Eight weeks to BQ attempt - advice?

IndyJ wrote:

Friends with the right guy wrote:

Agree with poster who said you should simple prepare for a 3:20. You're not in the right shape, you should be able to EASILY maintain your goal pace for 10-12 miles at this point. You've got 2 options: Run your goal pace and bonk HARD at mile 14 and hobble in a broken man to a 3:45, or run a very smart race for 13.1 miles, maybe at 8:00/mile, and try and negative split with a solid 7:30/mile on the back and come away with a 3:20-3:25 in order to get a solid outing under your belt and be mentally prepared to get after that BQ next year.

If I would have struggled today again I would have been inclined to take this approach. But I think today changes things somewhat.

Not to burst your bubble, but of course you'll have another 12 miles to go in the race.

I think you have put the cart before the horse. You are trying to force your workout paces to fit into an arbitrary goal. A lofty arbitrary goal. I don't think you have an acurate picture of your current fitness and you are reaching too far too soon.

late 40s guy wrote:

IndyJ wrote:

If I would have struggled today again I would have been inclined to take this approach. But I think today changes things somewhat.

Not to burst your bubble, but of course you'll have another 12 miles to go in the race.

I think you have put the cart before the horse. You are trying to force your workout paces to fit into an arbitrary goal. A lofty arbitrary goal. I don't think you have an acurate picture of your current fitness and you are reaching too far too soon.

I don't know what makes you think that. I went 14 today at better than race pace, two days after doing hard mile repeats, and closed strong. I have two months to go. I'm at 65 mpw or so and have been for some time.

Is it the 3:40? What is it?

A 30 min PR from one race to another has something to do with it. Also that you struggled in your previous recent MP runs. But mainly, I'm guaging from my own experience. I'm no expert, but simply based on my own experience.

You and me have similar 5k and mile times. I'm 7 years older, but you are currently running about 10mpw more than my max training. My PR is 3:21 which I set last year. My progression over 2 1/2 years went 3:42, 3:29, 3:21.

Now I didn't do much quality until recently and still run mostly easy, I'm still improving too, but i know I'm no where near 3:10.

Also, keep in mind 8 weeks isn't really all that long and 3 of those weeks are tapring.

This is my weekly mileage this year:

1 - 18

3 - 6

10 - 20

11 - 44

12 - 48

13 - 48

14 - 53

15 - 55

16 - 52

17 - 42

18 - 32

19 - 55

20 - 40

21 - 68

22 - 52

23 - 41

24 - 47

25 - 46

26 - 75

27 - 62

28 - 62

29 - 46

30 - 54

31 - 67

32 - 62

33 - 66

34 - 53

35 - 66

36 - 44 (and counting)

5x2 mile at pace or 10-15 seconds per mile faster.

Repeat weekly or bi-weekly.

2 minutes rest.

Start with

First time..

3x2 do a 4th set even if slow.

Try for:

4x2 eventually and do a 5th set even if slow

Same with 5x2 just do first set slow, second at pace, 3rd and 4th faster, last set at pace.

If you get this in 5-6 times total you'll have a chance. If you can't do 5x2 at pace or a bit faster you can't do it. So lower your goals.

IndyJ wrote:

OP here. Did my race pace run again today. After bonking bad last week, I finished the 14 at 7:10, closing at 7:07, 7:03, 7:03, 6:53.

I am chiming in again as the voice of optimism. I am looking for 3:05 in a few weeks, and would be feeling very confident if I were matching your training. As it is, my paces are slower, and average miles per week is less than.

By comparison, when I was 43, I easily ran 2:56:03 with similar training (mileage, paces) to what you've done so far this year. Five weeks before the marathon I ran 14 miles, evenly paced, at 7:02 average. That was one of my best workouts.

Also, I should mention that my most recent marathon previous to that 2:56 had been 3:30-something.

This was the training cycle. Fairly low overall mileage, but I was pretty consistent with the long runs.

Weeks to go/Week total/Longest run/Races

16. 46/15

15. 6/4

14. 53/15 5K 18:58

13. 40/10 10M 1:05:59

12. 41/15

11. 37/18

10. 42/18 8K 29:44

09. 48/20

08. 55/20 5K 18:12

07. 49/14

06. 63/23

05. 50/21

04. 51/17 5K 17:48, HM 1:22:47

03. 48/20

02. 39/17 5K 17:32

01. 28/7

00. Marathon 2:56:03

We'll find out on race day, of course, but I honestly think I've got this, if I play my cards right the next few weeks.

I'm going to amp up the race pace run to 16 miles next week and see if I can hold it. I think I could have today - I was getting faster and feeling strong the last few miles.

I think last week was an anomaly. It was humid. I had a headwind during one stretch that zapped some energy. I may have even psyched myself out, for whatever reason.

But I think this is within reach right now.

Hitting the wall in a modest length MP workout is a bad sign. Adjust your goal downward a bit.

Nobody is going to be able to tell you until race day.

My earlier pessimism is based on my own experience. I have only run one marathon, but at the time I could have matched your 10k or 5k times. I was running an average of over 70 mpw. I was aiming for 3:15:59 (my BQ at the time) and ended up at 3:16:04. I could have run all of the workouts you posted. Although I think the one you just posted would have been very tough for me. It's pretty tough based on your posted history and race times to think that your endurance is going to hold out all the way for 42.2. And I think it has the potential for you to hit the wall big time at 21 miles and have a very painful finish.

That said, I think you are making progress and hope you don't take my pessimism as personal in any way. I really hope you make it and hope you come back and update the thread for us.

Ever consider the West Wyoming Marathon?

I would add that I would personally consider a real race time to be a significant piece of information to work with. A time trial, well, it is just very, very tough to know if that is a good indicator or not. Same with workouts. I always think the best indicator of race fitness is another race time.

I don't take any of it personal at all. I'm looking for what I need to do in the time left to give myself the best chance at running 3:10. (I'm 40, but let's be realistic - 3:15.59 doesn't get you in any more.)

I feel like I have one real shot at this - I have two young children and a wife who works, as well, so I have to get my runs done by 6:30 a.m. each morning, other than my long run, which she accommodates as long as I get done by 7 on Friday mornings.

If I BQ, I'll train for Boston a couple years down the road, but I won't be able to keep taking shot after shot after shot at qualifying. It's not fair to everyone else.

Like you said, no one knows until race day. Even today, at 11 or 12 miles, I didn't know what was going to happen, but I never slowed down.

IndyJ wrote:I don't take any of it personal at all. I'm looking for what I need to do in the time left to give myself the best chance at running 3:10. (I'm 40, but let's be realistic - 3:15.59 doesn't get you in any more.)

no you're not, I don't think you've accepted anything anyone here has posted thus far. What it seems like you're looking for is people to tell you you're on the right track and looking for validation

seethroughit wrote:

IndyJ wrote:I don't take any of it personal at all. I'm looking for what I need to do in the time left to give myself the best chance at running 3:10. (I'm 40, but let's be realistic - 3:15.59 doesn't get you in any more.)

no you're not, I don't think you've accepted anything anyone here has posted thus far. What it seems like you're looking for is people to tell you you're on the right track and looking for validation

You could not be more wrong and you are not responding to anything I've actually posted. You're responding to what you expect someone to post.

I'm not looking for "validation." I'm looking for the best chance at BQing in eight weeks based on current fitness level.

I'm a fan of LT repeats. One of my favorite workouts was repeats of 1.5miles with 2 minutes rest. I would do 3 of them early in my buildup but 4 of them when I was closer to race day, and I think I may have done 5x one time as well. I was doing them somewhere around 7:00 pace (maybe 6:50, it was a long time ago) on a hilly course. I think 2 miles would be even better, but I had a 1.5 mile loop at the local city park. At one point I worked down to doing these in 10:00 (6:40/mile) but I think that was when I was training for my 1/2 PR.

Mr. Obvious wrote:

I'm a fan of LT repeats. One of my favorite workouts was repeats of 1.5miles with 2 minutes rest. I would do 3 of them early in my buildup but 4 of them when I was closer to race day, and I think I may have done 5x one time as well. I was doing them somewhere around 7:00 pace (maybe 6:50, it was a long time ago) on a hilly course. I think 2 miles would be even better, but I had a 1.5 mile loop at the local city park. At one point I worked down to doing these in 10:00 (6:40/mile) but I think that was when I was training for my 1/2 PR.

I've been doing 800s and mile repeats, but it sounds like 2-mile repeats may be the way to go re: speed work the rest of the way, from what you and others have suggested on this thread.

Mile or 800 workouts were for earlier in the cycle for me and would have been run closer to 5k pace (or faster). As I got closer to race day I focused more on longer efforts closer to (but still faster than) marathon pace. I really enjoyed these workouts as they were hard but left me feeling more comfortably tired than the shorter repeats. They were good confidence boosters.

My long runs came down in times to closer to marathon pace and my speed work came up in time closer to marathon pace as I got closer to race day.

See you at the start line Morty!

FWIW, my splits today were:

1 - 7:11

2 - 7:14

3 - 7:12

4 - 7:12

5 - 7:14

6 - 7:16

7 - 7:12

8 - 7:16

9 - 7:12

10 - 7:15

11 - 7:07

12 - 7:03

13 - 7:03

14 - 6:53