Q for JK

This is not JK, but I think I can clear it up:

"In short, long, slow distance is good, but long, comfortably fast distance is BETTER...."

Then in the second post:

"Tons of miles - even laughably slow ones - REALLY DO help your running.

...very focused hard days"

This does not mean that ALL of the running is long and slow.

As JK said above, having a GOOD PORTION of the mileage during the base phase at a slow or easy pace is excellent for BOTH recovery and various processes such as capillarization, mitochondria strengthening and increases in, boosting of VO2 max, etc.

HOWEVER, notice that JK points out that on a day when you ARE going to go hard, you should make it HARD.

Do NOT take it easy on a scheduled, planned hard day.

To sum up, simply keep the EASY days EASY and the hard days (including the base phase progression runs and short speed work like 150-200m strides and buildups) HARD.

Hard is not the correct word to use. Jk\'s philosophy is centered around almost exclusively relaxed running. Of course you run faster on some days than others, even in the base phase. But the strides and high end runs are never HARD, they are relaxed, perhaps even fast some days, but never hard. On some recovery days you may need to run 8 min miles to be truly relaxed and running EASY, thats not to say that you couldnt be running 630 pace on the same day, you just dont get any more benefit from 630 on an easy day compared to the 8min pace. And I dont want to put words in JK\'s mouth but i feel that I understand his system enough to answer your question. JK/Lydiards system is all about long term development, nothing about the system is a quick fix. Hope that helps.

Definitely helps, and thanks.

Actually, I would like to hear JK et. als. opinion(s), so I am bumping.

I'll take my stab at this. First I have no idea what a 130 heart rate is, but it sounds very slow. If you're not doing at least a high end run or some striders a week and are just going out the door and running pure mileage you shouldn't be out there going "slow". Something at a comfortably pace that is faster would be better. For example, this summer when I wasn't running that much and not doing workouts at first, I was running a lot faster than I am now on my easy days. But back then there wasn't much mileage and there were no hard days. It didn't feel any harder, it was just faster because there were a lot less miles and no workouts.

In the 2nd post, JK is talking about something else the Japanese. They are running tons and tons of mileage. (The more miles I do the slower my recovery runs often are). Plus they are working out. The women's team here from Japan this month is truly incredible. 3 runs many days. I don't advise trying it for most of you, but if you do go and run 3 times a day an 250k nearly every week, you'll slow down a lot trust me. But the Japanese have some high quality days in there too. Thus, on their recovery days they're still running a ton of miles, but go very slow to recover. I do the same thing. One of my new roommates is a 16:40 5k guy and he can't believe the pace I run most days especially in the morning (my shorter run) and at the start of runs. For example two days ago, I felt terrible at the beginning, but at the end was probably at least a minute+ a mile faster (and still was way slower than a lot of you out there). A 40 year old masters runner ran with us one morning and said "Is this the pace you usually run in the morning?" He couldn't believe how slow it was. But then add say 1:30-1:45 2nd run in the afternoon and a workout the next day and maybe you'll see why. I don't run slow, I run relaxed. The days I feel the pace is "slow" are usually days when I feel I need extra recovery, but usually I just feel like I'm running the pace I need to on that day.

The genius of the system is that is repeatable day in day out, year in, year out and leads to improvement over the season and year to year. If you're not getting better over a season and year to year something is wrong with what you're doing.

Was in flagstaff got most of it right when he posted, " JK/Lydiards system is all about long term development, nothing about the system is a quick fix." That is true, but if you get better over each season and race well when it counts you'll be pleased short term as well. But the other point I wanted to address was: "But the strides and high end runs are never HARD, they are relaxed, perhaps even fast some days, but never hard". This is ture a high end run and stride workout are never really that hard. But on say some days I'm doing a real high quality tempo run (faster than a high end pace and "harder" in most people's use of the word), I'm working pretty good and dare I say "hard", but probably not in the way most people mean it. I guess I need to address the word "hard". I may be pushing the pace a bit, but I'm sticking to the same principles on almost all the workouts and that is working from the safe side of the threshhold and pushing up against the threshhold. Thus, I'm staying as relaxed as possible at a good pace, running the 2nd half of the workout faster than the first, and definitely not hammering myself. This type of workout like the entire system is repeatable year in year out and leads to long term development.

A problem a lot of younger runners have is that they struggle to judge their effort or their threshhold, so they need to be advised to not run too "hard" in their workouts because they would end up hammering themselves and cashing themselves early on otherwise. Plus, they are in a team environment, so they can let their competitive juices take over them too early in a workout. But once they mature, (learn the system and the effort and principles we are after if they're training like I am), they can learn the effort they are after, plus how to run the workouts. Say two people are doing a x mile tempo run and it in the same time of XX minutes. This doesn't mean anything to me. If runner A went out started too fast, got cashed in the middle and struggled at the end, he didn't get nearly the same benefit as runner B who started off conservatively at the beginning, gradually pushed the pace down a bit the 2nd half, and picked it up say the final 2 minutes to run the same time. Runner B will finish not only feeling better about the workout, but he or she will be able to repeat it the next time and the time after. The pace may change but the effort and principles are often the same. Running fast is an art and acquired. You do not get any bonus points for running "hard". So you might as well to learn how to do it as relaxed as possible so you can keep improving.

For example, I did 3*15 minutes yesterday (often at mid altitudes I'll break up a tempo run into segments so I can push the pace a bit if I want). I wore a watch, but didn't look at it until I was done. I was not given a pace to run as it was all off of effort. The first 15 minutes was on the grass, so I didn't bother to compare any times. The 2nd 15 minutes had half on the grass and one road loop, and the third 15 minutes had 2 road loops. The 2nd road loop in the third set was faster than the first in the third 15 minutes, and the the road loop at the end of the 2nd set was slightly faster than the first of the 3rd set. Thus, even though the run was broken up, I stuck to the principles I discussed of pushing against my threshold, working the pace down throughout the workout. I don't really need a watch to tell me I'm doing this because I can judge how I feel. But I often will look at a watch afterwards for confirmation or just to tell my coach so he can maybe get a feel for my pace although none of this is on a measured course. The pace of these road loops has come down a lot recently on my high end/tempo runs as I get in better shape, but I'm more focussed on sticking to the principles above and running the workout correctly. I know I'll get faster as a result. Later on, I may start running a different loop so I won't even in the back of my mind have a time to compare the workout to, because most of the time what is important is running the workout correctly, not trying to beat some previous time. Some days I might do even more of a relaxed high end run, but I'll still stick to the same principles above.

I hope this helps.

Adam,

Thanks for bringing this topic up, and the interesting responses. Flagstaff I especially liked yours.

A 130 heart rate would be 66% of heart rate reserve for me.

Similar to wejo, I did 3x 7km this morning, which I usually do at even pace on steady (moderate) days. And gradually speeding up the pace on workout (hard) days.

Sometimes I speed up during steady days too, which amounts to merging steady and workout days continuously, so basically every day is a moderately hard day. Meaning you work hard but you don't do any killer days as that would destroy the program. Rather it's a pace that goes through everything. And this all depends on the time of year, season, your objectives, etc. For example, at this point I know every session for the next 10 weeks, and the outline and every goal through next spring.

Just a quick note to express my appreciation, Wejo, for what was a very informative post.

Thanks for taking the time to set me straight.

Adam

hi, i came from other site, mariusbakken's.

when i saw this post, it was a dejavu as this topic has been discussed over n over in marius'.

i think wejo is trying to say to run by your feelings, u can even drop a track session if u dont feel good that day.

im doing exactly the same with what mr.wejo is doing right now n lots of kilometres. i heard meb was doing 1 session perday, how'd u explain that. im crosschecking here.

im just concerned bout body hormones which are lost which means we have to alternate our training.

u can goto marius' forum (general msg)to know wut im talking about. this is important, perhaps a breakthrough.

i hope.

It's so odd to read these posts by Wejo & WasInFlagstaff. I know many people swear by such a program and clearly it produces results. But then I contrast this with how the Kenyans train.

Now granted, what I know of that basically comes from what I've read (from writings of/interviews with Toby Tanser, Marius Bakken, Bob Kennedy, etc). But everything I hear says that elite Kenyans at the camps do a very high percentage of their training runs at what would probably be tempo pace for them. Start off easy, finish up hard. Many many times per week.

How much LT training is too much, I wonder?

This is kind of tangential to the original question, but I?m curious?.In your system, what kind of recovery did you take between those 3x15 min tempo intervals? Normally I allow a minute of recovery for each 5 minutes of tempo interval (eg sets of 5:00 tempo/1:00 jog or 10:00 tempo/2:00 jog). That would give me 3 minutes jog for a 15-minute tempo interval. But I also have heard about people who do longer intervals with longer breaks, like 2X20 minutes with 10 minute jog between. What do you guys do on the JK system?