Please help me transition from Hobby Jogger to Real Runner, if it can be done

SoSlow wrote:

I plan to run a half marathon 7 weeks from now and a full marathon 14 weeks from now. There is so much contradictory training advice I am not sure what path to take to maximize my performance without getting injured. Any advice to help me make a plan to improve would be much appreciated!

If you really want to race, drop the marathon and focus on the HM instead.

BTW, women don't use the term "Hobby Jogger" and your cadence/metrics seems wildly inconsistent with your listed times. Nice try.

4/10

The marathon is my main focus, though I don't expect a fast time this year. Or ever obviously, but my goal is to one day BQ.

Are you implying I'm not a woman or that I'm something other than a Hobby Jogger? Sorry, I may not be up on the latest WomanSpeak -- I didn't even know there was a separate lexicon. What is the correct woman-specific term? It better not end in "-ette."

And what is inconsistent about my cadence/metrics/times? I know I have a fast cadence--I am small and take tiny steps. Also, I don't wear shoes. Are you thinking my pace should be faster at that rate? I agree, it should, and I want it to be, but also, those were just some recent training times I grabbed off my Garmin, not specifically efforts to run as fast as possible and probably included a couple of steep hills. I was just trying to provide a general idea of where I am right now.

I'm not a troll, just a slow runner who wants to improve. I could post the data if that's possible here and anyone wants to read it.

have you tried fuel belts for your long run? Might help with speed

I'm not sure what you mean by a fuel belt... I do all of my long runs with a CamelBak of water or diluted coconut water if it's hot. I haven't run farther than 15 miles in a long time, but if I feel the need to bring any food along for a longer run, I usually go with little squares of peanut butter sandwiches or ginger cookies.

Fuel Belt Benjy wrote:

have you tried fuel belts for your long run? Might help with speed

Sorry lady but the part about being small with tiny steps makes me think of a troll.

Lose the HR monitor and just run.

SoSlow wrote:

I could post the data if that's possible here and anyone wants to read it.

No, no, no! Enough with the data already!!! If this is a serious post, obsession with data = hobbyjogger

SoSlow wrote:

I'm not sure what you mean by a fuel belt... I do all of my long runs with a CamelBak of water or diluted coconut water if it's hot. I haven't run farther than 15 miles in a long time, but if I feel the need to bring any food along for a longer run, I usually go with little squares of peanut butter sandwiches or ginger cookies.

Eh okay you had me til here

6/10

1. I already said I was a hobby jogger.2. I'm not "obsessed with data." I provided some data, since how else would anyone have any idea of what I was already doing?

HardLoper wrote:

SoSlow wrote:

I could post the data if that's possible here and anyone wants to read it.

No, no, no! Enough with the data already!!! If this is a serious post, obsession with data = hobbyjogger

I only started using the HR monitor recently because "just running" -- which obviously I'd prefer! -- was leading to symptoms of overtraining. Some reading led me to the conclusion that I may be lacking aerobic capacity, so I thought I should give low HR a try for a while. I almost hope it doesn't work, because I hate it and I hate that stupid 80/20 book and Matt Fitzgerald.

Trolls don't run or hobby jog. They sit under bridges with free wifi, whereas I run over bridges with my tiny steps, because that's what we have for hills around here.

SoSlow wrote:

I only started using the HR monitor recently because "just running" -- which obviously I'd prefer! -- was leading to symptoms of overtraining. Some reading led me to the conclusion that I may be lacking aerobic capacity, so I thought I should give low HR a try for a while. I almost hope it doesn't work, because I hate it and I hate that stupid 80/20 book and Matt Fitzgerald.

Trolls don't run or hobby jog. They sit under bridges with free wifi, whereas I run over bridges with my tiny steps, because that's what we have for hills around here.

But you don't wear shoes.

You are running something like 30 mpw. At least ?10? of those miles are at a high effort. Given 2 x 5k on Tues and Thur say 2 miles up hill on Monday and the last couple on Saturday given that you are running almost 40% of your mileage that day. You can't basically race 4 days a week and call it training.

Stop "racing" HM and M until your 10k pace can be predicted from your 5k pace. Run 5ks through 10ks until then. Your 23:50 5k is worth about a 49:40 10k. Start running on grass more to slow your cadence down.

Start running four miles EVERY day with at least 1.5 miles on grass, more on grass is better. On EITHER Tuesday or Thursday do the exact workout you do now. The other 6 days just run four miles. On alternating days (three per week) including the day before your 5k at high effort with the group, run 6-8 x 100 m strides. Start the first 25 m at 60% of max pace, then 25 m at 80% and then near 95% for the final 50 m.

When spring comes, add 6 x 800 in 4:15 with 200m in 90 sec jog rest on say Monday and and make sure your high effort 5k is on Thursday. This will bring Monday and Thurs up to 6 or 7 miles. Do this for April and May and race both 5k and 10k two weeks apart in June to see how your 10k is coming. Then start building your (slow) long run on Saturday over the summer for a HM in the fall.

If you don't want to listen to an anonymous guy on the web, try this training:

http://www.runnersworld.com/race-training/solving-the-5k-puzzle

Okay, I realize now that I eat mini-troll-treats while I run, as I mince along with my superfast tiny steps. What do you people eat, steaks? I don't even eat while running unless it is a longer distance. I'm not even the one who brought up food!

That does not make me a troll!

I am running about 8 miles/week at high effort. I haven't been speeding up at the ends of the long runs since I started trying to keep HR down, and I only do about 3 quarter-mile sprints on Mondays. It probably is too much, so I will replace Mondays with 5 or 6 easy miles.

It has actually been well over a year since I did even a half. My 10K pace may seem slow for my 5K, but it was an over-and-back bridge race that included two steep ascents, while my 5K was on a flat course, so the numbers may be a bit misleading. To put it in perspective, that time was sufficient to come in third overall (the race was only 70 people). On a flat course, I probably could do 49:40 or better.

There is no grass to run on here that isn't full of spiny things unfortunately, but even if there were, what is the benefit of slowing down my cadence? Isn't a higher cadence supposed to be better?

I will check out that link and thanks for your help.

8 or even 7.25 mpw out of 30 is still a lot of high effort. What pace are you calling high effort?

For many older people like me, I'm 50, having a faster cadence is good but once you pass 180 it quickly gets to be too much.

Why do you hate MF's 80/20 book?

If you really like doing all the high effort runs, most likely it means that you are more of a miler or 5k person and the marathon is not really your best event.

Step-by-step how to become more of a runner:

1. Drop the HR/cadence crap

2. Run every day... shoot for at least 6 times a week

3. Run easy most days, build up mileage of other days, don't worry about long runs but work on doing more overall weekly mileage

Troll alert! wrote:

If you really want to race, drop the marathon and focus on the HM instead.

Make that 5K.

Your BQ time is 3:45. Get down to an equivalent ~22:xx 5K first, then extend your endurance. Keep overall weekly mileage high.

*&UHhfg986%@6yfgsxcu wrote:

8 or even 7.25 mpw out of 30 is still a lot of high effort. What pace are you calling high effort?

For many older people like me, I'm 50, having a faster cadence is good but once you pass 180 it quickly gets to be too much.

Why do you hate MF's 80/20 book?

If you really like doing all the high effort runs, most likely it means that you are more of a miler or 5k person and the marathon is not really your best event.

I know, it probably is too much. I will be increasing easy mileage weekly though and keeping those portions the same though, so soon it will become a more appropriate ratio.

The reason I say "high effort" instead of giving a pace is because I run to the location (3 or 4 miles) at my slow 135 HR pace, then run the 5K distance, plus the 5K sometimes involves a steep incline or two or three, so the paces aren't necessarily meaningful. As an example though, last Tuesday I ran the 3 slow in 29:09 (9:43 pace) and the 5k in 25:03 (8:06 pace).

When I run the slow runs, my cadence averages in the mid-190s and when I run faster it averages 205 or more. I know these numbers seem very high and I only actually became aware of them pretty recently. Much Googling at the time didn't come up with anything suggesting I ought to try to bring them down though, and they are my normal cadence, not something I've been purposely striving for.

I hate that book for several reasons. First, it reads like he is trying to sell me something, something that it would be a big mistake for me to buy. Chapter after chapter of redundant pushy tactics. I don't have a problem with the basic idea that doing 20% of runs at high effort and 80% at low effort is quite possibly an excellent training approach, but I do object to his flawed and unscientific attempts at reasoning and how he claims various studies "prove" things that they clearly don't. I hate his arrogant attitude, how he keeps insisting his way is the only right way and anything else is a "mistake" and how he makes completely unsupportable statements like "Every winner of a major international competition since the Lydiard revolution of the 1960s owes his or her success to slow running." I can actually only read the book in short segments before I become too irritated and have to put it down. It's shocking that anyone thinks he is a good writer, since his style is appalling in my opinion.

I also am not a big fan of running slowly, so having someone smugly insist over and over that I may need to literally slow down to a walking pace to improve my running is inherently irritating anyway.

A good troll ought to stand on its own legs. You have overplayed your hand.

Now dropped to...

0/10.