Road Racing and Training Thread - Week Ending 10/19

The Stone Cutter: Nice week. Way to bounce back!

Pikachu: Glad you're out there and enjoying it. Solid week, too.

Forcerunner: Congrats on the awesome race!

StevenJ: Very nice week.

pewow: Congrats on hitting your goal!

NP1112: I always feel terrible tapering, then magically feel awesome when I race :)

Netwerk Errer: Good luck in your race!

KBXC: Sorry about the rough week and race but hope you bounce back quickly.

HS_Runner_XC: I try not to think too much about time in XC, especially for hard courses. It'll come, just trust your training.

Nop200: Nice week and race!

CMM- Congrats on that impressive marathon, I'm sure you've got that sub 2:35 in you the next go around. Have you though about trying Philly in 5 weeks, its a fast course and the timing seems about right?

Steven- Athens ga so mild enough to not hinder me. I love the cold :). Yeah I help manage a farm, it's really rewarding!

Stone- actually I did go dancing haha glad you remembered.

Cmm- boy alot of people commenting on the farm work hehe.

I haven't been keeping up with the thread week but I'll start again now. However, reed, you did it!!

Everyone else on this thread you inspire me. Keep it up and thanks for your support. Right now I'm just frustrated, haven't set apr in about 5 years in anything. It's time to change that.

Forcerunner: Great job. 69:06 is a great time – especially for the first time out.

StevenJ: Being chatty at 5:54 pace? Definitely sounds like good shape! :-)

Pewow: Congrats for cracking the 30 minutes (I told you! :D) – and doing it with a hige negative split is even better!

NP1112: Taper madness is normal. Before some of my best marathons I struggled with my tempo runs, too. The hay is in the barn! Good luck to you!!

Netwerk errer: Nice to hear your ankle is ok again!

RunnersFix: Solid as ever. Looks like you take it pretty easy on your easy (like me) days, too :-)

Hereford: When I see your goal (sub 2:50) and your training really think you will make it there with no problems barring injury, etc... Great week! And yes... When I am back in my A game I hope to hit some pretty good stuff :-)

Slartzio: Yeah, keep enjoying the new routine – and some shorter stuff will benefit you in the longer stuff, too!

KBXC: Great perspective: Bad races happen – keep looking forward, keep your head up :-)

cmm268: You killed it – 2:35 is almost spot on for your goal. You did great!!!

HS_runner_XC: Bummer with your stomach – but the team won. Next time you roll again :-)

renewed marathoner: Don't give yourseld so much pressure – I am sure that too much pressure doesn't help. Enjoy the ride!!

Distance_fan: With that 10k you have the speed for your marathon goal in the bag!

Nop200: That 7 miler looks good when it felt that easy – keep up the good work.

The Garbage Disposal: Great race (altitude!) and solid mileage... On your way to a new marathon PR I'd say ;-)

reed: Great job with breaking 26 – way to go!

Xenonscreams: Juyt recover properly. Most people are too obessed with never missing workouts or doing them too hard (myself included :D)... The rest will benefit you!

Ghola: Your Friday session looks pretty good :-)

Bonham: keep recovering... It might seem hard – but takin' some rest is part of the marathon game :-)

Kendo: Like you said: Wednesday looks good for your race plans!

Reg Fields: Very good half – you might not hace hit your „A“ goal – but you should be able to squeeze it sub 3:00 come racedy IMHO.

I am amazed how much life is in this thread right now!! :-)

Goal: Get healthy

Goal: 2014 mi for the year

Goal:

M: 3 mi Easy 8:02/mi aHR 139 + strengthening

T: 4.5 mi Easy 7:59/mi aHR 136

W: 3 mi Easy 7:53/mi aHR 136 + strengthening

T: 4.5 mi Easy 7:55/mi aHR 136

F: 3 mi Easy 8:03/mi aHR 137 + strengthening

S: 4.5 mi Easy 7:58/mi aHR 133

S: 7 mi Easy 7:39/mi aHR 134

Weekly Total: 29.5 mi

YTD: 1578 mi

The slow build up continues. Started using my HR monitor again to qualify any progress. Sunday's "long" run was encouraging and I felt pretty good, easily my best run of the week. I've also added some strength exercises (squats, calf raises, hip hikers, pushups) for good measure.

Comments:

Stone: I like how you are mixing up the MP tempo days and your long runs. When I've followed hanson's I just stuck to the basic run at a given pace. As far as the migraine goes, I've found sometimes an easy run actually makes it go away.

Pikachu: Solid week. You mentioned HR, are you following some sort of HR plan or are you just keeping track? I'm just starting to keep track of HR again so you've got me curious.

ForceRunner: Nice race! Sub 1:10 for a first time is outstanding!

Steven J: You need to grease up in the rain! I always do if it looks like rain. Very nice week.

Pewow: Congrats on breaking 30!

NP1112 & Network: Good luck on your upcoming races!

KBXC: Hope you're feeling better.

CMM268: Well done sir!

Renewed: What kind of frisbee?

Reg Fields wrote:

CMM- Congrats on that impressive marathon, I'm sure you've got that sub 2:35 in you the next go around. Have you though about trying Philly in 5 weeks, its a fast course and the timing seems about right?

I hadnt thought about it but now you planted the seed in my mind. Maybe I will do just this instead of running the Run for the Diamonds on Thanksgiving:) Although let's see how I feel after this week...

Stone Cutter- I hope I can channel the way you're knocking out these weeks one after the other in a couple of months when I'm in the midst of heavy training myself. I think I am most impressed with how you handled those two quality sessions Friday/Sunday within about a 48 hour span.

One quick question: the Friday session is NOT a Hanson's session right? I actually had a discussion with someone about those workouts recently (MP +/- 15s/mi). I didn't recall seeing it in their books either, but seems like it could provide a different type of stimulus that may work well.

Also, NP and I were just joking the other day about how often I race, and it just dwaned on me that I am on track to pin on a bib about 35 times this year. Maybe just making up for lost time with my injury from last summer/fall, but I am definitely trying to hold back a little bit in the low key ones so I don't fry myself.

Pikachu- Nice week, and running 2:20-2:25 800s for a workout already? Impressive how you are already in this kind of shape.

StevenJ- Solid week man. Sounds like your 3x2 was quite a workout as well. I am a solid believer in running controlled in workouts most of the time, but once in awhile when you have other people pushing you it's worth it to take advantage and get out of your comfort zone a little bit. It's workouts like that that will make you take that next leap as you get back into shape.

Pewow- Congrats on the sub-30 and running a impressively executed race!

NP1112- I feel jipped. No buffet for me and you'll have 10 stations next weekend. Good luck!

Netwerk Errer- Hope the recovery is still progressing well.

Runnersfix- Really liking how the weeks and sessions are slowly building up from the prior weeks. For your long runs, do you always start progressing with 6 miles to go?

Hereford- Solid week but really impressed with the Thursday/Saturday sessions with only one easy day in between. Seems like you are hitting your stride.

Slartzio- Nice workouts this week, good maintenance week.

KBXC- One of the great things about being in HS is that you have about 3-4 times the recovery rate of us old geezers. I bet there won't even be a hint of your illness left by the time your next race rolls around.

HS_Runner_XC- Good week of training, and way to gut it out for your team. It's hard to judge times in XC because of terrain/hills/conditions and stuff, but it's all about racing and beating people.

Renewed marathoner- Nice comeback week, keep building man.

Distance Fan- Good job handling the beginning of the taper and it sounds like your body is responding already. 2 more weeks to go!

Nop200- Solid race this week, sounds like you put yourself out there and took a shot at going out a bit more aggressively and almost came away with the win. Keep up the good work.

Forcerunner- Solid debut man and I definitely remember that hill the last mile from when i ran it 5 years ago. Not a cool way to end the race!

Reed- Congrats on the sub-26 man. Must have felt awesome.

I'm a highschool senior from New York on a relatively deep XC team. My 5K PR is 18:27 and I'm about 14th man on the team.

I'm primarily training now for my county meet, where I'll be racing JV, which is this Saturday.

Monday: School was off for columbus day and I took the opportunity to visit Penn. We were just doing a ~40 minute run today so I did it on my own in the morning around the Penn campus. I actually managed to sneak onto Franklin Field on account of some of the track team guys leaving the gate open and I ran 3 or 4 easy 90-second quarters on the track in the middle of my run just to do something fun. Makes me really pumped for Penn Relays which my team goes to every year in the spring.

Tuesday: Had an easy race prep day. 30 minute run followed by a few 200s at 5K pace. Felt good enough.

Wednesday: Raced at a league meet 5K in the JV race. Unfortunately these races are tough to run fast in because they have little to no depth outside of my team, as was exemplified at this race when my team swept the top 15 spots and had our pack in the lead as early as the 400m mark in. Our coach was actually disappointed in how we raced it because we were all looking back too much or looking at our watches as if this was a tempo run at the end when we should have just been focusing on finishing the race. I finished in 18:51, which was only 5 seconds off what I ran last here, so my day wasn't quite as bad as some of my teammates, but I definitely fell victim to looking back a few times. More to learn from for next time; I didn't feel the need to write a full in-depth analysis for this race.

Thursday: Recovery. Just 30 minutes easy and then weightroom.

Friday: The only real workout of the week, which involved getting some quicker stuff in. My coach made us do this because he thought we were a little slow for the last 1K of our race on Wednesday and needed a little kick in our legs. First 6x300 at goal mile pace (~54's), then 4x200, which were technically supposed to be at 800 pace but he let us have fun with them (31, 31, 30, 27). Plenty of rest in between each rep. I felt good at the end, but unfortunately there was a middle-school race starting just after our workout which the middle school coach wanted me to help rabbit (so the kids don't make wrong turns). I was expecting it to be fun and easy, but while it was fun, the kids were a little faster than expected. I had to finish the 1.75 mile course in 10:40 to stay in front of the lead, and running six-flat mile pace at the end of a workout wasn't exactly easy on my legs.

Saturday: Just an easy run, 35ish minutes. Afterwards a few teammates and I drove over to watch an invitational that we weren't running in because we suspected one guy would break the course record at our local 5K course (15:47). Luckily we made sure that he didn't know it and he missed it by 2 seconds. Now it's still fresh for our top runner to take it tomorrow, which is his goal. I probably should have icebathed today but I didn't find the time.

Sunday: Just an easy run. I had plans to meet an alumni but for some reason he didn't show so I just did 20 minutes by myself.

cmm268 wrote:

Reg Fields wrote:

CMM- Congrats on that impressive marathon, I'm sure you've got that sub 2:35 in you the next go around. Have you though about trying Philly in 5 weeks, its a fast course and the timing seems about right?

I hadnt thought about it but now you planted the seed in my mind. Maybe I will do just this instead of running the Run for the Diamonds on Thanksgiving:) Although let's see how I feel after this week...

My buddy who runs similar times to you did Baltimore last year then Philly and ran a faster time in Philly. Definitely wait a week before jumping in.

TheGarbageDisposal wrote:

Stone Cutter-

One quick question: the Friday session is NOT a Hanson's session right? I actually had a discussion with someone about those workouts recently (MP +/- 15s/mi). I didn't recall seeing it in their books either, but seems like it could provide a different type of stimulus that may work well.

You are correct. The Hansons have you run a straight MP tempo every week. To mix it up and to add a slightly different stimulus, my coach and I "rotate" different tempo runs, all of which end up averaging around MP but in much different ways.

1) Classic tempo. Try to hold a steady effort and lock into pace. Sometimes I will do these with a shorter warmup/cooldown (2mi up, 2mi down), sometimes I will do a longer warmup 6-8mi, and run the last 6-10mi of a longer run at MP.

2) Alternating tempo (MP-15s/MP+15s). This is more of a Canova type session, which is designed to help your body improve its ability to use/clear lactate. After awhile, it's amazing how "easy" the MP+15s feels.

3) Cutdown tempo, dropping pace :10/mi (e.g., MP+30/MP+20/MP+10/MP/MP-10/MP-20/MP-30). Again, this will come after a longer warmup 6-8mi, so you end up finishing a longer effort really fast.

Rotating the workouts breaks up the monotony of doing the same thing each week, but keeping the integrity of the plan in place while adding different "tools to the belt," so to speak.

CMM268- Congrats dude! I got home from my race yesterday and that was the first thing I checked for. Super pumped for you, and I'm sure you got more room to improve too. For anyone else I would say Reg's idea is probably a bit aggressive, but I have seen you run PRs within 5-6 weeks (specifically last fall/winter) so I can definitely see a 2:32-2:34 from you in Philly.

(to answer your question: yeah RnR used to be pretty ambiguous on who they will comp for each race, but starting this year they set the standards at 1:11/2:27, and this was the first race I have been able to take advantage of that. Denver is a little over an hour drive away from me so I didn't even have to shell out for a hotel room either)

Xenon- Sometimes it takes a bit more time for your body to get back to being ready to race hard after being sick. Seems like you won't have to wait that long for redemption though.

Ghola- Nice workout this week, not bad for having what appears to be a minor case of the post-peak-race blues.

Hereford- Ah, I commented on your week first and then had to run a bit before I saw your question. My PR is 67:44 from the Gerry Bjorklund half this year, (the half that's held in conjunction with Grandma's marathon) but running only 5 min slower on a hilly course at 5200-5400 feet altitude at the end of a solid training week gives me a ton of confidence that I may not be that far away from regaining peak form.

Bonham- That's actually a pretty solid mile so close to your marathon. For what it's worth I popped a 4:52 about 4-5 days after I ran 2:37, and a few months later I was in shape to hold that pace for about 2-3 miles.

Kendo- Nice week, keep on plugging away man.

Reg- Didn't realize the HM was in the middle of a week that was so close to your all time weekly high for mileage. Definitely a good sign you could pull that off with the side stitch.

SPS- Solid show of discipline building up slowly and doing strengthening to support that. Keep up the good work.

Habs- Looking good kid. Good luck this weekend.

Stone- Thanks for the response and that makes sense (different workouts to provide slightly different stimulus). Those alternating fast/slow mile workouts seem to be becoming more and more popular the last couple of years too.

CMM: You say you waited all day to see what you had at mile 20, but I'd submit that we wait all cycle to see what we've got when the real race starts at that point. Your race report shows (along with the passed/passed by stats!) that you had a ton of guts and courage left. Congrats again on a great race. Let yourself savour the PR. You earned it! Sub-2:35 will come. (Though I'm going to do my best to beat you to it!)

Garbage: Thanks for the encouragement. I'd like to take that Strava segment (2:45) if I can, but I think the snow will arrive here before I am in shape to do it. My mind is ready to race and feel strong again, but every time I run my body says it needs more time. This is definitely the most tangible the wages of racing 26.2 miles has felt to me to date (two previous marathons to this one). Five weeks is normal recovery period from a PB-level marathon effort, right?

CMM: You say you waited all day to see what you had at mile 20, but I'd submit that we wait all cycle to see what we've got when the real race starts at that point. Your race report shows (along with the passed/passed by stats!) that you had a ton of guts and courage left. Congrats again on a great race. Let yourself savour the PR. You earned it! Sub-2:35 will come. (Though I'm going to do my best to beat you to it!)

Garbage: Thanks for the encouragement. I'd like to take that Strava segment (2:45) if I can, but I think the snow will arrive here before I am in shape to do it. My mind is ready to race and feel strong again, but every time I run my body says it needs more time. This is definitely the most tangible the wages of racing 26.2 miles has felt to me to date (two previous marathons to this one). Five weeks is normal recovery period from a PB-level marathon effort, right?

Hey guys :)

my week running wise was a bit quiet, raced a 5K on Wednesday and then didn't run Friday-Sunday as i went to Dublin, Ireland for my 21st! so didn't run.

back to normal this week though. so i will post the 2 weeks next sunday

:)

I just had a good workout this morning doing an alternating tempo (alternating 800s) on the track (so I could get used to spikes a bit). I figured it would be a good workout since a) it's still pretty much a tempo, and tempos are good for me, b) having some segments at faster than tempo pace should be more specific for cross country racing, and c) I'm generally great at getting into a rhythm but terrible at shifting gears, so this would also help work on one of my weaknesses. Anyways, I hit right around 5:30 per mile pace for the faster segments and 6 flat for the slower ones. Total was 28:44 for 8k, with a 2:30 break to switch to spikes after 4800 and rehydrate a bit.

Some more comments and replies:

Forcerunner: Good job in the half, especially for a first effort at the distance, and awesome story with the Kenyan marathoner checking you out! I guess you must look fast enough that you had him slightly worried!

reed: Congrats, man! Kind of sucks that you missed the club record by so little, but you ran a really well executed race and kicked some major ass! I've also noticed the unfortunate bit that if you actually pace yourself well you can end up alone somewhere in the 3rd or 4th mile.

xenonscreams: Rough week. After having some similar experiences I tend to shy away from really digging deep except in key races, but it can definitely be hard to be prudent when you're in the moment. Hope you feel better by now!

Kendo: 10 miles is a lot of walking. Doing some truly old school training there! Best of luck this Sunday!

Reg Fields: Only a minute and a half or so slower than you were hoping ain't bad given that you were dealing with a side stitch for 10 miles! Those things can just ruin me if they hit me the wrong way. Also, strong long run on Monday! That may also have had an effect on your time in the half.

cmm268: Well, it was only conversational for like the first 1200 or so of a 5:54 piece after some rest. If I've been running ~6 flat pace for much longer than that I'm pretty much reduced to grunts. And even if you can't hold conversation at that pace, I sure as hell can't run a marathon at that pace either!

sps: Looks like a nice week, especially with the strengthening stuff and the strong long run. Your patience in this buildup will pay off!

habs: Sounds like a pretty tough day on Friday, and some quick young'uns! Good luck at the county meet!

didn't realise i put 'didn't run' twice... oops!

Stone Cutter- Sounds like your week was up and down but you got the work in. I like the 3x2 workout Tuesday. I do that workout as well from time to time. I was wanting to ask you about your alt tempos, do they get easier to pace as you do them more often? I did my first one just this week and all though the paces were fine, I just had a hard time hitting the slower reps because of the alternating pace.

Pikachu- So, I do understand that your still deciding on a race but have you decided on the distance yet that this race will be? Just curious. You seem like you're in great shape already, especially when looking at your progression long run.

Pewow- Nice 8k! You ran that race very smart just by looking at your splits. You negative split almost every mile and your last mile was the fastest. I think you're going to run a great 5k in two weeks.

Np1112- I think its just part of the taper process as long as you didn't actually tweak it or hit it on something. My body acts so strange during the taper and I did the same exact mileage pretty much.

RunnersFix wrote:

Stone Cutter- Sounds like your week was up and down but you got the work in. I like the 3x2 workout Tuesday. I do that workout as well from time to time. I was wanting to ask you about your alt tempos, do they get easier to pace as you do them more often? I did my first one just this week and all though the paces were fine, I just had a hard time hitting the slower reps because of the alternating pace.

The pacing is a bit tricky on those alternating tempos. Generally, this is how the workout goes for me:

First mile - I start out too fast for the first .25mi, and then ease into the correct pace over the final .75mi, so that I am usually about 2-3 seconds too fast overall.

Second mile - I slow down a little too much and I am behind pace for the first .25mi, and then I overcompensate for the next half mile and run too fast, and then slow down just enough over the last .25mi to hit the target.

Rinse and repeat.

If you looked at all of the quarter mile splits WITHIN each mile, my splits might actually be all over the place, especially the first couple times I do the workout.

Over time, though, the "slow" miles become much easier, but the "fast" miles require a little more effort, if that makes sense.