50+ Weekly Training Thread (for week ending 31-Oct-2010)

Haven't posted for a few weeks. Couldn't come up with much to say...

Just banging out some solid training the past 3 weeks. Hit 71 miles this week. Been getting back to basics with some straight up, get after it right out the door, 10-12 mile progression runs. These always seem to get me in pretty good racing shape. Crushed the one last Thursday in 61:53, running the last 5 in 29:33. I'll continue this pattern up thru Charlotte...

My favorite workout? On the roads it's the above mentioned 10 mile progression run. If I get it down below 62-63 minutes, I know I'm getting ready for a good race. I do a lot of these in Jan-Feb-Mar. On the track I like the 400-800-1200-1600-400 ladder. This is also a good indicator of where I'm at.

Thanks for kicking us off this week, Runmore. That's a pretty innovative way of getting back into running!

Dave

38 miles in 5 days. 3 of the 5 days were hard: 8 miler with 4 long fartleks, 3 mile repeats on dead legs, and a 1000 foot climb 8 miler. That last one is now my favorite run as its a new one I created for the birth of my granddaughter on Tuesday of last week :-)

I'm working on a minor late-season peak for a favorite Thanksgiving day 5K. My goal is to slip under 19 as I have been teasing it all year and finally all my parts are injury free!

Thanks for getting us started runmore. Glad you've included the parenthetic clause that we talked about a few weeks back.

Weird week for me. After the big relay last weekend, I was very sore Sunday and Monday so I didn't run. Tuesday we had terrible high winds followed by driving rain, so it was a wash (pun intended). Then Wednesday, I got so busy with work, between teaching, advising, and grading, I just didn't have time. In the end, I only trained Thurs and Fri (6.5 miles each day). Saturday, I was debating on whether to run an XC race, and caught the bug while thinking about XC races that I cared about back in Wisconsin (BTW-Go Badger! Boy did they look good at the Big10 meet). I jumped in, but it ended up really just a solo training run, as there were only a few slower folk that entered; it was an open 4k tacked on to the back of a long day of HS/MS/Elem School races. In the end, I didn't have much mileage this week. Maybe 18 miles.

Hip still is an issue, but I'm managing.

As to this week's question, it's a tie for me between Fartlek runs (with varying times on and off, just going by feel) and hill workouts (8-10x 90s @5k effort on 6% grade, jog recovery).

Hopefully, this week will be more productive. Have a great week everyone!

My favorite workout (other than just running easy) is 5,2s. Sets of: 5 min. at Tempo pace/effort, then 2 minutes at a harder effort. I usually do 3-4 sets and there is no recovery between sets, so it's just 5,2,5,2,5,2 etc. Knowing the effort is important because if you go too fast, you will blow up.

It goes fast so it's a perfect workout when I don't have much time. Also, my mind plays interesting tricks on me - I look forward to the 5 min. part because it is slower and easier than the 2 min, but i look forward to the 2 min. part because it's shorter.

muddy girl, i like the sound of that workout and might give it a try this week or next. i also agree with you that long easy jaunts in the woods are my favorite kinds of runs, but if the category is limited to workouts, i guess i'll cast my vote for 4-6 circuits of 1.5 mi uphill hard on forest road, 2 mi downhill easy-moderate on trail.

my week was low volume (only 48 miles) with two days off and only 3 (uptempo) miles on a third day. tuesday, though, i racked up 19 miles including 8x 2-min hill in spikes on the golf course, and added 10x strides another day.

yesterday was my first real xc race, and i was glad to have tried the spikes for the first time earlier in the week to recognize that i needed to coat my heels with bandaids before putting them on. the event was fun -- in a hard and quasidemoralizing kind of way. it was our USATF region's masters championship, and i carried my age group, although i was fourth masters overall, my 53-yr-old teammate was just 11 seconds behind me, and i was passed by two (open) women in the final kilometer (i think i was eighth among open and masters women). i definitely realize i need to work on strategy and somehow develop something resembling a finishing kick, which i completely lack at present. anyway, i managed a nonstellar (but nonembarrassing) 25:25 for 6K a mix of flat, rolling, and steeply hilly terrain, including one scary drop-off (and this commentary is coming from a trailrunner!). we'll see what next sunday's race brings (i think the course will be much more golf-course-ish).

sounds like a good week of building up, training, racing, and/or time-trialing for most of us. lucKY2b, hope your hip continues to improve; and, Rtype, mazel tov to you and your expanding family.

Thanks for getting the thread going runmore. Good luck on building the “mileage”. When do you plan on "leveling" off.

36 miles on 6 days this week. With the wind and rain I was happy to get out most days. Ran too hard on my Saturdays long run and felt beat the last 2 miles. Recovered to get a decent run in Sunday.

Currently my favorite workout is a 7 mile progressive run. I have a tough hill at 4.5 miles but its mainly downhill after that. A long run on the trails is mentally the most relaxing but the winds last week brought down a lot of trees and branches so have to stick to the roads for a few weeks. Good luck for everyone running XC races.

old hamdog wrote:

Thanks for getting the thread going runmore. Good luck on building the “mileage”. When do you plan on "leveling" off.

No problem. It is fun and informative to hear what everyone else is doing. To say nothing of inspirational. There are some great times being turned in!

My plan is to build up to 90 minutes a day, which should happen around mid December. From there I will transition into a Lydiard schedule with a goal 1/2 marathon in early April.

I am toying with the idea of just doing the base and hill phases of the Lydiard progression for this race. I would do the full cycle later in the year for another target race. My thinking around this is that it is best to be spending my time on building aerobic base and strength before moving into the stamina and speed areas later in the year.

What do all of you think? I would welcome the input.

Ski season is here, and no running due to sore ITB/knee which I inflamed a week and a half ago from one skating session.

M - 40 min ski

T - weights 1 hr; ski/coach 1:40 (2X ~50 min sessions)

W - 35 min double pole (upper body only)

R - weights 1 hr (did 20 pull ups); ski/coach 1:40 (2X ~50 min sessions)

F - Rest

Sa - weights 1 hr; ski/coach for 1 hr

Su - 90 min ski with two top 10 USA skiers (for about 40 min) and my son and another 15 yr old

So 6 hr aerobic training; 3 hr weights

Favorite workouts, long threshold runs

It sounds like a good moderate build. 90 minutes a day should give you a good base.

You have a lot more patience then me. In the past I've tried starting out at 30 minutes per day but after a week or so I would be increasing the long run and need an easy day. I hope to stay consistent without many days off and keep the long run between 10 & 12 miles. Right now 5-6 hours per week is all I can handle.

Good luck on the Lydiard schedule. It reminds me that I should dig out the Lydiard book on Masters running again.

runmore wrote:

I am toying with the idea of just doing the base and hill phases of the Lydiard progression for this race. I would do the full cycle later in the year for another target race. My thinking around this is that it is best to be spending my time on building aerobic base and strength before moving into the stamina and speed areas later in the year.

What do all of you think? I would welcome the input.

I had been told that it is a good idea to atleast do a maintenance level of speed work: doing strides at the end of runs, including some harder segments to longer runs, pushing the hills, those sorts of things. I guess, to me, varying the pace is always a good idea. If I don't, I tend to get pace locked, and it's harder for me to shift gears. Everybody's different though.

old hamdog wrote:

You have a lot more patience then me.

Not really. This is really a discipline for me. My experience has been that when I do a long, gradual build-up then my training and racing can be sustained much longer, is more enjoyable, and I perform better. Nevertheless, I really want to run closer to the top end of my aerobic range right now, rather than later when I move into the base phase. So this slow build up isn't easy.

I have benefitted from a few recent podcast interviews I have heard where the interviewee has mentioned the need to be disciplined in a slow start up phase. I think Lydiard referred to this as getting in shape to train. This is exactly where I am right now.

lucKY2b wrote:

I had been told that it is a good idea to atleast do a maintenance level of speed work: doing strides at the end of runs, including some harder segments to longer runs, pushing the hills, those sorts of things. I guess, to me, varying the pace is always a good idea. If I don't, I tend to get pace locked, and it's harder for me to shift gears. Everybody's different though.

Thanks for the comments. I think this is a good idea. As I get closer to transitioning into base training I will start add some of these elements. Also, my plan is also to adopt what I call a "Lydiard Distribution" of my time running and then my milage. So, I will be running longer some days, shorter others and on some of these days I am running faster "effort" runs, fartlek, and steady state longer runs. So, during the base phase, I will be mixing up distances, effort levels, etc.

We'll see how this works. I am my own guinea pig in this science experiment of distance running. Great fun!