HELP! Tempo run advice needed.

Great articles on tempo:

frenchbulldog wrote:

All the literature I’ve read says my tempo pace should be 6:20 (roughly 15K pace). No way I could hit that on the road for more than a mile in a non-race situation.

You are right and the "literature" (written mostly by non runners) is wrong.

Advice for non-elites is nearly the same as that for elites, except scaled down a bit.

A couple of things, your long run is WAY out of proportion to your weekly mileage. Cut it back to 13-14 miles, but since you are training for a marathon try to hit one 18-20 miles about once a month.

Tempo runs. You should be able to do them 4-5 days a week, if you wanted to. Try doing them about marathon pace 2,3,5 6, 8 miles - what ever if right for the day. My favorite was 2-5 mile "run to the barn" runs. It's also done by many Kenyans. You can do them to.

You do nothing short and fast. Try adding some strides (8-10 x 100m) or something like 6 x 150m at the end of those workouts. Take full recovery between each. Walk if you want. You will benefit from them.

Malmo, tempo runs 4-5 days a week? That's the most moronic reply I've ever read.

Pey wrote:

Malmo, tempo runs 4-5 days a week? That's the most moronic reply I've ever read.

"You should be able to do them 4-5 days a week, if you wanted to"

hugo wrote:

Pey wrote:

Malmo, tempo runs 4-5 days a week? That's the most moronic reply I've ever read.

"You should be able to do them 4-5 days a week, if you wanted to"

"Malmo, tempo runs 4-5 days a week? That's the most moronic reply I've ever read."

well, according to malmo most people are doing them too hard.

If you would do them slower, you could do them 4-5 times a week.

He said "if you wanted to", not that you should.

Also note that he said to do them at Marathon pace, not at LT. That makes all the difference to me.

OCD wrote:

He said "if you wanted to", not that you should.

Also note that he said to do them at Marathon pace, not at LT. That makes all the difference to me.

You could eat dog shit too "if you wanted to"

And note that a marathon pace run is not the same as a tempo run. That makes all the difference to me.

I think it's wiser to listen to the former American Record holder in the 1/2 marathon than some ex phys geek in a lab coat.

Remember folks, if it weren't for ex phys geeks you would never even have heard of the phrase "lactate threshold" and you would be better because of it.

There's a difference between "training to improve lactate threshold" and "training to improve your overall conditioning and racing ability".

Get your heads out of the books and onto the track/roads. Stop being science nazis.

Alan

Pey wrote:

And note that a marathon pace run is not the same as a tempo run. That makes all the difference to me.

It is if you are running continuously for 40-60 min.

Look at El G. training (http://members.iinet.net.au/~peterg1/run/el_train.html Note I definitely don't claim this that this is super accurate). 30-60 mins of 3:00/km running 4-5+ times a week. I think 2:50-3:00/km would be roughly in the range of half marathon to marathon pace for a 3.45 miler.

Kevin52 wrote:

Pey wrote:

And note that a marathon pace run is not the same as a tempo run. That makes all the difference to me.

It is if you are running continuously for 40-60 min.

Pey wrote:

And note that a marathon pace run is not the same as a tempo run.

It sure is. You don't understand what tempo pace is. They are not races, son. And yes you could put in 4 to 5 tempo runs a week if you wanted to.

malmo wrote:

It sure is. You don't understand what tempo pace is. They are not races, son. And yes you could put in 4 to 5 tempo runs a week if you wanted to.

Sorry, that's not what I read, SON. Forgive us if Ed Eyestone and Jack Daniels are better known than you.

Malmo, I have great respect for you accomplishments as a runner, but you are not an arbiter of the English language. You are free to opine that you consider a given pace to be ideal for a tempo run, but you do not get to define the term.

I have heard tempo runs used both ways (20-30 mins at hm pace or 40-60 at mp). There are very few exact definitions in running (is the interval the length you run or the length you rest?, what is speed work? I also to remember a discussion about if 105% was 5% slower or faster than 100% of a pace). At the end of the day it probably doesn't matter a whole lot. I doubt anyone could tell you what would result in a higher lactate threshhold pace: 30 min at half pace or 60 min at mp. It might even depend on the runner. It is safe to say that running faster promotes higher LT. After that it gets vauge in a hurry.

extremely angry wrote:

Malmo, I have great respect for you accomplishments as a runner, but you are not an arbiter of the English language. You are free to opine that you consider a given pace to be ideal for a tempo run, but you do not get to define the term.

Ding ding ding! Blah for president--a man who truly understands our ambiguous existence in this postmodern world!

Spence wrote:

Sorry, that's not what I read, SON. Forgive us if Ed Eyestone and Jack Daniels are better known than you.

Did Eyestone actually train that way, or was he just regurgitating what he's heard? If he actually trained that way, that perhaps explains why, despite his prodigious talent for long distances, he has run far more crappy marathons than good ones?

If you can run tempo runs at half marathon pace then your half marathon sucks. If it sucks, then the most obvious reason is that you are overtraining. The most common way of overtraining I've seen (35 years of observation) is people racing the tempo runs. At five miles into a half marathon race you should be hanging on with white knuckles. That's NOT tempo pace, sonny.

If you'd learn to do your tempo runs at the correct pace (my opinion one of the most important workouts for HM success) your half marathon PRs would improve. What the hell do I know, right?

It should be noted that Ken Martin, a Jack Daniels trained runner, used to have "brilliant" tempo runs for a few months then drop into an abysmal slump that would last for months. "Mysterious" is how Ken described those slumps to me. I told him there was nothing mysterious about those slumps at all, "it's obvious, your tempo runs are way too fast." Jack Daniels has never been a competitive runner, he has no idea what is too hard for a tempo run.

Tempo runs are not races, they are a step towards an ultimate goal. You should feel invigorated afterwards, not exhausted. They should be done at about marathon pace up to halfway between marathon and HM pace.

There are no rewards for tempo runs.

I agree with malmo here. These days my tempo pace is 80% of mhr. When i get close to racing it gets to 85% from time to time. It is harder but not killer. Certainly not an exhaustive run such as a 5 miler at 88% mhr. That is day and night difference.

I hate people using guerouj as a sample, i overtrained after reading that to.

Get a real look at the fitness of the professionals before you start comparing anything.

A 4'00" miler already might give you an idea if he does a 5 miler at 5'20" per mile he is not surpassing 80% of his maximal heart rate. Still he might call it a tempo run.

If he does a run at 6 minutes per mile it will feel little different for him then a 6'30" mile if he is fit. For him that would be jogging. Maybe 70% of mhr or slightly higher or lower.

Blah wrote:

Look at El G. training (http://members.iinet.net.au/~peterg1/run/el_train.html Note I definitely don't claim this that this is super accurate). 30-60 mins of 3:00/km running 4-5+ times a week. I think 2:50-3:00/km would be roughly in the range of half marathon to marathon pace for a 3.45 miler.

For the sake of discussion, go ahead and stipulate that article is entirely accurate. I don't see anything out of the ordinary. What you quoted, "30-60 mins of 3:00/km running 4-5+ times a week" is not what the account says. It only says that "aerobic endurance" can be one of four kinds of training sessions, including easy runs. It does not say that ElGuerrouj is running "4-5 tempo runs at 3:00min/k pace."

From the article;

Aerobic endurance is of four types:

1) 30-45 min of continuous running

2) 50-60 min of continuous running

For this workout there are no pre-set conditions, he is not asked any specific pace. However, he is demanded that he runs at his maximum at that moment, this varies from day to day and has nothing to do with the season. So, this means that El Guerrouj can run one day between 3:00-3:10/km pace and sometimes at 2:50/km.

3) 4 x 2000 m in 5:10 with 2 min recovery

4) 6 x 1000 m in 2:30 with 2 min recovery

Aerobic endurance.

30-45 min of continuous running at 2:50-3:00 or 3:10/km

30 min of continuous running as recovery.

Aerobic endurance.

30 min of continuous running at 3:00-3:10/km

40 min of continuous running as recovery.