55 year old female trying to PR in Half Marathon in 6 weeks

Shouldn't someone who knows about running be training her? How much is she paying you?

Mileage is her limiting factor. She should be putting in 3x the mileage she is right now.

She may not be concerned with her low mileage, but she should be. Speed is not the limiting factor. Just tell her to run more. Unfortunately, with only 6 weeks it will be tough to build that up gradually.

You are her biggest limitation.

She definitely needs to run more.

How many miles was she running per week when she went 1:57? She needs to run more than that.

Make a good part of that running at goal pace. Make some of it at slightly faster than goal pace.

I see this is a friendly place....

I know a little bit about running. Enough to know that with her fitness level current mileage and time frame that her goals are a reach at best. Just trying to figure out her best bang for her buck in the time frame with her goals in mind

fpole wrote:

Shouldn't someone who knows about running be training her? How much is she paying you?

What is YOUR weekly mileage? What are your PRs?

I think she is looking to improve her running without the hassle of having to run. Low motivation, not concerned with her low mileage, has followed a Hal Higdon plan in the past (why isn't she still following it.?).

Its straightforward, as stated already, she needs to run more miles. If she really wants to PR, six weeks is too short a time to make big improvements but, ditch one or preferably both of the "spinning" and the "les mills body pump 60 high endurance weight lifting session" and devote the time to running. Doesn't really matter too much what kind of workouts she does at this stage, just steady running more often plus 1 long easy run per week (10 miles lets say as she is already at 8) and some goal pace miles thrown in. No speed work she will risk injury, just include one run each week (3 - 5 miles maybe) at her goal pace or slightly faster and throw in rest days and easy days after each hard effort (the long run and the goal pace run are the hard efforts everything else should be steady or easy).

Taper only the final week but not too drastically, shorten the final long run a week out, do a very short goal pace effort early in the week then no more hard stuff, shorten the steady runs, take an extra rest day during the week and rest completely the day before.

HartHealth15 wrote:

I know a little bit about running.

wrote:

Very little.

So little you shouldn't pass on any second hand information that suits your needs more than hers.

Send her to a local running organization (like the NYRR) where she can talk to someone that is at her level, or someone that at least runs, which you do not.

Quit trying to BS your way to a solution.

"Mileage is about 15 per week right now"

Her best bet is GW 501516, instantaneous aerobic training

effect without actually doing any running.

+1

Here's your training plan.

joho wrote:

She definitely needs to run more.

How many miles was she running per week when she went 1:57? She needs to run more than that.

Make a good part of that running at goal pace. Make some of it at slightly faster than goal pace.

Thanks for the reply Joho.

She was running about 20-25 miles a wk (plus 2hrs cross training) when she ran this time. What is a good plan for her mileage leading up to the race? Does this look ball park?

Wk 1 20 (Long 8)

Wk 2 22 (Long 9)

Wk 3 25 (Long 10)

Wk 4 28 (Long 12)

Wk 5 30 (Long 10)

Wk 6 8-10 (plus race)

*With one 5k tempo per week

Thoughts?

6.5/10

Pretty clever, but almost too believable. Some people just reply to obvious trolls posts. So you have to keep a few more elements of a troll. Throw in a few things that are a little less believable. Not having these somewhat unbelievable items, that will attract people to argue and be more critical is going to limit your total number of responses.

Keep working on it.

What is YOUR weekly mileage? What are your PRs?[/quote]

53'3 shot put

57'6 35lb weight throw

HartHealth15 wrote:

I know that this is not that much info but I was hoping to start a discussion here. What else should I be considering. What is a general theme/layout for a plan for this client. Is this a realistic goal?

Her 8:15 all out mile has nothing to do with speed. This is the marathon. If you run only 15 mpw, the limiting factor is going to be aerobic fitness.

What else should you consider? The something from nothing attitude your client has. Great, she wants to run a marathon. That's fine on its own and I'm not shaming anyone who wants to accomplish something athletically. But come on... She wants to PR but doesn't want to put in more than the absolute bare minimum, hence the Hal Higdon training plan, and spinning and weight training. If you want to be generally fit, that's OK, but if the goal is to run well she's going about it the wrong way. If you want to succeed at running for your own given ability, you have to put in the work - there are no short cuts.

Let'srun may be full of a$$holes and trolls, but it's one of the only places around that will tell it like it is in regards to the work required to get faster. It doesn't pander to people who want to quit when they have to run more than the minimum. I'm not that fast, but I'm a lot faster than I used to be when I used to blame my lack of success on not having talent. Turns out I was wrong in thinking that 5 days per week of running was enough.

Hal Hidgon plans suck. It's the same thing over and over again week after week. A much better plan would be Hanson's. But that requires running at least 6 days per week. If you client doesn't want that, then she should concentrate on just running to participate and try not to focus on PR's.

Have her do the cross training using different muscles,

after the 10 miler, and then 2 days of low activity

recovery.

fred wrote:

Have her do the cross training using different muscles,

after the 10 miler, and then 2 days of low activity

recovery.

Thanks. The class is on Saturday. We will move the long run to Friday from Sunday if it works with her life schedule.

Would you hire a marathon coach to help you with your weight events?