"Running With Lydiard"

http://www.amazon.com/.../104-2629096-7527128

"Daniels Running Formula"

http://www.amazon.com/.../104-2629096-7527128

Lydiard is a good source to understand "how" to structure and pace a high-frequency running program. Once you really understand his sense of pacing the basic parts of an everyday running program, you'll execute it better. He teaches you to rely on how you "feel" -- which, in the age of the HR monitor, is a lost skill.

Daniels gives much of the same background, but then cuts to the chase with tables where you look up your race times and then look up exactly how fast you should be doing various workouts. Most people find the tables quite effective and on-target. The "long run pace" column in Daniels can also give a sense of the possibilities for an IM run split. It's not a predictor of your split, but it can tell you what is possible if you get your bike+run fitness together and execute well on the bike.

Yup. You are doing the same thing that an elite high-volume athlete does. You tailor the mix of intensities, durations and recovery to your time budget. If you find the sweet spot and stay with it consistently, you get better.

Like many of us, I follow Gordo Byrn's personal training notes. I also read Ray Britt's. You know what -- they both do the same thing. They make the most of their time. With quite different time budgets, they both do very smart training even though Ray's will have a much higher proportion of higher-intensity work.

The major difference between an optimal 10-hour training program and an optimal 30-hour training program is that the 30-hour program uses lower average intensities.

Does the 30-hour guy beat the 10-hour guy? Of course! But not because he's training at a lower average intensity -- it's because he's training MORE and doing so intelligently. MORE doesn't always beat LESS. But MORE done right always beats LESS done right.

jesus ash-

go train or spend some time with the family;)

let us scientists figure out the why and the coaches determine what works through real life application. athletes just need to train and not worry about all this. didn't marc teach you this already?

your secret admirer from boulder...hehe.

I'm stuck in the office waiting all day for a phone call that never came. I'm gone. Bye. Out for 75 minutes of steady running.

Hey, where can I find the articles you followed to build your running base.... i went to lets run.com and could not find anything...thanks.

He stayed at a Holiday Inn last night. :)

OK. I'm back. My legs are tired, and it reminded me of something very important Marc taught me that relates to this thread.

There is a big difference between: "My legs are tired" and "I'm overreached and I need a break." I used to confuse these two and I don't anymore.

Marc: "The best way to develop endurance is to endure."

Thanks for this great thread. I hope you all don't mind a question from a longtime lurker. What Ron describes above is what I'm hoping to accomplish over this winter (not the times--just the training effect--however, I will continue to dream:)) I'm now trying to figure out just what base building might look like for me.

Ashburn~ in reading your experience it seems you were in the 50 mpw range as well (although at an increased intensity). I've read the Hadd article but I don't think I'd ever have the time/energy/desire to run more than around 50-55 miles a week (and only for a limited time!) which would be a substantial jump for me at this point (only doing 20-25 split between 3 runs). I'm new to tri's, coming into it with a swimming backround and years of varying fitness activites + running (a bunch of 10K races). Serious biking on the road is new to me, but I've used Spinervals for the last couple of years for crosstraining purposes.

Like most everyone else I want to be smart about how I focus my energy (I'm a mom to 4 kids and 2 dogs:)). I've completed my first half marathon, have just one sprint tri under my belt and was hoping to build enough running base over the winter to seriously consider a marathon in the spring (May perhaps?), and then work toward a half IM at the end of the summer (Great Buckeye Challenge).

My question to you is how long is long enough to build a reasonable base? Is 3 months enough time or should it be longer than that? I can comfortably run for 2 hours, but I've only been doing one "long" run per week, and I'm going harder than Hadd suggests. That'll need to change since I know I'm not fit enough to double my mileage without decreasing the intensity of my runs.

Since it doesn't sound like either of you followed Hadd or Lydiard/Daniels precisely, how did you go about laying out your running program? Hadd's specific example for Joe begins at the 50 mile mark, and seeing the sheer number of miles he prescribes is mind-boggling to me. Did you still have one very long run each week, and split the rest up evenly between the rest of the days per week? Or did you have 2 longer runs each week? I know it probably changes from week to week somewhat,but I'm looking for a starting point so I can get some sense of how to plan for it. I'll still keep a couple of swims and some weight training in every week while I'm working on the running.

I hope you don't mind the excessive detail, backround info and shameless request for help :-o. I appreciate any information/advice/experience anyone is willing to share. Thanks in advance.:)

Janet

I'll tell you what I did. I increased my weekly milage from the 20-30 range to the 40-50 range last year. I ran 6-7x per week. I'd run 5miles 4 days, long run of 10-15 one day, and one day double session of two 5 mile runs.

My PR in every distance went down significantly and I'm 40. I ran a 15k (Utica Boilermaker) in 53:02 (5:40 pace) which is much faster than I'd ever been able to run before for that distance. All of my training runs leading up to that race were around 7min/mile with no speed work.

rfarkash wrote: As far as the "train slow race slow" sentiment, I can personnaly say it's BS. I did nothing by 8-10 min/mile base work last winter with a few strides thrown in each run. My weekly mileage from Nov. to March was around 50-60 miles/week, and I was regularly doing 2 and 3 hour runs through this time.

I think where people get off track on this arguement is the miles spent running per week. I certainly think running 50-60 miles a week at a pace that's a couple of minutes slower than "best 5K" pace could result in faster 5K pace for many people. However, if you run 15-25 miles a week a couple of minutes slower than "best 5K" pace, unless you are really new to running, it's less likely to result in a 5K PR. If you are someone that doesn't have the time/inclination to run 50-60 mpw, and you're looking to go faster, you'd better serve that goal by running your 15-25 miles with some of it in a higher intensity range than 2 minutes slower than your current 5K pace.

To keep OT, since biking doesn't beat you up as much per hour, I think someone can bike at higher intensities, compared to running intensity, and still recover...therefore higher intensity biking is a good strategy for most of us. If you're able to bike a few hundred miles a week, your intensity level could be less than the person that puts in a few hundred miles a MONTH.

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Quid quid latine dictum sit altum videtur
(That which is said in Latin sounds profound)

Sorry it took so long to respond - here's the articles I was referring to

http://www.ffh.us/cn/hadd.htm

To respond to a day by day and week by week schedule, here's what worked for me. First of all,k I would build for 3 weeks, then recovery (about 70% mileage) the fourth week. Throughout the week, I'm just running for as long as I can (time, not distance). LAst year this was about 45-1:15 per day, with longer on the weekends - say 1:30-2:00 sat, and similar or longer sunday. This year I finally got a treadmill, and since I don't have to run with time constraints during lunch, I'm trying to do 1:00-1:30 per day, with longer outdoor runs on the weekend.

My history up till about 3 years ago was riddled with injury and time off. I am convinced this was due to too much intensity and lack of recovery. The amazing thing to me is that at the lower intensities this base training involves, I never really feel beat up. I can run for an easy 1:30 (hr below 150) one day, then go 3:00 the next. My legs have "bounce" in them when I run, and I rarely ge that dead legs feeling.

One additional side benefit - the slower pace allows you to really work on form. I've gone from a pretty heavy heel striker to a complete midfoot striker in about 1.5 years. I now do all my training in lightweight shoes (mizuno phantoms), keep my cadence around 90, and my legs have never felt better.

Thanks

Ron

Hey Ashburn,

you said you go ez on your runs and high intensity on your bike. By going hard on the bike, does'nt it mean that it will take out the advantage of your low intensity run ? Shoud'nt the upper limit HR of your base training be about the same for running, cycling and swimming to take advantage of a high frequency program? I understand that it's harder to run at 150 bpm than bike at 150 bpm but is this what I should aim for? Stay Aerobic everywhere.

I really like the idea of a high run frequency program and that's where I had my best running (ran 7 days a week) but man, how can you mix that with swimming, cycling and weights ?

Thanks a lot for your posts, very helpful.

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Richard

"You're only young once, but you can be immature forever" - Larry Andersen

do you train long and slow even if your training for sprints and oly's?

I have to train slow in running because of injury prone legs. In cycling I train with a little more intensity but also mix in a lot of resistance training in the offseason.

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Many thanks to those who repsonded to my question. :) I really appreciate your help.

Have a great day!

Janet