50+ Masters Training and Racing Open Forum

DHaaga mentions a character building run. After all these years, I don't need anymore character building. It's all about my comfort these days!!!

Winter set in fast and furious here in northern Indiana. I'm just east of Notre Dame so anyone that watched the game with whiteout conditions yesterday against BC... That's what it's like here! Zero degree wind-chill with another 8" of snow last night definitely makes for character building runs. If I chose to run outside...

Managed a solid 50 mile week. Mostly 8:00'ish pace runs with a Thurs tempo (655,647,637) and a Saturday 10 progressing 8:25-7:35. I've been on the treadmill since Wednesday. Because it's all about my warmth and comfort! Still running 100% healthy and painfree. Sort of, kind of thinking about the Masters 5k champs in February since things have been going so well for about the past year.

I'm running the 10k on Thursday at our local turkey trot. I'm thinking 39:00'ish would be a pretty good day. The race starts downtown but runs thru my neighborhood, on roads I've run 1000's of times! So at least I have a home field advantage.

Finished my 10 miler Saturday just in time to watch the NCAA XC champs. Both the men and women's runners are tough as nails!!! The races were deep and fast. Fun to watch!

Have a good run,

Dave

Mid-Fall running is interesting for weather changes. Happens every year and never in the same manner. Sets up Winter.
My week that was:

M: 5.5M @ 11:04 pace; 40:00 treadmill @ 13:11 pace

T: 8.5M - 4(5:00/3:00) @ 8:30/12:00 paces

W: 2 hour treadmill @ 11:47 pace

Th: 9.5M @ 10:02 pace

F: 75:00 treadmill @ 11:48 pace; 45:00 treadmill @ 12:14 pace

Sat: 22M @ 10:40 pace (a cosmic convergence of obstacles. Made chicken salad out of chicken refuse.)

Enjoy the week and happy thanksgiving!

Second week of recovery in the books. 43.6 miles on 6 days. Did a bit of fartlek on Saturday (after the NCAAs because it was cold and icy in the early AM) and mid-long of 10.7 today.

Those were some great NCAA races, both men's and women's team and individual. And TV the coverage was awesome.

Agreed! Why can't we get that kind of coverage for major marathons? I know--all of the runners at NCAA XC are serious athletes who got into the race on merit, not charity runners with heart-wrenching backstories.

Gosh, it was nice to watch a televised race that was treated entirely as a serious athletic competition, and didn't cut away for commercials at crucial moments.

I ran our local XC series championship race this morning. As I told several people, going in I knew that if I ran really well I would get 2nd in the series for the 70+ age group, and if I ran poorly I would get 2nd in the age group, so there was no pressure. I did run well and closed the gap some on my two 70+ team mates who have been ahead of me for most of the season. 7:02/mi pace for the race which is the best pace by a couple of seconds that I have run on that course in the last 3 years. No tweaks on minor injuries from the race, so 3 more solid weeks to Club XC.

My training has been productive and getting back in shape. 80% of the training has been on the treadmill at 15% or above inclines at around 5 mph with "hard" sessions every few days where I get up to 7mph.

Back running the occasional road workouts(2-3 miles sessions) at around 5:40/mi and not feeling too bad. Guessing that is my CV pace at the moment but maybe a little optimistic. Ran last night on a 2.8 mile extremely hilly route that I was running all the time back in 2018 when I was running my over 50 PRs. Averaged 5:52/mi(~5:40 effort) which is only seconds off my 2018 pace.

Monday Run 20:41 2.20 mi
Monday Tread 1:25:37
Tuesday Run 29:15:00 3.30 mi
Tuesday Tread 5 min 10kph/15%, 3 min 11kph/15 and then7 mins of random ints +25 min @ marathon effort 1:18:29
Wednesday Run 15:18 1.73 mi
Wednesday Tread 1:17:20
Thursday Run 8:52 0.74 mi
Thursday Tread 25 min TH - 9.0 for 7 mins then 9.2 for another 18 @ 15%. 38:41:00
Thursday Run too fast 5.38/mi and quit after 6 min CV then 4 more faster than CV. 47:31:00 6.17 mi
Friday Tread 1:19:23
Friday Run 37:50:00 4.17 mi
Saturday Tread 20:43
Saturday Run 37:51:00 4.26 mi
Sunday Run 16 min CV on hard steep hills(5:52/mi+ 5 mins random ints 43:45:00 5.73 mi
Sunday Tread 20:30

hope all had a good Thanksgiving. Relaxing weekend here other than saturday race:

M 1:15

Tu 1:10 with 20:00 at half-marathon effort + 1:00 x-t

W 1:35

Th 1:30 with drills/strides

F 45:00

Sa 1:40 incl. fairly hilly 10-mile race 65:52 (10th OA, 1st AG)

Su 1:35

Saturday race was two loops, and I negative split (33:25/32:27) after easing into it at the start with tight hamstring on a chilly morning. That part ended up ok, but best of all I was ahead of Chris Shaw (national-level M45 from our club) for I believe the first time ever.

A nit picker could point out that he was clearly out for a training run on the course with a group of friends, chatting and taking it easy. Doesn't show up in results, so he may not have even crossed the finish line. Doesn't matter -- I will be mentioning my triumph at every opportunity. A rivalry is born!

Have a great week,

Dave

Haven't done a lot since the World Senior Games. Partly because it's my busiest time of year workwise - I'm 65, but no intention of retiring - and had a lot of catching up to do when I got back from Utah, and partly because I don't expect to be racing until the spring (there's nothing much in the way of races less than an hour + away - miss Long Island in that respect, multiple races close by every weekend).

Have been doing the odd hard four or five, and yesterday did 5.5 miles in 7:22 including 4 times 4 min moderately hard with 4 min steady recovery. That will be the first step to gradually picking it back up again before the weight starts creeping up (about half my runs these days are purely about burning calories).

Interesting thing I have found is that despite only doing 6 or 7 runs in 5 or 6 weeks, according to Garmin, my VO2 max has hardly changed. Maybe it's one of the positives of training and racing for 50 years+

Greetings, fellow 50+ers. Hope you have all recovered from your Turkey Trots!

No need for any excuses this week as the weather and schedule cooperated which allowed me to reach a local maximum of 21.3 miles of actual running. Again this week I touched on a bit of “speed” as well as adding a “long” run. (It’s all relative, of course. 😉) The niggles are still present, but they have been manageable. Fingers crossed that they remain under the radar.

Mon: 54’ CR w/ utility pole fartlek (4 x 2 on/off); body wt ex + med ball routine

Tue: off

Wed: 54’ CR; body wt ex + med ball routine

Thu: off 🦃

Fri: 64’ CR; body wt ex + med ball routine

Sat: off

Sun: 54’ CR; body wt ex + med ball routine

All the best!

My last really hard week before Club XC went well. Counting last Sunday's XC race I did three straight hard days, a rest day, then hard day, easy day, hard day, easy day for this week. Only 28 miles total though -

M- 5 miles of 10 x 400easy/ 400 at 5k pace (1:40s) ave for all 8:48/mi

T- 4miles of 8 x 400easy/ 400 at 5k pace (1:40s) ave for all 8:56/mi

W- rest

Th- 4miles of 8 x 400easy/ 400 at 5k pace (1:40s) ave for all 8:44/mi

F- 5mi walk

S- 6mi hilly trails with my son 7:56/mi

Su- 4mi walk

My next two weeks will be easy runs with some strides and maybe one more 400 workout late this week if I'm feeling really fresh. Club XC should be really fun as it now looks like pretty much every fast guy in the country in the 70-74s has entered.

Good running to all!

Greetings!

dhaaga: Dave, my congrats on a very solid result! 10 hilly miles in 65 min is very impressive!

Cavorty: rest/easy month may be quite beneficial, especially in our age. No doubt, you will pick up soon.

Good week for me. Two doubles – Sat and Sun. Does not happen often to me. As the running season is closed here (but skiing is open), I do not count miles/kms, but training time only.

Mon – off (planned)
Tue – 1:00 mix of treadmill and elliptical (42’ treadmill, 18’ elliptical)
Wed – off (unplanned, late from work)
Thu – 1:07 mix of treadmill and elliptical
Fri – 1:08 mix of treadmill and elliptical
Sat – AM 1:06 skiing, PM 38’ elliptical
Sun – AM 1:01 skiing, PM 44’ elliptical

Subtotal 6:44, about 25% @LT effort (by feel)

Happy and injury-free running to all!

Because I didn’t work after Monday the week of Thanksgiving, seriously pondering retiring. Anyway . . . a good week for us.
M: 5.5M @ 11:19 pace + 6x:30 strides

T: 9M - 4(5:00/3:00) @ 8:20 pace into the big cold wind; 3km @ 9:15 pace

W: morning- treadmill 7.5M @ 11:03 pace; afternoon- treadmill 4.5M @ 11:45 pace

Th: 10M @ 9:30 pace

F: 5.5M @ 10:40 pace + 6x:30

Sat: 17M @ 9:15 pace w/last 10km @ 8:40 pace on hilly loop

Enjoy the week

Update.

I am one of the original posters on the thread but I have been mostly didelined since a medical issue in August. I went into urinary retention on a 4 hour flight and subsequently required catheterisation. Also managed to cop a nasty urosepsis with a temp of +41°C (about 106°F).

The prostate measuring about 3 x the norm. Medicated with Duodart to bring prostate size down (the soft option). Anyway subsequent trials without the catheter all unsuccessful. So now awaiting TURP surgery. Timeline anywhere up to 25th Jan. Covid has left a bit of a logjam with elective surgeries. Still living life with the catheter insitu.

Previous attempts to run and ride had left me with haematuria so I had been sticking with lots of walking, kayaking and cautious strength exercises.

6 weeks ago our state got hit with record breaking rains, massive flooding. Out walking during a break in the weather I got smashed at half way by a massive storm cell. 20 mls of rain in 20 mins. I had no choice but to run home as I would have got stranded by flash flooding.

No haematuria post running.

Since then I have gradually eased back into a ery cautious trial and error training plan. Well it's barely training but it is something positive.

Best to you mo pac.

My "training" from last week. Don't laugh, it's not easy doing this stuff with a catheter and I do have to be cautious.

M. 23 min uphill mountain bike ride to the spot where my secret single track trail meets the ridgeline. Hid bike in the bush, chucked on the xc spikes. Hiked down the singletrack then jogged up 900m most of it at 20% gradient, jogged 300m back to the bike. Changed shoes, 14 min ride home.

T. 48 min kayaking on the lake. Our lake is at 105% of capacity, I could paddle over the railtrail.

W. Babysitting duties with grandson Harvey. I jogged a lap of the property 1.2 kms 8 mins before my daughter went to work. When his dad got him in the evening I hiked 5 k in the forest with occassional jogs.

T. 35 min kayak on the little reservoir near our daughter's property. I then jogged the rough trail around the reservoir, exactly 1 mile as it turns out. Took me 11 mins. In the evening I hiked 8 kms through the forest jogging occassionally.

F. 36 mins gentle ride on the mountain bike.

S. 32 min gentle ride on the mountain bike.

S. I walked a few kms to get breakfast. I then jogged 2.5 kms uphill in 21 mins then hiked down my steep singletrack finishing with 200 m of running at about 5.30 km pace just to move the legs.

Also some strength training sessions and being concious of keeping my step count up to help minimise weight gain. 138,000 according to Garmin. Friday the only day under 20,000.

* Sonogno (MoPac), I didn't realize you were having difficulties. Sounds tough to do any of those things you're doing to stay fit. Inspiring to see you still at it when things are obviously challenging. Wishing you the best.

* Solid 10 miles Dave. I'd take that anyday!

My Turkey Trot 10k went incredibly well. I ended up with an 89.12% 38:18. Far exceeding my expectations! I haven't been over 89% since the Spring of 2017. Crazy thing is it was 4 miles before I knew what pace I was running. My Garmin had a 'memory full' error when I pushed start. And nothing happened. The course had mile marks but no one there calling out splits. I asked a guy that was running next to me just before 4 miles what our time was. And he said 24:40! I honestly had no idea what I was running so I was real happy to hear that! I ended up leaving him and went after a guy maybe 75-100 yds ahead. I caught him with about 1/4 to go, but he got me back right at the line.

I Google map'd the course at 6.18 so it was pretty accurate.

Needless to say I was super excited with my race results. This was the first time I've ever raced without a watch but I might start racing without one from now on!

That's it from here. Have a good run!

Dave

You should be excited, that is a good mark.

Thanks Dave. I spotted that performance on Facebook. You are flying.

Australian 60-64 5000 record set to be challenged by Steve Moneghetti this week. He is aiming for around 16.30. Amazing for a man who ran 4 Olympic Marathons 3 x top 10.