Struggling at Half Marathons...why?

You have incredible speed relative to your terrible endurance, yet your workouts are all speed based. You should be running 1:22 for the HM

Focus on building up your endurance. Build up to 8-10 Mile tempos (around your HM pace), and also 4x2Miles slightly faster than HM pace. Slow down your long run, and keep it around 2 hours.

As a reference, I’m a 45 hobby jogger with 3 years of structured running. I can run 1:24 on 40mpw, but can’t break 18:30 for 5k and would simply blow up and get injured attempting your interval workouts.

Troll dumper wrote:

aNOTHER TROLL! ))) wrote:

Hello mr Trollman!

You should not have written this : "This the answer I was looking to find." Why ask the board to find whats wrong with your training if you already knew what answer you were looking for? LoL

Send in next case please!

Sounds good to me. Here I give a new case. Suppose a coach generates improvement to all about 100 runners coached

in just three years. Can we then agree that the basic method of that coach have something to teach us others?

Scorpion_runner wrote:

Dr, Jack Daniels stated that tempo pace and half marathon pace are pretty much equivalent, because tempo pace is a pace that you should be able to hold for up to 60 mins, and elite runners will run an entire half marathon at tempo pace.

So if you can only manage 7:10 pace for the half, then that is basically your tempo pace, so you are going to have to improve on your tempo training. In order to run sub 1:30 for the half , you are going to have to run at 6:50 pace or faster. You're 20 seconds off that, so you got some work to do.

Your talk about tempo/LT/HM pace confused me. Here's how I understand it: LT pace is approximately the pace you can hold for 60 mins. An elite runner's LT pace is about the same as their HM pace because elite runners can run a HM in about 60 mins. A tempo run is a type of workout designed to improve LT pace. The pace of a tempo run depends on the length of the tempo. If you did a 60min tempo at LT pace, then that'd be an all-out effort, since LT pace is the fastest pace you can hold for 60min. So naturally longer tempos in practice are done a bit slower than LT pace. Shorter tempos are done a bit faster than LT pace.

This guy's HM is significantly slower than 60 mins. So his LT pace is faster than his HM pace. But since you go a bit slower than LT for long tempos, his HM pace ends up being about the pace he ought to run for a long tempo. So he could work on it from both ends, running longer tempos to help get him comfortable at current HM effort and run shorter tempos to get comfortable at goal HM pace.

The problem is that the guy never practices running his true half marathon effort relative to ability. That would be a lot of 4:00 kms.

The body generally doesn't average out training very well although a lot of people go way too slow in easy runs and way to hard in hard runs and then expect to magically be good at the middleground on race day.

As a young lad every run ended up being in that half marathon type effort and I was terrible at middle distance racing. Despite never running long I had little trouble holding that pace for a half. Because that's what I practiced.

Future case wrote:

Sounds good to me. Here I give a new case. Suppose a coach generates improvement to all about 100 runners coached

in just three years. Can we then agree that the basic method of that coach have something to teach us others?

Most likely, but it depends. All else the same:

- Do other methods produce same results faster?

Or

- Do other methods produce better results in the same time?

Or

- Do other methods produce the same results with fewer injuries?

I was able to run sub 1:25 at less than 45 miles per week. It's more than enough miles and I know guys faster than me that do it on similar training. OP is probably running his easy runs too fast.

SUPERIOR COACH JS wrote:

George213 wrote:

I knew a guy who ran a similar time (1:32, on a not particularly hilly course) in summer, and when the weather got cooler, he dropped a 2:47 full. Granted, he was running 70-80 mpw at the time (actually he still is).

I know (also coach) a guy who ran a 1:32 as a pacemaker in a marathon , not a half in 1:32, but 30 k ! …...on just 55 mpw!

I mean, that's not THAT impressive. I ran my 1:28 on about 40 mpw at 38 years old. And I'm slower than most on this board.

No. wrote:

Badtraining1 wrote:

Your training is super weak

I don't think 8x1000 at 6:00 flat is "super weak" training at all. I don't know many runners who can do that workout. A 4:53 mile for a guy in his mid-30's isn't weak either.

He's just not doing good tempo work to get him close to 1:30.

LONG TEMPOS LONG TEMPOS LONG TEMPOS at 6:50-7:05 flat pace.

Dude that is exactly the type of advice I gave too, lol.... 10 miles at 6:30 pace. If you can do that, then you're ready.

I say his training is weak because I never broke 40 min or 18 min in the 10K, but I threw down a 1:27 half marathon in my first road race. I rarely did any speed work - just a couple long tempo runs and maybe 50-60mpw.

He's working hard to get mediocre results... that is the definition of weak.

If I were the OP, I would cut out all the track BS.

Focus on getting your strength and endurance up.. run more miles, run hills, do tempo runs (i.e. 10 miles @ 6:30 pace)

The fast interval track stuff isn't going to help you reach your goals at this stage... you alrready have the speed, you just don't have strength and endurance. Doing more mileage, hill work, and long tempos will get you there 100% guaranteed.

If you want to get crazy, do some uphill tempos (4x5 min with 2 min rest). You'll get strong like ox.

Badtraining1 wrote:

If I were the OP, I would cut out all the track BS.

Focus on getting your strength and endurance up.. run more miles, run hills, do tempo runs (i.e. 10 miles @ 6:30 pace)

The fast interval track stuff isn't going to help you reach your goals at this stage... you alrready have the speed, you just don't have strength and endurance. Doing more mileage, hill work, and long tempos will get you there 100% guaranteed.

If you want to get crazy, do some uphill tempos (4x5 min with 2 min rest). You'll get strong like ox.

The posts on this thread are hilarious. Your recommending 10 miles at 6.30?! For someone whos just trying to break 90? Make it max 20-30mins at that pace (4ish miles). Do steady warmup/down either side to bump that day up to 10. But don't do 10 at 6.30, even if you could.

Average doesn't happen wrote:

The problem is that the guy never practices running his true half marathon effort relative to ability. That would be a lot of 4:00 kms.

The body generally doesn't average out training very well although a lot of people go way too slow in easy runs and way to hard in hard runs and then expect to magically be good at the middleground on race day.

+1

"Moderate" pace is exactly what he misses. The hard/easy approach is not the only way to train.

Less eyesballs out workouts, more moderate pace runs. With OP speed, 1:30 half should be effortless once he practiced that pace more.

AnOldRunner wrote:

Future case wrote:

Sounds good to me. Here I give a new case. Suppose a coach generates improvement to all about 100 runners coached

in just three years. Can we then agree that the basic method of that coach have something to teach us others?

Most likely, but it depends. All else the same:

- Do other methods produce same results faster?

Or

- Do other methods produce better results in the same time?

Or

- Do other methods produce the same results with fewer injuries?

"Do other methods produce same results faster?" Answer is NO.

" Do other methods produce better results in the same time? " Answer is NO.

" Do other methods produce the same results with fewer injuries? " Answer is again , NO.

There have been studies done that show for the average runner (non-elite) there is no benefit going from say 55 miles a week to 65 miles a week and in fact diminishing returns for going any higher. So yes at some point mileage isn't the answer and in fact, it's nailing down the right workouts to add to the already existing miles he has. On the Hanson website, one of the coaches actually spoke about this in depth. Sometimes it isn't about increasing mileage but getting better at the mileage you are at. Once that has been exhausted then you increase mileage but you just don't throw mileage against the wall and see if it sticks.

Good words of you here, mcguck. This special case with the OP is a very clear case. And it`s not about more mileage needed. Just the common problem of not knowing his best individual paces.

It`s very simple to see for an experienced coach. This is a very common problem that the runner don`t know his/her best EXACT training paces. I deal with it quite often when a new runner want me to coach.

Thanks for the advice guys. I've bookmarked this thread. I was able to do a 17 mile run yesterday, starting at 5am. 8:40 pace for the first 4 miles, kept steady at 8:00 minute pace for the remainder, then worked my way to down to 7-flat for the last two miles.

I'm going to keep between 60-70mpw from here to October.

I've got a monster of a workout tomorrow:

2 miles easy + 2 x (10 to 12 at tempo pace with 2-minute rest) + 10 miles E pace + 15 to 20 min T pace + 2 miles easy.

I'll post the results...and maybe someone could give me a good marathon pace goal based off that.