Pete MaGill - Tell us what you did to be able to run a 14:34 5k at 46.

Bare Facts - As someone who runs close to 100 miles per week, and as someone who knows quite a few masters runners who do the same, and as someone who also made his living as a writer during his 30s (and who currently has a new book out to publishers in NY and a new script out to studios in Hollywood), and who also makes a pretty good living working for a legal firm, and who also spends between 3-6 hours one-on-one with his son every day (seeing him off to school in the AM, greeting him when he gets home from school, helping him with his workout, helping him with homework, and just hanging), I feel in a unique position to suggest that you just might not know what "just can't possibly be any other way" and what can.

Also, consider this: maybe some of us putting in higher mileage are just running our miles a hellavu lot faster than some of you who aren't. And maybe we get into and out of our workouts faster. And maybe, just maybe, some of us get up long before the crack of dawn to run, and then are home before our families even wake up. Perhaps the same genetic luck that allows us to maintain this type of training also allows us to do it on less sleep, so that while some of you are exhibiting self-centered anti-good-parenting by sleeping more than 5-6 hours a night, we aren't. ;-)

The effort each of us puts into our lives and the quality we demand from it varies from person to person as much as do our times in local road races.

I don't judge yours.

If you judge mine, it says far more about you than it does about me.

As for trolls like "aging" - good grief, teenager, ask your parents to edit your posts so as to at least give the illusion that you might have some idea what you're talking about.

Never ceases to amaze with the "pity me, I'm unhappy with my life so I'll take everyone else down with me mentality" of posters like "Aging". Just curious, where does this leave the 'Dads' who are coaching at the collegiate or professional level and are not 'helicoptering' around everything their kids do. Does this mean they are lesser of a parent, show less love to their family and are less connected to what is going on? No. And do not come up with "well it's their profession". Yeah, well there are still gone 12-16 hours per day at least 10 months a year. I'd doubt any top runner keeps that schedule regardless of who they are masters or worldclass.

Well you are judging me because you are implying that I think you are a lousy parent, which I most certainly do not. You sound like a great parent and a great guy and my hat's off to you for what you can accomplish.

I wish you 100mpw guys wouldn't get so defensive. Not speaking for 'aging', but I was not trying to judge anyone. Just trying to have an honest discussion about the commitment it takes to train and race at a high level while being married with kids.

I have 3 kids ages 11-15. And I am well-versed in getting 4-5 hours sleep a night to get my one run in a day around all my other responsibilities. There is no way on God's green earth I could spend 3-6 hours a day with my kids and run 100mpw (I'm slower than you, but not that slower). You can, and that's great. More power to you.

The Tempo Run I... think SoCal was speaking to The Bare Facts and as such couldnt have been judging you....unless you are posting under several different screen names in an attmept to get your point across.

sort of coming out of left field here but:

I am a 45 year old married father of four with a full time job and some pretty respectable 5k times (although nowhere near SoCal Pete.... inspirational)

I can tell you that the posts I have seen from SoCal Pete and the SB are accurate. Its a fact that it really comes down to desire. How much you want to be fast will determine how fast you can be (favorable genetics aside... So Cal Pete would kick my ass). If you want it bad enough, you will get your mileage in very early or late (I run after I put the twins to bed). If you want to run fast, you will train fast enough that it hurts. Its insulting to these guys to suggest that just because you cant do it that nobody can unless they sacrifice family. its just not true.

The Bare Tempo wrote:

The Tempo Run I... think SoCal was speaking to The Bare Facts and as such couldnt have been judging you....unless you are posting under several different screen names in an attmept to get your point across.

No, that's me - my bad. I posted under that name on another thread to ask a question about a workout and I forgot to switch it back.

One idea that is missing here, or perhaps I missed it, is that of "genetic gifts." People who were fast in their your will probably be, if they stick with it or want to, fast in their master's career. I don't really know how good SCP was a a "kid," but from poston Lr he ran 1:55 or 6 as a soph or jr in HS. I had a brief chat with him on a run several years ago, and asked him how fast he was in his youth. He told me at that time that he thought his best mark was something like 5:07 or 5:10 for 2000m. Now that is pretty good - not really world class, but pretty darn good. So combo that talent with not killing himself early, and having the time, energy, desire and durability to run 80-100 mpw now, and what might you get: 14:34 track, and 14:49 road last weekend.

If someone ran 16:30 in their prime, unless they did it on 10mpw, I don't think they will run 14:34 at 47. A major accomplishment would be to run that 16:30 again - and even that will be hard, with a lot of work necessary. It is always very hard to beat genetics - on the upside or downside. Not impossible, but hard.

Just my 25 cents worth.

I agree. thats the X factor. At the end of the day, I am only going to get so fast no matter what based on my genetics. Somewhere in the mix of genetic gifts and hardcore desire/dedication is the answer to this issue. Neither of which require neglecting family.

Radical Ron wrote:

I think the main reason why we continue to train and/or are interested in running is because we left something on the table as younger men/women. We had a spark sometime back that got snuffed out due to a variety of circumstances. We chose to abandon our running pursuits and journeyed on our way with silently unfulfilled dreams only to realize later in life to find ourselves in a position where we might fulfill those earlier pursuits before we get too old and die.

This is exactly it for me as a masters athlete.

This is really not the point of the discussion at all. I'm competitive as hell and train as hard as I can when I can. I do it early in the morning or at lunch from work, but I can only manage one run a day. When i get home from work we either try to have a family meal together or I am taking a kid to practice, or coaching my own practices in the spring/fall. On weekends I go out at 5 in the morning sometimes to get it in before I have to race around to see my kids at games or meets. I choose to devote time to coaching my boys in baseball and basketball because I like to do it and I never want to explain to my boys that i never coached them because I was too darn busy pursuing my hobby.

Pete is awesome. He's immensely talented and he would run fast as hell for a guy his age on just 40mpw. He can balance 100mpw with his job and being a great dad to his son, and that is terrific. I have absolutely no problem with that and don't resent it one bit. But I simply could not do that without neglecting my kids a bit. It has nothing to do with desire, so don't even go there. When my kids are grown and out of the house, it might be a different story.

The point of my writing example was that spending a lot of time at anything but parenting, vocational or avocational, may, but not necessarily, put the quality of your parenting at risk. I don't think it really makes much difference to a kid why his parent is never around, if he is never around; being away a lot for career reasons may mean one made a "selfish" career choice where one's kids are concerned. Of course, I think it's just a ridiculous to prejudge someone as a parent based on their vocation as their avocation. And, for what it's worth, I don't think there's any evidence that writers great writers particularly poor parents, or even that Hemingway was necessarily a bad dad in his kid's eyes-- another caution against judging people from afar.

Since posting last time, I've run 15 miles, written a 5 page report for my work, and set up the garage weight room for my son, who'll be home in a couple minutes. Do I win? ;-)

Seriously, if there's one knock on any of us - as parents, runners, and human beings - it's that we spend too much time on message boards arguing silly nonsense like: Which one of us generally good guys is maybe a little bit less good than everyone else?

You're all okay with me.

And, seriously, I woulda only run 15 minutes if I knew it was going to cause all this trouble.

Later.

SoCal Pete wrote:

Seriously, if there's one knock on any of us - as parents, runners, and human beings - it's that we spend too much time on message boards arguing silly nonsense like: Which one of us generally good guys is maybe a little bit less good than everyone else?

Later.

Pete, you don't get it. We do all the message board posting WHILE at work :-)

Hey So Cal, now I know who you are! You're that guy from SNL who's married to Morgan Fairchild. Is she still hot?

Seriously, a little too much bashing going on here. Suffice to say that both sides have some grains of truth- it is a monster commitment to run 100 mi a week at any age, let alone 45, but it is doable.

The real secret is being able to stay healthy. I have two old training buddies who loved training and racing more than anything, and they were both world class, but starting at about age 30 they couldn't handle 40 a week and no speed work.As I occasionally run 64 sec 400s with the kids I coach, I enjoy the feeling but I will never confuse which of us was the great runner.

Have to agree here re: the importance of staying healthy; although, knowing this is the secret doesn't make it any easier to achieve. In my case, time is not the thing preventing me from running a little more (to run 80-100mpw would only require, for me, 75-95mins per day as opposed to the 50-60mins I manage). The inability of my weakest links to handle the extra pounding is the limiting factor. And, I don't think running that much actually IS necessarily a huge commitment. I think even very busy people could find the time (if perhaps not the energy-- but then that is largely a function of having the passion) if they simply didn't watch any T.V. (or, for that matter, posted on the internet!). I'm actually amazed when I hear busy professional parents display their knowledge of the latest hit T.V. series. (And socal pete, if you come on here again demonstrate your intimate familiarity with the full prime-time line-up, I will have to take it all back and conclude that your are an extraterrestrial!)

To clear things up I'm not trolling.

I asked a honest question on how SoCal Pete trains which led to the ChiRunner (troll) and SB's defensive pile-on posts to RunDaddy's follow up.

Like many other challenging and rewarding endeavors in life, such as training hard and running fast, being a good parent takes a lot of time, effort, determination, responsibility, yes pain, and discipline. Being a terrific parent, logging extenstive mileage, and running fast (not to mention providing for our families) simultaneously is not easy. Most of us parents just flat out can't do it all to such a high level of achievement.

These boards are rife with responses to and judgments of those who are doing something better than us. Predictably, many posters respond to their own awe or jealousy with skepticism, cynicism and criticism. Both sides can cite examples which prove their point til blue in the face (indeed, there are many real ones), but can we decide ultimately and definitively how effectively each poster is parenting? I hope not.

To those husbands and fathers on this thread who are running because they love it, and running fast to boot, in addition to loving and caring for their families, well done, and I really enjoy your training advice and encouragement.

aging wrote:

SB,

After that post you better wipe your mouth!

maybe not a troll, but you're still rude and sounds to me like you're hanging around just to pick a fight...hmm, wait a minute, that's classic trolling!

I ignored your "wipe your mouth" comment because, frankly, I'm wasn't even sure what the hell you were talking about, let alone why you'd bother coming on here to say it. You were actually better off when people thought you were an 18 year old dickhead trying to amuse himself by provoking the old guys.

And, "pile on posts"? I simply asked a guy who was accusing another guy of neglecting his parental duties to go for a bike ride whether he knew the full story. Then, I offered my own view. Besides, why don't you let others make the call as to whether they feel they've been unfairly attacked or not? We were managing to have a civil, if pointed, discussion here until you came along. (Now, I suppose now, in classic Letsrun fashion, you will simply re-register and go on being a dick under another name...)