did you actually do, and what was the end result?

sample #49 wrote:

I agree with a lot of what you say. I think Canova's principles can be adapted to hobby jogger-level talent and mileage, and that some of the most important principles include extension of speed, and high modulation of hard and easy efforts.

But the workouts you list seem to be beyond what a serious amateur runner could complete or even should attempt. I've done similar workouts, but 4 x 3 miles at MP and 14 miles at MP were the limit for me on my last few buildups. Trying to go beyond that was too big of an injury risk (and 5 x 4K did results in injury on one buildup).

If you've done similar workouts in a recent marathon buildup, what workouts did you actually do, and what was the end result?

Well, my last build-up was just before everything got weird and cancelled, so although I don't have a result to show, I was in great shape on March 15. I was looking at a race a few weeks out still. I had time to do a couple more key workouts and taper.

But I have done stuff like this in earlier cycles. I've dabbled in different things like 4X4 miles. I have done a ladder intended to be similar to Canova's 6-5-4-3-2-1 km. I just used miles, like 4 hard, 1/2 easy, 3-1/2 hard, 1/2 easy, 3 hard, 1/2 easy, and so on. One I have returned to a couple times was the 3X8 mile. It just happens to work on a course I run where it's that length. I chocked on the last one a while back but early this year I pulled it off just like I'd hoped. So here was the difference compared to earlier years:

I did more stuff in what Renato would call the Special phase that set me up for these long workouts. One thing I did pretty recently, not really even training for anything specific, is a 21 miler with a hard 13-1/4 miler late in the run, like there's only 1-1/4 to go after that, so just a cool-down. So that hard part ends at around 20, so that's not incredibly marathon -specific.

But what I did do in that cycle last winter was a run on that same route with 5-1/2 hard (maybe a little better than MP) at the end. Well, a little jogging at the end, but the 2nd hard part ended at about the 26 mark. Yeah, it was hard, but if workouts such as the one I did this fall are routine, that last one is not an enormous jump. (These distances seem odd. That's sort of due to where I did the runs in question. Park here, it's 5-1/2 that way out-and-back. It's 15 that way, but 13-1/4 if you start the watch at this junction, etc,)

And another factor you can consider, because I believe you can do workouts of this sort. I'm not doing them in a packed week with other hard efforts only 1 or 2 before and then 2 or 3 days after. That theoretical 10 day block I mentioned is sort of an ideal scenario. Maybe they're farther apart than that. But look, could you do that build-up I posted with the workouts at the following intervals?

10 weeks, 8 weeks, 6 weeks, 4 weeks, and 2 weeks out.

I believe you could, and OP, take note of this too, if you're not too tired from too much non-specific work. Ax the 10k worth of intervals between 10k and HM pace workout. OK, do it farther out in the set-up phase after a moderate 10, but not in the middle of the specific phase 3 days before a hard 22 mile workout. Don't even think about the 3k-5k paced 600s and the 4 mile tempo at classic tempo pace. If the overall schedule is not too dense, these workouts are achievable. In between each I'll try to do a maintenance-type non-specific speed session just to touch on the systems that Pfitzinger emphasizes (over marathon pace, in fact).

Allow me to go this far: it might be realistic to suggest that if you can't do several of these - when well rested and as the only hard workout in a week - that you also can't run a continuous 26 at the pace in question. But yeah, #49, it seems like we're on a similar page. These workouts I'm describing are the kind I wouldn't really have been aware of prior to Canova and those he's influenced. Your long MP intervals and long MP tempo are great. Guys like us can indeed do this.

Oh, forgot to mention the 17 miler. I have used this, had it go well, and still endorse it. Let me confess that I have also had it not work because of doing it too close, like a week out. My goal next time will be around 2-1/2 weeks out. Hanson's does 26.2 km, getting close to my preferred 17. Meb and Hall would do 15 at high altitude. One of Mosop's last big ones - before the 1km/1km alternator - was a hard 25km on dirt at altitude. Rojo has mentioned 30km, so that seems high, but his rational was that you are planning on doing 42km at the same pace.

It doesn't seem I'm way out there with 17, but the guys like you who have reposted my theoretical schedule (it is literally what I'm planning as of now) are not the ones I'm primarily arguing against. What is NOT ideal in my mind is 10 a notch faster than MP. I've done it but......

Just thought I'd throw that in the ring; should have been in my last post. OP, are you still here?