RW Forum Six – Sub 2.50 Kier with Parkrunfan

Keir, Well manned-up! I had to give myself a talking to just to get out for a recovery run!

PRF, As you say the quality / quantity combination is bound to pay off. Will be watching for your mara result with more than a keen interest.

7M with hills + 4M recovery yesterday. Tempo at lunchtime.

Keir, I agree with prf, 3 / 10 on the motivation scale and to then go on and deliver those last three miles is impressive.  Did you enjoy the session once you got a few miles into it?

prf – good going that, I imagine running round a track in those conditions would have been sapping mentally, did you have any company or did it end up a solo effort. An impressive block of training over the last few days as well, good to see.

15m w/ 10m @ MP for me last night. Quite blowy out, but I managed to pick a reasonably sheltered route so it wasn’t too much of a chore to get it done. MP feels ok, certainly not the TT effort TR describes.

So a good nights training for us all then!

Y D wrote (see)

So a good nights training for us all then!

I'd go further than that - in Charlie Spedding's words, it was a PERFECT nights training for all of us. By that he means that nobody would have had a 'better' night by running faster, the purpose of the sessions was achieved, so 100% perfect

YD - Not mentally tough at all tbh. And I did have company, a young man who sat on my shoulder from the gun to lap 18 and then found some acceleration to find a few seconds at the end. I cant fault his strategy but the slapping of feet behind was getting a bit annoying after 18 laps - I was glad when he went.

Good positive thoughts there PRF. I am very impressed by your 20s and then 5-10ks all together in such a short space of time. As impressive as it is unconventional. Last night was a really good run with Sunday still in the legs. 

I am glad you are running 38.xx though. I was a bit down after Sunday's result and it is easy to lose positivity and confidence sometimes. With Phil and YD posting such impressive times, it can cause doubts that I am behind where I am meant to be.

To be honest, I felt great through January, but have felt tired and lacking enthuasism a bit the past 10 days whilst I have had and with getting over the cold. Sore throat again this morning and 5m were tough going in the cold wind with tired legs, but I have been here before and it is just a case of pushing through it and soon I will break through and hit a purple patch. I am trying to be careful and listen to my body, but it is a fine balance. Looking forward to running long on Sunday.

YD - That is the 2nd indicator in 3 days - perhaps your PMP is set to low?

Keir – have been discussing it with Brian on another thread. Yes it looks like PMP is set a bit low, but there are loads of unknowns for me, being a first time Marathoner and all. The key being that I have no idea how I will stand up to MP after 15, 20, 22 mile etc…. I think caution is wise + there is loads of time to make decision on PMP, getting some consistent consistency is a better use of my mental matches at this stage (god I am starting to sound like TR!! )

The fact you are tired and not necessarily full of confidence yet you are looking forward to your long run at the weekend speaks volumes about you Keir. I am sure you will be fine, just keep on keeping on.

Keir - Beating yourself up about race times at this stage of the game is just wasted energy. For a faster 10K its simple, stop doing the long runs for 2-3 weeks....the 10K time will come down but it wont help the marathon training.

As an example, I would rather have two 38:xx 10Ks in the bag in quick succession with lots of slower miles in the equation as well than one 36:xx. It is far more useful towards the aim of knocking out a string of 26 x 6:30 miles.

Other people's times are also a source of unnecessary stress, comparisons on April 21st are the ones that matter

73 days to go, thats a fifth of a year, so now is the time to be getting tired, running on fresh legs can come later.

Keir - If I can put a positive spin on it (from your perspective), I would say that your recent prep has looked more marathon-like than mine and you've been building up the mileage on key sessions like the progressive runs, all whilst battling poorly health.  (Much of my training in the past couple of months has kept in touch with quicker than threshold pace to help with my XC performances, and also the 10k being very much a target race in its own right.)  I've got every faith in prf's emphasis on getting the process right for the bigger picture. 

YD - If it turns out that you're operating just a notch under PMP that's probably not a bad thing.  If indeed you are getting fitter, for the same effort you're applying now the pace will get quicker anyway.  You seem to be at a very similar stage to me before Paris 2008.  (Where I mulled over possible targets between 2:50 and sub 2:45 between January and April, and ran 2:44.  Just saying.   )

Phil - Thanks for the vote of confidence

It is probably fair to say that for a marathon prep to get you well prepared then, certainly for the first few, you will have periods during the training where you're going to have serious doubts about whether it is going to come together in time. It is par for the course and was actually the predominant theme that I was hearing at last night's race.

And getting back to 10K race times during training, it all depends how you interpret the results.

For instance, I could have posted a session for last night as:

6 miles w/u + 6 miles @6:10/mile - which I would have been very happy with, especially in the middle of big mileage. No need to look at it differently just because it is nominally 'a race'.

This discussion rings familiar bells. When mara training, as soon as you miss a session (in effect, a mini taper) you feel like Superman and prep races are potential pb fests. In TR-speak, every time you race hard you burn some matches, and this reduces the stock for your 26.2. It's hard, to know you are in great shape, and "keep a lid on" the prep races. Aim to finish them and think that you could have gone another 4 miles at that pace. But on the converse, sometimes the call of the pb is too strong and you'll never know how much time the pb cost you in the marathon. I have done the prep both ways, stringing together a few pb's and then hitting a mediocre marathon. But I have also hit the marathon just right and eeked every last second out of the performance on the day. At the end of the day it depends on how focussed you are to get the best result out of the marathon. As PRF says, no point in hitting 10k races now as fresh as a daisy and registering fast times, when all your training is geared towards the 26.2

Sorry for my waffle....

Brian - You've hit the nail on the head there, ie you should feel as though you can carry on for another mile or two afterwards in prep 'races'. It was the first thing I noticed from the video of the finish line at Dewsbury (that YD posted) on Sunday that I was talking to the chap I finished alongside immediately that we crossed the line in a calm voice, you wouldnt see that if I was PB chasing!

A snippet to throw into the equation since I like to keep an eye on Jocelyn's training on the way to her sub 2:50 attempt - today she was delighted with 10 miles in 63:29, so 10 @ 6:21/mile.

We're all doing roughly the same stuff!

I dont usually say anything much here as its Keir and PRFs gig, but seeing as my names been mentioned, here sa few thoughts I have had after reading this today

All of our training, work, life, family etc causes a certain amount of stress, once that stress gets too much then you get tired, burned out, sick etc we all have different levels of stress which is why IMO someone like PP can train differently to someone like Keir. I know I rib PP about peaking early, but he is wise, eats well, gets planty of rest, has low life stress, doesnt train at Gobi o'clock etc.............and Keir has family stress, more job stress, trains at Gobi o'clock etc the more stress the more it takes out of you. Getting to a marathon start line in one piece ready to nail it is despite our lives not because of them. So the whole life picture has to be taken into account to manage the campaign.
Keir has been maxing it out in lots af stressful ways recently and has been tired and under the weather. He now hits the big push, has a less than hoped for 10K and then zips his man suit up to grind out a tough session, more stress. Which is ok for the odd time but is only going to end in tears if he doesnt listen to his boday a bit more. Once you have enough leg speed to run a sub3 then its all about endurance and running frequency and consistency, meaning that if he only hits 5 of the 10M runs or misses a long run or a midweeker with pace etc then for me thats fine, i dont think it changes his result on race day much. But over reaching, burning out or getting ill would.

Build up races need you to put your ego to oneside a bit (PRF does this well), I can do this too as I have no short distance ego, or no Pof10 ego etc I choose to run 1/2s and 10s deliberately tired as they help my 1/2 IM running. Some folks will worry about the short distance build up races though and so either taper or get down if they dont run as well as hoped for. Even if you taper a bit and get a good result like PP and YD its still compromised by the VLM campaign which is why IMO PP and YD couldnt hit the expected HRs in their 10ks.

I deliberately dont chase paces in training, I just run, although I will do a few marathon specific sessions later on and will look for some ~MP. However too much watching paces, agonising over details, HRs, hoped for paces etc in training is a waste of matches (like YD said). I mostly just run, bag the session and move on. Control the controllables, let the rest go and simply resolve to be the best you can be on the day when race day comes around. This lifts any pressure and is more important than target times on the day for me. Doing your best trumps target times.

The perfect marathon campaign and race day needs a sequence of planets coming to alignment that is never going to happen. Its all too easy to train really hard, leave it all in training and have a shit day. For me its about getting to the start line as fresh as possible, marathon training is about saving energy now, not expending it.Life stress matters and will shape your campaign and end result.

Be wise, and its only running after all.

sorry Keir and PRF - I think I got a bit carried away ! Back over to you.

BTW - no criticisms meant in any way, just thinking aloud.

Amen too, TR, a lot of what you say is what I was starting to plan for my next campaign having ignored the body and come out with a PB but an injury as well.

Great posting TR, that’s one of the reasons why I name checked you, I like your brand of wisdom.

Same to Brian, prf and Phil. Plenty of sense being posted here!

parkrunfan wrote (see)

Brian - You've hit the nail on the head there, ie you should feel as though you can carry on for another mile or two afterwards in prep 'races'. It was the first thing I noticed from the video of the finish line at Dewsbury (that YD posted) on Sunday that I was talking to the chap I finished alongside immediately that we crossed the line in a calm voice, you wouldnt see that if I was PB chasing!

 

prf – I noticed that when watching the video the other day, lazy sod I thought  
Cracking session from Jocelyn, she is running Manchester isn’t she? You will have to introduce us, I imagine we might be quite close to each other in April!

Phil - behave

Some very wise words from some very wise people (what's the collective noun for a group of wise people?)

Very nice to see 5 people who have all given me great advice over the past few years all posting on the same page.  

I was speaking to a colleague today (who had a break down a few years ago) about a 'mini emotional breakdown' I have last spring time and wondered why with so much more on my plate this year I seem to be coping ok. Essentially we worked out it was the combination of 3 things:

1. new baby changing home life balance / responsibility stress. Although this hasn't gone away, things have settled down now.

2. I was trainning a teacher - who took over all my 'good' classes. Although this reduced my work load, it meant all my work was with difficult classes, whic is emotionally draining without the 'pick me up' of good lessons.

3. Getting injured, but not bad enough to put me on the bench all together led to 6 weeks of 'will I, won't I' make VLM startline. 

So essentially I think jugglng lots in our busy lives is fine, but it is when one or more areas starts to go wrong or require extra attention that things can turn bad. Although being a mentee brings another layer of responsibility, at least with last years experiences I have increased awareness of the importance of keeping things in perspective (most of the time!). 

Keir wrote (see)

Some very wise words from some very wise people (what's the collective noun for a group of wise people?)

Three ...

TR - Excellent post, that should be a post that is pinned to the top of each marathon training thread. In general terms, far too much energy is wasted agonising about pointless stuff, but I think it takes a few years for you to realise just how pointless some things are.

YD - You didnt need to watch that video to know that I'm a lazy sod

And yes, you could well be close to Joss at Manchester. You could do worse than use her as a pacing guide, she is very good on that front. I'll introduce you at some point before April.

Keir - Good analysis. As TR says, people seem to think of tiredness just in terms of physical resources but just as good news can put a spring in your step, so stress can demotivate and actually make you physically less able. And it isnt just imagined, it is a real lowering of physical ability due to stress hormones released into the bloodstream.

Planned sessions at fixed times seem to be the biggest cause of stress, a bit like an impending doom hanging over the day. Generally I just go for a run, as TR describes, and decide once I'm out what sort of session it is going to turn into. It tends to be just races/parkruns where I know what I'm going to be doing on any particular day.

And on that note, 12.0 miles @ 8:47/mile this evening.

With 52 miles completed Mon-Thurs and 20 pencilled in for Sunday, it is looking like being a 90 mile week with a strong 5K and strong 10K in the mix. That is a bit beyond the mileage level that I can maintain but it is still a good week to get in at this stage.

It seems as if new runners just go for a run - and get fitter. Then as we become more serious we look how to improve - read, study and analyse a whole lot, become obsessed by HR, pace, intervals etc, then only when we have several years of doing this and we get to know ourselves really well do we come out the other side and can run and train as TR and PRF describe above. 

First attempt this morning at PRFs recommended 5k session @ 10k pace. Following a suggestion from YD I have planned a set route for this session so I can accurately see progression. I have a cycle path which is pretty flat 2.5m from home, so an ideal warm up distance. I ran to perceived effort for the 3m which came out at 6.19m/m. Although I was a bit disappointed with the pace first of all, I think running on an unfamiliar path in the dark at first thing in the morning probably cost me a few seconds per mile. HR was in a similar range to sundays 10k. PRF - with this in mind, would it be better to try to rearrange this session so I am running later in the day with a 'warmer engine' so I can hit 10k pace, or is the effort level the key benefit for this session?