sub 4 hour group,if anyone wants to get together

DtF, Shame I missed you on the line at Henley.

Wabo, AH looks superfit because she is superfit

DtF pretty much in agreeement with your LSR comment, same as both Fido and I on previous page, a wider pace range is fine though so 9:15-10:30, especially for the men amongst us.. we often go too fast, don't have enough endurance then crash out... or so the theory goes. Ladies? Women are of course far better distance runners because they don't do this..

The bit I don't agree with for Tom Ikle and other sub 4 hopefuls is going way faster than marathon pace on long runs.. no point? Runners will be dipping into their anerobic rather than aerobic side... which is the whole point of the long run right now early in training. Further into training, can get tighter on that range to 9:30 ish.

Faster than marathon pace on your medium mid week run...( so for sub 4 I'd be going 8ish min mile or under). And if you can do the LSR much faster and not knackered after, then maybe you could go faster so your MP is faster. I like my long runs to feel really easy, run well inside myself.. not breathing hard at all, chatting to friends. Its usually on trail so naturally slower. Not tempted to "race" or force it.

TOTP ! ...

Dave the Flower wrote (see)

In my experience I have trained to what my body is telling me and even completed LSR at a far quicker pace than perhaps I should (c. 30 secs faster than PMP at times) but I've always made sure I recover well afterwards.

 

 

 

 

FRC - yes... this bit is certainly not recommended for many people! And only goes to show how rubbish I am at pacing! When I was training for Chester last year one of my LSR was run at 3:35 pace - 8:12min miles (but then it was only 15 miles ) The others were all run at around 9:05 - 9:10 min miles (PMP + 30 secs) to achieve 3:46

Stat-mad me... 

Susan, can't make the 15th - going up to Yorkshire that day - sorry.

I'm not sure I really can either, D the F. Sorry about that life too crazy too much to fit in especially hilly run. Moop. My MA isn't growing either, it's shrinking.

Sometimes something has to give, doesn't it, Ikle?  Today I've made life much easier for myself (even having time to post on here ) because I've decided to have a rest day and not fit a swim in. And breathe. You've got so much on your plate at the mo. 

On LSR pace, something to think about is the physiological purpose of an LSR. It's to build endurance ie to prompt your body to build the infrastructure it needs to keep going for a long time. If you run too fast in your LSRs, your body doesn't get those prompts and therefore it doesn't adapt.  For endurance your muscles need more mitochondria (although lactate/fast tempo promotes those, too), more capiliaries in your muscles to GET the oxygen to the mitochondria, and, really important, running long and slow teaches your body to burn fat. If you don't burn fat very efficiently you're more likely to hit the wall.

So I think it's useful to keep in mind the purpose of each type of run you do so that you're not tempted to go too fast in LSRs (great you've done a fastish run but you haven't done as much as you could to get your body good at fat burning and you can probably manage on mostly glycogen up to 18 miles anyway, so you could merrily be thinking you're getting your long runs done... but they're not really doing you much good and you'll still hit the wall). Also, you're more likely to over stress your body if you run them too hard so you don't recover as well - so you can't train as hard the following week and you're more likely to get ill/injured.

It's the same with tempo/lactate training - it's easy not to run fast enough.

FWIW I think it's worth doing the first few of your really long runs dead slow/easy (they're still never 'easy' at the end, though are they?) then perhaps start introducing some slightly faster/MP efforts in the last couple of long runs.  But really, the speed element of a marathon comes from good threshold runs.

Oof  that's a long post.   Just something else to think about!

I had a newish club member last night - she only started running in the summer and clearly has some talent but OMG she's a handful. She's doing VLM. Won't bore you with the ins and outs but she did 19 last week and 23 at the weekend!  I'd already explained a month ago she didn't need to do such long runs and why (she had intended to do 30 before VLM). There's definitely an awesome marathon/ultra runner in there but OMG. I'm still not sure I've convinced her not to do so much.  She asked last night if it was normal to feel so tired during marathon training... .

Lastly in completely non-running news, I'm off for lunch today at L'Ortolan, a Michelin starred restaurant, with my best friend from school (Tonia, Susan).

The chef is a WADAC friend so I'm hoping that our ridiculously well priced  three course set menu meal deal might get augmented with a few little extras.  He might show us the kitchen, too, which woudl be brilliant. He's Alan Murchison if anyone's interested. HAs been on Great British Menu lots and does various TV bits.  God knows how he fits in so much training, too. He runs a million restaurants, actually cooks in them, is a brilliant (animal) xc runner and international duathlete.  I think he probably just never sleeps.

Haven't got anything smart enough to wear, though...

Thanks FRC, Hen, Dave and everyone else for the advice on pacing longer runs. Feel much happier about running them so slowly, but very impressed with the pace some people are getting on their long runs.

Yes Wabo it was great doing the long run midweek, it made the weekend much more relaxing. Back to normal this Sunday with a 15 miler first thing.

Howard did some beginners ballroom and latin a couple of years ago and really enjoyed it. I was keen to carry on but it took out a complete night and I don't think my wife was too keen as I was a fairly rubbish partner. Kept ending up in the corners! Sorry to hear about the theft, very stressful.

Club run tonight, 7 miles followed by a committee meeting. Weather doesn't look good, Artic wind.

The wind will make you tougher, Tom! When the going gets tough, the tough get running.

I've got my long run tomorrow - feels very soon after the last one on SAturday, but if I do it tomorrow, I can race the season's last xc on Sunday as my tempo run.

Howard - dancing is marvellous for the core! Terrific combined with pilates. You will be a core god before long. Lovely to do something new together.

Oh yes, Howard's horrid theft. 

Just back from THE most amazing lunch. We were very spoiled because we paid for the three course table d'hote but he actually gave us the seven-course tasting menu. It was FAB U LOUS.

Did 7 hilly miles. If one looks at the graphs, this one has more bumps which is very satifying. Thing I find with hilly runs is that if they are hilly enough one feels like one has run 15 flat miles by the end, because it's so tiring! I'm glad I did it. Needless to say didn't want to really. I'm going to France (Paris) next week with work. Will need to do lots of running. What fun. Hope I don't get lost.

All the advice and reassurance about long uns has been great so thanks. Now feel utterly reassured that I'm on track. Went running with a friend youngster (late 20s ish) who is running her first marathon (VLM) and it really put things into context for me.I'm doing alright.

Happy running all.

I will justify my two long runs in 5 days.

Have to do xc race on Saturday for club champs so today is only day I can fit it in.  There's no way I could do it tomorrow, then race xc the next day. This way I get  a day off between runs. Could do it on Monday, but can't cos of work. Could do it on Tuesday next week but that means... I'd be doing two long runs in 5 days cos of Bramley 20 the following Sunday. Had complete day off yesterday. No swimming, no pilates, no nothing. Just eating

The upside is I don't have another long run till next Sunday, so that's 10 days between LSRs.

Do I get let off now?

Actually the thing most likely to hamper my training at the mo and make me ill is stress.