People who ran mega-miles and didn't see improvement? Lesser knowns who did?

I guess I shouldn't have turnt up the rhetoric so much in my previous post, and I'm sorry if it offended you. I have noticed that there are incongruities in the minds of posters on this site where certain physical feats (elite or sub elite level times) require talent while others (running very high or mega mileage) are not looked at as a talent that only certain physiologies can handle.

Todd Lemon wrote:

I think the point you're missing here is that the ability to run and withstand mega miles is itself a talent. Letsrun has this idea in its collective head that running mileage is the key to hacking your potential. Having the hardware to run those kinds of miles is like having the hardware to run a sub 14 5k or a sub 220 marathon. Desperate, misguided kids attempt it, fueled by anecdotes like Brian Sell and whichever Pre quote their coach decided to put on the team shirt that year. Most of them end up getting done in by some complications of CNS fatigue.

Who? I find it hard to believe that there are hordes of kids recklessly attempting 140 mile weeks. Usually they are they opposite, using anecdotes of Bernard Lagat to argue that they too will run well enough on 70 mpw (even though their times show otherwise).

OK, you asked for it. In high school in those days no one really knew how to train so essentially, we didn't. We had no cross country team until my senior year and only began "practicing" in early to mid-March for outdoor track. I would guess that in season I might have done 10-15 miles a week at the absolute most and really it was probably more like 5-10, (that was in season, there was almost no out of season running though I did dabble with things at times,) and I showed no ability at all. I never broke 6:00 for the mile and didn't beat another runner who actually finished a race until very late in my junior year. In my one high school cross country season, where the courses were 2.2 to 2.5 miles long, I always managed to beat a (very) few guys so got the idea that I was better suited for longer things.

When I decided to run in college and learned that cross country courses were between 4.5 and 6 miles long, distances I had never run at one shot in my life, I decided that the first thing I needed to do was be able to run that far so I spent the summer before my freshman year trying to get in 6-8 miles a day. I wasn't keeping a diary then but know that I skipped a fair few days so let's say I was doing about 30 which probably bumped up to 40-50 once I got to school.

Our home course was six miles long and I ran 40:10 on it as a freshman best and off of pretty much the same mileage, maybe a bit more but not much, as a sophomore ran 39:00. I also did the 4:34 marathon then. The three mile time came as a sophomore. I think I had a 5:27 mile and a high 11:00 two mile in there as well and the 18:08 three mile.

Following my sophomore year I got to the 50-70 range and that made a huge difference. I got my cross country time to 34:31 and later my mile and two mile to a shade over 5:00 and 11:00. I also got the marathon to 3:29 and shortly after to 3:24.

From there I worked up to about 80 for several months and then to 100 in the summer before my senior year and got 32:29 for the cross country course, 17:04 for three miles, 3:05 for the marathon and then got really sick for the balance of my senior track season. Upon graduating I started working up to 120, then to 130-150 or so and the times kept dropping to those I posted earlier.

Another "big improvement" story that comes to mind is a Canadian called Norm Patenaude who also never bettered 6:00 for the mile in high school but became a mileage beast, 150 was reportedly pretty common for him, and ogt a 2:24 marathon and some really good ultras though I can't be specific. Sadly, he was run over by a snowplow and killed.

HRE, nice.

Ty, going from 18:30 to 2:16 is as impressive as Sell's 10:00 to 2:10, IMO. Keep up the good work and nice write-up.

doo doo wrote:

HRE, nice.

Thanks. By the way, Patenaude survived being run over by the snowplow but killed shortly afterward when he was run over by a car while biking.

It's so specific to what your talents and durability are. At 32 I can max out around 45 a week as my average for about 12 weeks and run 15:30, 33:00 and1:12:xx but spend about as much time stretching, strengthening, massaging etc as I do running. Not super impressive. All my runs (5/week max, usually 4) are around 6:25 pace aside from maybe one interval or tempo effort. I feel on the verge if overuse injury but energy wise, I'm sharp and strong and can really hammer a workout for my ability because the volume isn't so bad. I ran 1:51 in the 800 this way despite a coach wanting more miles

My friend can casually run 45 a week with no workouts and win a half marathon in 1:06:xx or a 5k in 15:00 and not really suffer much. He's a 13:30's guy from university though, so my 5k pr is what he runs off the couch. He ran close to 100/wk to get his 13:3x pr and qualify for the trials.

Xcskier66 wrote:

do you guys mean you run 120+ every single week?

Don't you have hard weeks and easy weeks? In skiing and running it would be foolish to have every week be the same effort level. It would be much harder to get the advantages of super compensation.

People who ascribe to high mileage training don't usually take "down weeks." It's not about a big stress and then a recovery, more like a prolonged exposure to a very high workload that gradually shapes you into a better runner, like a stone worn smooth on the beach by millions and millions of waves.

At my best I had about four consecutive months without a single week below 100, and many at or above 120. Dropped down to race, but even then still hit 85ish.

doo doo wrote:

This is pretty interesting. What sort of mileage had lead to your 27:00?

85-90

Dave Bedford, his career was over by 23.

I'm focusing on 1500/5k at age 20. When is a good time to start doing 100+ mpw and focus on the marathon? mid/late 20s? And when I do focus on the marathon at high mileage, how do I structure the weekly training?

2 things.

1. When I run ~90-100, I do take a down week every 5th week. This is pretty common practice, though I never have trained for a marathon or done super high mileage. I know a lot of guys who have and they take down weeks every 4th-6th week or so. I'm sure there are exceptions like yourself, and you've proved it works so I'm not knocking your style, just saying that down weeks are indeed common practice for many high mileage people.

2. I find it remarkable that you were training 85-90 and running 27:00 yet when doing ultra high mileage dropped roughly a minute and a half. That's awesome. 85-90 is a pretty high level of training already.

A few more things to add to this discussion (really interesting conversation, by the way).

1. I agree with Doodoo - I think it's normal (and relatively vital) to take some period of recuperation during very high volume training. For me, that doesn't usually mean taking a week where I run 75% each day, but instead, I would take 3 days where I run VERY little (30-60 minutes only) every 20-25 days. I found that this super-recovery gave me a huge mental and physical break and allowed me to recover and then get back into a big block of training.

2. It sounds like this poster followed a similar trajectory to my own. I ran ~27' off of 80-90 MPW and then ended up running 30'22 for 10k in college off of 120+. Still, I think that this can be a bit of a misinterpretation of the results. While the increase in mileage surely had a big impact, I think the bigger impact is the fact that a couple of years of consistent training passed between those times.

What I'm trying to say is that you can't expect to go from running 27' for 8k to 25' for 8k in a month just by increasing your volume by 50%. Yes, my volume increased by 50% and yes my time went from 27' to 25', but that happened of the course of 2-3 YEARS! The thing about mileage is that it's a long, slow, patient game and if you want immediate results, you might be disappointed.

Finally, to comment on a poster who mentioned the idea of talent and durability. I think he's right and there's a huge misconception that TALENT can only be measured in how fast you can run 400m or what your 5k time is in high school. Surely, this natural ability is extremely valuable and a great indicator of future success. But, the idea of being durable and being able to train at an extremely high level without getting injured is a huge outlier and therefore I would call it another form of talent.

I'm the perfect example of someone without very much of the first type of talent (slow of 400m, slow in HS), but enough of the second type of talent to let me see some serious improvements.

So, yes. Having success with very high mileage is not JUST about work ethic. You can "want it" as much as possible and go out and put the runs in, but your body needs to be able to accept it. Call it talent, call it durability, but it's something that not everyone has, so count yourself lucky if you can handle it.