Any > 50 year olds under 3:00 for the marathon?

dnixon wrote:

If so …

• was it on a record-certified course?

(no one-ways w/ the wind at your back / no negative inclines)

• what could you do a 5k in at the time?

• what was your training like? mile p/wk, etc.

* yes

* 18:30

* 80-90 mpw.

>50 sub-3:00 isn't that big of a deal. A poster here has done that at the 70+ age range.

I was pretty happy with it ....

foffletsrun wrote:

>50 sub-3:00 isn't that big of a deal. A poster here has done that at the 70+ age range.

Exactly. Search "Ed Whitlock" sometime.

Yeah, and sub-2:20 for an open guy is no big deal either. Some guy in that category ran 2:03.

foffletsrun wrote:

>50 sub-3:00 isn't that big of a deal. A poster here has done that at the 70+ age range.

Why are people on this forum such elitist a##holes?!? Where did the OP say it was a big deal?? He's just trying to get some benchmarks to gauge against. Christ!

foffletsrun wrote:

>50 sub-3:00 isn't that big of a deal. A poster here has done that at the 70+ age range.

I agree it's no big deal. I ran 2:47 as a 50 year old and 2:57 as a 57 year old. Just train like anyone else younger than breaks 3 hours. 70 or 80 miles a week. Long runs, tempo runs, mile intervals.

There was a guy in the 1970's who ran a 2:22 marathon in his 50's, then perished from a heart attack a couple years after that.

Apparently his diet wasn't as good as his running.

Despite what some people might say,it is a big deal to crack 3h at <50yrs(for a male).Bloody fantastic for a female.Just check out how few manage to do it.Only a few stupid elitists or those who have not done it would feel otherwise.

My only other comments would be

1. that you have to have the natural genetic talent to be capable of about 2h30m at 30yrs of age.

2. you should train same as you would as a 30yr old,just slower adjustments for age.

3.Please do not quote Ed Whitlock and his ilk as indicative,they are something very special.

Good luck.

dnixon wrote:

If so …

• was it on a record-certified course?

(no one-ways w/ the wind at your back / no negative inclines)

• what could you do a 5k in at the time?

• what was your training like? mile p/wk, etc.

I did it twice this year, 52, 2:57/53, 2:56.

Legit courses, both negative splits.

I don't run any 5K's.

65 mpw, speed 2x weekly, no tempos, the usual long runs.

There aren't a lot of us doing it. Two in all of Ohio this year I believe. Go for it!

I'm not a novice, I follow running at all levels, and I'm one of the geekiest people I know when it comes to the sport, so I certainly know about Mr. Whitlock and consider him a legend.

______________________

To those who weighed in with constructive advice, thanks.

Sounds like 70-80 is the range in miles/wk. I'm guessing we're talking doubles?

I think I have the talent, though I never showed it much in college. The 2 things against me early on were asthma and slow maturation. I went through puberty very late and kept growing in college. Didn't even start shaving until my last year. I also had asthma through high school and the first 2-3 years of college. But then asthma just went away, I was done growing, and my times finally started dropping my last year at the NAIA school I attended. I could just break 52 in the 440 and ran 3:57.0 for the 1500. Wish I could've continued.

[This next part is for laughs.]

When I was 23 and in grad school, I won a several summer races (2-mile, 15K, 25K) in Memphis that were buildups for the Jackson Marathon. I was young, arrogant, and didn't respect the distance. It may be hard to believe, but there were only 4 water stations for the race (which wasn't unusual back in the day). So as to save time, I skipped both the 5-mile and 10-mile stations even though it was a cloudless day in September with quickly warming temps. I was on 2:30ish pace, but by 15 I was dehydrated and by 20 I was toast. I walk and jogged the last 7 miles, finishing in 3:07. (This was the sin of commission: doing something I knew I shouldn't do, but thinking I could get away with it.)

6 years ago, when I was 47, I trained for the Richmond Marathon, running about 40 miles p/wk., and felt like I could run 3:10. This time I respected the distance and took fluids at every station. At the half I was at 1:35, but a strange fatigue had been accumulating in my right leg for the first half. Somewhere around 14-15 miles my right quad cramped up horribly. I stretched and massaged it out, but it came back within a mile. And then my right hamstring seized up. By 18 miles a severe pain was developing in my right hip. Once again, I walked and jogged the last 7-8 miles, bewildered and finishing in 3:38. But back at the hotel I couldn't find one of my (very thin) shoe inserts, and then had a sickening feeling that I had maybe run with only one. Sure enough, I had one in my right shoe, but none in the left. So essentially I ran the whole thing with my right leg jacked up slightly. (This was the sin of omission: forgetting to do something that was critical and would come back to bite me in the ass.)

I then trained for the 2007 Berlin Marathon, hoping to break 3:00. Training went very well, but 6 weeks before the race, when I put my mileage up to 70-75 p/wk., I developed a severe case of osteitis pubis that took me 7 months to recover from. (The miles played a part, but it was more the planting/replanting of trees that caused it — jumping up and down all day on a shovel.)

So I've still got the bug to break 3:00, but if I'm going to recommit to the training I want to be smart. Pretty much all I did this last time around go out and run 80% of my weekly mileage at 7:30ish pace. Once a week I'd do some repeat 1200s or repeat 800s. Once every 2-3 weeks I'd do a 5K tempo run in the 19:45 range. And then once every 10 days or so I'd do a long run. Looking back on it, I don't think it was the best way to train for sub 3:00.

dnixon wrote:

To those who weighed in with constructive advice, thanks.

Sounds like 70-80 is the range in miles/wk. I'm guessing we're talking doubles?

God knows, when you get an itch...

from your story, it sounds like you may benefit from a training plan like kevin beck's:

I started running late in life (35), and am finding success on a relative scale. I ran a 2:33 at age 40 in 71-80+ degrees in chicago a few weeks back. In the seven marathons I've run since 2003 I've not run slower than 2:40 and find my recovery takes about a month. I attribute this to keeping my milage modest (60-80 mpw), race specificity (runs of 12-18 miles at race pace), proper recovery runs and some quick, short work from time to time.

I hope that doesn't sound boastful, but I wanted to give you context of why I believe as a matter of my results in relatively low mileage plans with a good deal of race specific volume.

Ask Joanie......she breaks 3:00 regularly

Good luck to you, sounds like you have the inherent ability. 80% of miles @ 7:30 sounds a little too quick though. Do you use a Heart rate monitor to find out what % of max that puts you at (see Hadds postings on this site). Also check out Mcmillans running calculator for pacing info.

I never did 12-18 mile runs at race pace, which from this vantage point seems like such an egregious failure on my part. Thanks. That's a keeper. And I think I was low on recovery runs, but mostly because I only rarely did really intense workouts. The repeat 800s and 1200s every other week were as hard as it got, so I only did recovery runs after those.

What sort of shorter, quicker work did you do? Repeat 200s? 400s? How fast? How many?

Have never used a heart rate monitor. Only the thumb against my neck between intervals or at the end of a run. I'll check out Hadd's stuff and McMillan's running calculator.

dnixon wrote:

What sort of shorter, quicker work did you do? Repeat 200s? 400s? How fast? How many?

recovery runs for me are roughly 7:20-7:30 pace

One of my favorite workouts is straights and curves. Do 8-12 laps of striding out the straights and jogging the curves. No watch, just a fluid transition from jog to sprint back down to jog, repeat.

I would do simple stride work once or twice a week of roughly 75-100m or so. An average city block.

200s would be roughly 30-32 seconds and 400s would be 78 working down to 65. 200 repeats would be 8-10 and 400 repeats would be 8-12. 100m jog between each.

Another favorite workout is a ladder of 1 mile, 3/4, 1/2, 1/4, 200 all done progressively quicker. I start the mile at 5:05ish. The kicker is I do a mile between each repeat at six min. pace or lower, I tried it once at marathon pace and found I couldn't pick it up quite as much.

A really good tool is Daniel's Training tables, which you can download here:

The sub 3 has been a goal of mine likewise. Thus far it's eluded me over the last 2 years.

To keep tabs on an active marathoner who ran 2:54@ age 54, visit

http://daveelger,blogspot.com

.

Dave is currently 55, and shooting for sub 3 at the upcoming Nov.30 Seattle Marathon. His blog contains much of the lead up training.

I went 3:04 last year. This year I felt I was in 2:59ish shape --- but I wimped out and went 1:32/1:29 split. The difference between going out at 1:32 versus 1:30 is enormous in my opinion. I RESPECT the 3:00 barier - yes its an arbitrary round number but for those of us who have no talent and are old but work hard (70 mpw) it REALLY is a HUGE deal and an accomplishment if u can pull it off. Again, the difference between 2:59 and 3:04 is night and day.

(Regarding dotato who started running at 35 and has only gone sub-2:40 - he clearly has inate talent. That is sick. )

Last year I used daniels and this year I used pfitz 70/18 plan. I think I might switch back to daniels. I like the cruise intervals.

I read the beck article (for the first time) with interest. But it is very similar to pfitz. M-pace runs ARE a good idea. I thought it was funny that he does 30k on the track though.

On the other hand, I do many M-pace (6:50 pace) runs on the treadmill for the same reason - to control pace and to minimize impact. I have rethought this because it seems that treadmill running is easier than road running and perhaps I am not in as good shape as I thought I was!

(Any comments on this last point?)