Matt,

Congratulations. That's a great progression. Very realistic.

It gives creedence to the point that real, substantial improvement and changes in endurance sport performance takes time - not just weeks or even months, but a few years.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Ooops, misread the original post.

Thanks fo the info. Approximating: three a year for three years, each time improving by about 7 minutes... hmm, it's still amazing!

Hat's off.

Broothrand -

It's all in the lactic threshold. I'll go to the track and run at a 6:30 pace and will know within a mile whether I'm ready for a sub-3 hr marathon or not. It's all about being able to run a long time without raising your heart rate too much.

PS. Eating fruit and bean sprouts is living; cigars and McDonalds is slow death.

Fleck...I ran the LA marathon last March....me and 30,000 other people. It was freakin unbelievable hot..92 degrees in the shade and I was falling apart the last 6 miles running 8 minute pace. I kept looking behind me down those long LA boulevards, waiting for packs of runners to swallow me up and couldn't see a soul. Nobody in front, nobody behind for about the last 10 miles.

One guy caught and passed me at mile 24 and a guy I had run with the first 16 miles caught me at mile 26 and they were the only other runners I saw. Biggest and loneliest frickin race I ever ran....finished 30 something in 2:46.

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"A society is defined not only by what it creates, but by what it refuses to destroy."
John Sawhill

 
Time is running out on me to find the key to "substantial improvement and changes in endurance sport performance over time." But then there's another quarter century before I'm Ed Whitlock's age, and I guess that means there's hope.

In the mean time let's not break the china.

Matt, that's just awesome. That brief list represents so much damn work! That's a great progression. Determined??

Correction:

It took 4 years, Chicago was in 1999 and CIM was 2003.

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"A society is defined not only by what it creates, but by what it refuses to destroy."
John Sawhill

2004 Chicago: 255 runners between 2:21:00 and 2:49:59. About eight runners per minute or one every seven or eight seconds. Note, there were fifteen women in this group, some of whom were elites.

2004 NYC: 195 runners between 2:20:24 and 2:49:59. About six runners per minute crossing the line or one every ten seconds. Twenty three women in this group (including Paula R).

2:35:00-2:40:49 had thirty nine finishers. Six to seven finishers per minute.

Yes, these numbers are paltry compared to the 30000 or so that toe the line, but in general you can find someone to run with at these races if you are a sub-elite male.

I have run one marathon, Austin in 2002-2:50:20. I ran almost exactly even and it felt easy. It was just a matter of staying relaxed and surviving at 6:30 pace. It never really felt hard because I was never pushing the speed. It is all relative though. Of my running friends I am one of the slower people. They have all run much faster then me: 2:16, 2:18, 2:22, 2:24, 2:30:15 (and he was pissed that he only needed 16 seconds). On the other hand I have friends that are not that serious about running that think 6:30 pace for a 5k or a mile is blazing fast and cannot conceive of running 26.2 miles at that pace. I have always thought training for 10k and down was more difficult for me. To get faster you have to train "harder" or at higher intensities. For the marathon I just ran long, peak milage at around 75 on my own plan. I also ran hills pretty often.

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JW (on the comback trail)

I did 2:58:29 with a body that I had 20 odd years ago. I was happy with it, but it just wasn't that big a deal to me.

Things have changed. I don't have that body anymore. I just had a fantastic race last weekend. I did a 5K at a pace slightly slower than my marathon pace of 20 odd years ago. I can not even imagine doing a marathon that fast today.

So, I guess the answer is that I have done it, but I no longer have any idea what it is like. I wish I could give you a better answer.

I just ran in the Houston 1/2 Marathon (US Championship - which my wife found really funny as I was in the "Championship").

The full marathon ran 1st 7 miles and last 3 w/ the 1/2's.

Needless to say, at mile 11, I saw the top 3 marathoners with camera in front of them, on the other side of the closed down 4 lane road we were on.

So the point is Booth, next year you can enter this race, hop the divider between the two races for your 2 minutes of glory - on tv too!!!

Indeed, that's a strange thing in a race with 30,000 people. Funny that the more people that run marathons, the slower the average times get and as you have pointed out virtually no one running in what I would consider the good recreational runner zone.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

Thanks for sharing the numbers. What is odd is that there really has been no increase in the numbers of people running in this time zone despite the massive increase in the numbers of people running. One would think that just based on the numbers that it would be getting more competitive and deeper in this time zone. In fact the reverse, is happening - it's getting weaker! A strange phenomenon.

Fleck

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

3:00:42.

DOH!!

2:38 lifetime best. I train to eat. When I started having a slight weight problem (everything is relative - I didn't want to go up to size 31 jeans) I started running. I got the bug and started running more. Enjoyed the running, because when I went ot a crab feast or a bull roast, I could eat myself raw knowing I was going to run it off tomorrow, except for what I had already run off...

My secret is to always overeat, then my metabolism never fears for a shortage and never stores anything. I'm 54 and have a BF ±10%.

I believe anything worth doing is worth overdoing. Biggest week ever, ±120 miles, favorite workout, New Year's Eve = 10,000 swim, 100 mile bike, 10 mile run. That one is good for 10,000+ calories. That's two cases of beer, ten bags of Doritos, twelve quarter-pounders (with cheese and fries) crab cakes, porterhouse steak, baked spud, a quart of Haägen Dazs, and that's just for breakfast...

I choose my races by what kind of food they serve, love J&A here in CA, and there's a 4th of July 10K near my home where they serve Haägen Dazs bars after the race. Last year I ate six of 'em. It's all about the food...

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Cousin Elwood - Team Over-the-hill Racing
Brought to you by the good folks at Metamucil and Geritol...

I'm suprised nobody has given out props to our buddy Francois"the fleet" . He must be enjoying this thread, cause dude has run like a 2:10-2:15 marathon. Come on Francois what is your marathon PR ??? Don't be shy, lay it on us :)

bump

Francois is fast, but he's not world-class in the marathon. But a pretty impressive marathon PR, around 2:24 I think.

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"Yeah, no one likes a smartass, but we all like stars" - Thom Yorke


smartasscoach.tri-oeiras.com

At the 1999 Motorola Austin Marathon I got caught near the middle of the pack at the start. My five Kilometer split was over twenty seven minutes. I caught the three hour pacer group at mile fifteen. Continued to push hard and finished in two hours, fifty six minutes and twenty seconds. It was kind of erie in that there were so few people about, I felt as if I had done something wrong and should not be there yet.

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Once, I was fast. But I got over it.

I wanted to reiterate what was said earlier about the speed of the elite runners. They run faster for 26 miles than most people (98%) could hold for a half a mile, and I may be overestimating most people.

Funny story.

Five years ago, a buddy of mine, Deegan and I decided to commemorate our thirtieth birthdays by running 30 miles. This later became known as the dirty thirty. Deegan is a veteran of something like 67 marathons...all between 2:40:40 and 3:00 hrs (not including ironman marathons). We had some friends who had been doing some fitness running. So a couple of these guys decide to jump in with us at mile 27.5 and run us in, figuring we would be trudging along. The reality was that we had been doing 7's pretty comfortably the whole time, and just maintained pace. I can remember looking over at one of the guys about 1/4 after he joined us and his chin was already stuck up in the air, his head was rolling from side to side and I think he was doing some lamaze breathing. A couple dozen meters later, he grunted something, dropped back and walk/jogged it in.

I don't retell this to diminish this guy, because I had a lot of respect and appreciation for him trying to help bring us in. If I tried to help Tergat finish up a twenty miler, my experience would be identical or worse.

A lot of it comes down to how well we picked our parents. Additionally, its all relative. My definition of good has always been the guys ahead of me. Someone may think of me as a sub-3 hour guy. I think of myself as an over 2:40 guy.

The finale of the dirty thirty was that we had a kegger at Deegan's dojo and we got stinky drunk.

There has been rumors of an attempt at a dirty thirty five this spring, however, we may change to kilometers.

Oh yeah, marathon pr is a 2:49 at a wonderfully kept secret known as the Bayshore Marathon in Traverce City, Michigan. Small crowd, great support, beautiful area.

2:15 LA/81...2:16 Nike/79, 2:18 OT/80 (still the fastest marathon in US History... 80 non imported Americans under 2:20).

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