The science is conclusive: high mileage does nothing for improving performance.

Genius...

Yes the "science" is conclusive...

low miles = better wrote:

Case in point: I did high miles for about 4 years (90-120 mpw avg.) I would wake in the morning after having done about 4 miles, get up, shower, do another 14, 15 miles in the evening in the context of a quality workout. I would wait the entire day for the workout, only to have barely enough time to fit it in, and often having to miss it entirely, leaving out a large portion of the weekly mileage -- bringing the overall effectiveness of the mileage much lower (goal mileage 90 lowered to somewhere in the 60s).

You said yourself you missed days and weren't running 90+ miles, you were only running in the 60's. How can you give an anecdote in place of actual research when you never actually did what you claim to be refuting?

namehere wrote:

Yes the "science" is conclusive...

low miles = better wrote:

Case in point: I did high miles for about 4 years (90-120 mpw avg.) I would wake in the morning after having done about 4 miles, get up, shower, do another 14, 15 miles in the evening in the context of a quality workout. I would wait the entire day for the workout, only to have barely enough time to fit it in, and often having to miss it entirely, leaving out a large portion of the weekly mileage -- bringing the overall effectiveness of the mileage much lower (goal mileage 90 lowered to somewhere in the 60s).

You said yourself you missed days and weren't running 90+ miles, you were only running in the 60's. How can you give an anecdote in place of actual research when you never actually did what you claim to be refuting?

You're missing the point of my post entirely. The QUALITY is what should be of concern to you. When I missed the quality workouts, the entire weekly mileage suffered. An otherwise 100 mile week or so would be brought down to within 80 mpw or very often lower (60-70 mpw). You simply get too tired in the high mileage weeks to see benefits, and it is not conducive to good training. High mileage is not nearly as effective as consistent quality.

The real question is 'How does high mileage affect global warming?'.

And you're missing my point. How can you know that the low mileage week is sub-par to the high mileage just because in one specific case (yours), it was too much? Perhaps other runners can recover from the previous days better than you did and complete the quality workouts while keeping their mileage up.

namehere wrote:

And you're missing my point. How can you know that the low mileage week is sub-par to the high mileage just because in one specific case (yours), it was too much? Perhaps other runners can recover from the previous days better than you did and complete the quality workouts while keeping their mileage up.

Sorry my friend, but I think we're talking about two separate things here. I'm talking about the total weekly mileage -- put the whole quality thing in a separate category for now. Just in terims of overall QUANTITY, it is a measure that is not conducive to a high level of performance. You need a blend of both in order to achieve fitness gains, people often benefiting in the 100+ mpw range at a consistent level This is smart training, as it allows the body to adapt fully to a training stimulus over a consistent number of weeks. When mileage is sought as a means in itself, the results are at best mediocre, the quality bringing the overall total much less than what you would otherwise run. For high miles to even be effective, they need to be over 100 mpw or so -- not nearly as effective as good QUALITY running.

The focus NEEDS to shift from quanity to quality.

That's Great! Thanks for posting!

What is "quality" running?

This thread gets the award for the most confusing one.

The other thing is, with all respect to everyone here, the only ones who don't tell people how to run are the ones that really know how to do it. Funny.

Ok, how am I the first one to notice that somehow this guy is able to do 4 miles before he wakes up or even gets out of bed? LR is slacking, normally you guys are all over stuff like that.

low miles = better wrote:

I would wake in the morning after having done about 4 miles, get up, shower, do another 14, 15 miles in the evening in the context of a quality workout.

The reason the QUALITY method worked for you is because you did QUANTITY for four years.

low miles = better wrote:

namehere wrote:

Yes the "science" is conclusive...

You said yourself you missed days and weren't running 90+ miles, you were only running in the 60's. How can you give an anecdote in place of actual research when you never actually did what you claim to be refuting?

You're missing the point of my post entirely. The QUALITY is what should be of concern to you. When I missed the quality workouts, the entire weekly mileage suffered. An otherwise 100 mile week or so would be brought down to within 80 mpw or very often lower (60-70 mpw). You simply get too tired in the high mileage weeks to see benefits, and it is not conducive to good training. High mileage is not nearly as effective as consistent quality.

There's no "quality vs. quantity" debate because ideally you'd be doing both quality and quantity.

You personally get too tired on high mileage to see the benefits of quality.

Some people don't. So they can do both quality and quantity. Which makes them faster than just quality alone. You want both. The question is what your body can handle and still recover.

High mileage during base building.

High quality during racing season.

Please give us your credentials (not if you graduated from high school, but times).

Some people don't. So they can do both quality and quantity. Which makes them faster than just quality alone. You want both. The question is what your body can handle and still recover.

Precisely, which comes down to individualization of training. Not all runners can handle the same workload. Some can only do 80 mpw. Some can only do 30mpw. Obviously the elites are the type that can handle a lot.

From what I've read on LR forums a lot of runners are in the 60-70mpw range, then see that 100mpw (an arbitrary number that sounds to them, really impressive) is in reach, so they jump from 60-70 to 100 in the span of a couple weeks, and then get burnt out, and say high mileage doesn't work for them.

Confused? wrote:

Ok, how am I the first one to notice that somehow this guy is able to do 4 miles before he wakes up or even gets out of bed? LR is slacking, normally you guys are all over stuff like that.

low miles = better wrote:

I would wake in the morning after having done about 4 miles, get up, shower, do another 14, 15 miles in the evening in the context of a quality workout.

You know what I meant....

6/10

You get the golf clap, but just barely.

A lot of posters here are completely twisting my words. I'm not saying quantity is POINTLESS, I'm saying it's not how you get faster, at all. I'll break it down to two examples.

Runner A: Let's say he does 3 quality workouts per week at 80 mpw. The quality workouts are clearly going to prevent him from hitting up around 100 mpw, 110 mpw, so he'd be much better off running only the two quality sessions, as the 3rd quality session is likely to prevent him from reaching the higher level.

Runner B: Does consistent high mileage at 90-100 mpw with only one quality workout. More likely to see consitent high mileage and proper improvement.

Quantity will only take you so far -- quality is what really greases the engine.