I've basically been doing the Norwegian model on singles.
It's not really that hard to "copy" in the sense the hobby jogging Ingebrigtsten [Kristoffer Ingebrigtsen] puts all his training on Strava.
It's very basic , usually:
Easy
Sub threshold
Easy
Sub threshold
Easy
Sub threshold
Long run
Repeat .
I hired a lactate meter and turns out my paces are very similar to the equivalents he is running. That's a sample of two but for me who doesn't have unlimited money to spend on the test strips, it's good enough.
I had stagnated around 18:5x for quite a while for a 5k (that's all I really run) but have now made quite a big jump recently to 17:27.
Because there is very little vo2 max stuff I pretty much am ready to go for the next session no problem. Also feel way less tired running this way.
In terms of overall training load (coming from a cycling background) it also creates more CTL [Chronic Training Load] for about the same amount of time on feet (around 6 hours 45 for me) compared to training more traditionally, which I had tried (I'd read Daniels, faster 5k and a couple of others).
curious about LT wrote:
So do u mean you adjust the pace? I just can't believe you would run just at LT pace. Doesn't make sense. U would need to run at different places for different adaptations.
I am curious though, that's a huge jump in improvement after stagnation.
One thing I always been curious about also is that is all ctl or training load equal. Are you from cycling background? They use ctl all the time.
Yes I used to cycle. I experimented training in a lot of different ways. What I found out (I used to time trial) is that whatever CTL I got to that I could maximally sustain, my power was the same over 10 or 25 miles (key distances for time Trialists). To pluck an arbitratory number at random , say my 20 min power was 340w at a CTL of 60, it didn't really matter HOW I got there. In the sense I could do that power on a range of 7 or 12 hours a week training. The 7 hours may have been sub threshold sweetspot every other day, or the 12 hours may have been lots of slow riding and some vo2 max stuff in a week. I tried 4-5 different ways to get to that CTL number. Each time my power was almost the same.
Applying this to running, I have about 7 hours a week to train. So running as much sub threshold as I can, which gives a very good CTL score compared to say running 6 days, with long run, hills and a workout, means I'm creating more CTL for the same amount of time running the "hobby jogger" Norway model. This I think is the reason my times have improved, despite now not doing any proper REALLY hard stuff. I hope this makes sense? It's effectively a running version of what is very popular in cycling, "sweetspot" training.
In terms of running just at LT pace, of course not. You adjust the pace depending on the length of the reps + rest.
So for example 25x400 would be a faster pace, than the other end of the scale , 5x2k. But ultimately you are reaching the same state of sub threshold, just under. Remember threshold is a state, not a pace. That's why it's important to play around (if you can) with a lactate meter first, to get an idea and try to marry it up to the more traditional data you can get after each run. Ideally you would have a lactate meter all the time, but for hobby joggers like me, after a month or so you can probably get to 98% of where you need to be without it. For a pro, that 2% difference is a concern. But for me, I'm OK with that 😀
My CTL hovers around the 58-62 range. Although that number is kind of arbitratory in the sense it's only really relevant to me and how I've defined by pace , to set the training loads. If you do it by HR, it could be different etc. But as I said before, relative to me and how I collect data, I was about the same pbs for a while around the same CTL range. Which was about 50-52. That was on 6.5-7 hours a week.
But now, training using the hobby jogger Norway method, I can reach that higher CTL, for the same time training. Everything I've played around with in both sports, suggests all CTL is created roughly equal. So in that sense, I could go back to running more of a classic running approach, ditch the Norway model , get a CTL of say 60 - and be around the same for 5k I am now. The problem being, it would take me more than 7 hours to get there. Maybe 9. I can't quite squeeze that in. So for the hobby jogger with a life outside of running, the Norwegian model probably gives you the best bang for your buck, even outside of doing doubles. Which I suspect is what Kristoffer, the oldest Ingebrigtsten brother, is doing.
In terms of sessions. Again, it's pretty simple. 3 easy runs a week. All under 70% of max HR which is usually about 65% of MAS for those who work in paces as well. This will keep you definitely under LT1. Long run, I tend to just keep the same and by the end I'll be almost at the upper limit of that 70% which is the goal. I think the recent studies which was excellent, on the training characteristics of long distance elite runners (2022) had easy characterised as under 70% Max HR. That seems slow. It is slow. Very slow.
The rest of the sessions are anything from 25x400 to 3x3k.
25x400 is probably around 98-99% of Tinman's CV.
10x1k is around 12-15k pace.
5x2k is around HM pace.
6x1600 right around 10 mile pace.
I run everyday, so it's 3x easy, 1x long at the higher end of the easy boundary and 3x of the above sessions. The only fast stuff I do is are the parkruns. I've gradually improved after a huge stagnation last year and the summer before. Keep chipping time off my 5k pb each month and have for about the last 9 months now. It was around the same for ages. It's not a quick fix, but over time if you stick to it I think most people will improve and I also have felt fresher than I ever have. Also less niggles, I equate that to not doing the really hard and past paces anymore.
I try to stick to that to be honest. It keeps it simple and mixes up what the body is running at. The key to this though, is all short rest. 60 seconds for everything but the 400s at 30. But having had the lactate meter for a while, it will all be around 2.5-3.5 mmol. Again, I no longer test. But I tested enough for a good month or so to know it's good enough for me. But I'm a 17 min guy. If I was Jacob, id care enough to do it every session. As I said before, I think I'm within the margin of error (as my paces I've specifically set on the safer side rather than pushing it.
tinman updated wrote:
I think you are really disciplined to stay at those paces if that is how you measure without the meter. As I think most people would blow the workout and go too fast. That is why I think most ppl cant train like this as they push it too hard and have no discipline.
It's quite tinman like in that it probably doesn't feel hard and u have to believe in the process. I think 9/10 runners will feel good so "push " it that little bit too much. I looked up the brother u mentioned. He is crazy discipline. I assume u the same? U don't think ok today I'm feeling great? Let's push it?
I stick to the paces, no matter what I feel. Cycling helped in the fact that no matter how you feel, you can probably do the workout. It's a shame power isn't a real option for running. The stryd is pretty laughable and the wrist based power on the Garmin is even worse. Until something better comes along, pace seemed to be the best metric that matched up with what the lactate meter was reading. Obviously if you live in the hills, this is gonna suck for you. But there's always the track. I'm lucky, I live by the sea and can do pan flat loops. So pace is very easy to stick to.
I get what you mean about pushing it. I have a friend who is much more genetically gifted than me and started training like this and made some gains. But then he was sending me messages like "felt good on the easy run so pushed it 15-20 seconds per /km faster". Or "was feeling so strong! So I did the 10x1k at 8-10k pace!". This is where it starts to fall down. Obviously at the time it doesn't feel like much, but over time it adds up and you do that every other run and it's no longer sustainable. Then he's like I'm ruined, I can't handle this! Forgetting he was going way too hard.
It works, because it creates what I think is the maximum training load, that minimises the risk of getting injured whilst still stimulating Threshold and vo2 max to an extent, by pushing it up from below.
I definitely think it's a confidence thing. I think if you are coming from cycling or rowing , it's probably way easier to have the confidence to try this - as it's just not as alien. I think runners panic and see "why are the easy runs so easy!!" "No vo2 max stuff?! What a joke!!" Or similar.
The icing on the cake for Jacob , that extra 2% I mentioned might be the hills. The stuff that pushes that lactate up above 8mmol and above. But for me, for the hobby jobber Kristoffer, just sticking to 3x easy, 3x threshold and a long run will get you very very close to your max potential, with relatively low injury risk and the extra bit of training load overall that will make the difference for your average, time crunched, hobby jogger.
Shirtboy already answered, but 30 seconds rest is standing for me on the 400s. On the 60 second rests, I'll usually take 30 standing and then just slowly get back towards a short jog.
Ultimately , just rest. I don't think it matters too much.
As shirtboy also said, it's about creating as much training stress as possible, without burning out or getting injured.
It's not really about single or doubles. If you aren't doing enough miles to warrant it (im doing like 50-55) just do it in singles. If you are probably at the 70+ range I would start to think about doubling, but I would do the doubles on the easy days. So like 2x 45 min runs a couple of days. Then maybe (as I've seen Jacobs hobby jogger bro so), stick to 3 sub threshold sessions but add extra reps on. For instance I've seen him do 12x1k or he quite regularly does 4x3 k, whereas I'm doing 3x3k. This would take me up to maybe 65-70 miles and I'm still not in threshold double range, although a couple of easy runs.
Doubles definitely help, I just don't have time. The most insane fitness I ever had on a bike was when I was riding doubles. I would do sweetspot on a bike twice a day on my commute and hour home and then same again back. I didn't know it really at the time, but I guess I was doing early Norwegian training almost by accident.
I'm glad people find this useful. I'm not saying it's absolutely optimal. But for regular hobby joggers especially I think it's probably the maximum TSS [Training Stress Score] you can squeeze into a week and it be sustainable.
far fetched wrote:
So you really want us to believe running more threshold and running no race specific stuff will make you faster? Yeah right lol
All I can say is this has worked for me. Same mileage, dropped about 80 seconds off my pb after a huge brick wall I hit. I'm certainly not the only one doing this - and nobody I've spoken to or seen as got slower. Even Jacob's older hobby jogger brother is still progressing.
It's also worth noting what has already been mentioned, that just because most people train a different way, doesn't make what the masses do the best way.
Going back to cycling, look at how British cycling or team sky looked at things totally differently after people had relatively training their aerobic systems the same way, for almost a hundred years. They then reinvented the wheel and everyone had to catch up. Obviously there were outliers who understood threshold training, use of power meters before, but they brought it to the masses. In my opinion we could be in the midst of something similar for running, due to the success of the Norwegians.
This isn't a miracle. It's not suddenly turned me world class. But I do think it's the best way to eek out the maximum of my relatively limited talent.
If you think, it's still not that different to a more classic approach.
Before I was running 1 easy, 3 moderate runs, a vo2 max session and some sort of tempo along with the "long" run.
Now I'm running 3 easy runs, 3 threshold and 1 long run.
The key difference is the latter is slowly creating more stress, week after week on the body so you get fitter and fitter whilst feeling sustainable. It's just more work. Even though on the face of it it might not seem it. More work equals more gains. I really think it's that simple and for me makes total sense .
Paces? wrote:
Do you find these to be paces you can comfortably hit on workouts 3x a week on that rest? I'm around 17:00 and have been doing basically this for a month or so based on a similar thread from a few years ago, but the 1k's were closer to HM pace and the Mile/2k closer to M pace. I don't feel gassed at the ends of workouts but I also don't think I could go with those relative paces you're referring to without getting significantly more fatigued over time.
Specifically, I did 25x400 at about 85 with 40s rest, 10x1000 at 3:40ish with 1:00 rest, 6-7xMile at 6:10-20 (road, so less precise) with 1:00. All of them felt comfortably difficult like I *could* double later that day, but would need an easy run the next day. Running about 65 mpw, 17:low fitness.
OP, just realised I actually had an account so don't need to reply as a guest each time.
I couldn't double at these paces. These (I think as shirt boy posted) are probably near the top end of sub threshold. Most people who double will do these slightly easier perhaps but definitely the first session of the day would be more like marathon pace. But it you did 2 marathon paced workouts for example, that's still more TSS scored than one of these sessions I outlined. But I think I've heard people successfully targeting 1.5-2 in the morning mmol and maybe 3 mmol in the evening. Im more up around the 3.5 range in the single session. But if I was to double, I would probably do MP in the morning and then instead of say 12-15 k effort in the evening, make sure I was no faster than 15k in the evening. I hope that makes sense.
You are basically doing the same paces I am now and for me it doesn't feel easy, but it also doesn't feel hard. The last one in the 10x1k I sometimes feel a bit. But I've dialled these all into paces that match up with my actual lactate responses when I've tested. So it may be slightly different for you. What I posted is just a guide.
The one thing I would say, is if you are worried you are going to hard, dial it back a bit. It's most important not to go over. That's where even a few minutes a bit over threshold, you can really feel it the next day. Even at 90% of LT, studies have reported you are still getting 97% of the benefit. So I just don't see any reason to really push it and blow yourself up long term.
I think if you can run what you are doing, run easy the next day + then go again the day after - keep doing what you are doing. It took me more than a month for a breakthrough, for what is worth. But then the gains kept coming in small drips. 5 seconds here and there off my 5k time and seems to have just kept going.
lexel wrote:
Easy: yep, concept is to run easy at lactate baseline <70%HRmax.
So you do 3E, 3Q, 1L/week, which is one Q session more than the mass does. In my opinion not optimal. May i ask how old you are? (recovery time)
They do 10x1k at around 95%CV and 5x6min at around 90%CV. And yep 98-99%CV for the 400m. I think the 90 and 95%CV runs have to be adjusted down for hobby joggers.
Hi Lexel, I'm 39. I run every day. I've been doing this for maybe 9 months now I think. I missed a few days for a bout of COVID, but that's it.
If you look at what the oldest hobby jogger does, who does singles - I believe he does all the paces also around what I have posted. The younger brothers, who all do way more miles and doubled, I believe ease of the pace a little more. I think for singles, you push it mostly to as close to threshold as you can safely, without risking going over.
I'm going to go back to where I started with this - and talk about CTL. These aren't necessarily 'real' numbers, just using them as a guide as an example.
For instance, if you were doubling you might run the 1ks in the evening and 5x6 in the morning.
The 5x6 might give you a TSS of 65-70 at marathon pace and the 1ks at 95% CV around the same again.
Whereas on singles, myself/ the older brother are running the 1ks around 12-15k pace (faster than 95% CV, and 95% is around HM pace for me) and for me this might create a TSS of 85. All these runs keep you below threshold , but the doubles are much safer, in that range where you might be getting 97% of the benefit for 90% of the effort.
But over time, TSS and CTL wins. You'll obviously create a HUGE amount more doubling, even though you are running slightly easier. I believe, the singles brother and myself - have both decided or accidentally stumbled on the same idea that you want to be able to get every other day, but also want the most TSS. The doubles. I've ran slower but maybe created 140 tss a day rather than 80-85.
What I'm also not doing and neither is the older brother, is the "X" factor session either. Or the hills. Or 10x300 I've heard Jacob do or anything like that.
As I've tried to outline, I'm not trying to copy the professional Norwegian's. Just adapt it, to something manageable and sustainable any hobby jogger could do, if they have the discipline. I think others have point out as well as myself, the issue is most people will run this too fast. Once you do that a few times in a week, it's all over. The next session becomes too hard, or the recovery run isn't enough, then you suddenly find yourself in a hole halfway through the next session.
One thing I've learned from cycling is going on feel is the most outdated concept. You won't see anyone racing or training on feel anymore be hugely successful. The power meter numbers, the training zones, it's all made people better riders based on the science. Running is quite a way behind in all of this, but this is a step in the right direct that there is even the interest on here to talk about it 😊
lexel wrote:
Thank you for outlining your concept again in very detail.
Interestingly i had the same idea several weeks ago, trying to optimize the maximum training load/week, but i used the TRIMP system. Also here a longer duration around 60min threshold/week gave a better result = higher load per week. It seems to be better to have a higher duration below THR, as to have a shorter duration above it. I am more and more convinced that this is the better (and safer) concept , even there is still a lot of dicussion on this.
Yes for sure. Time crunched cyclists who Time Trial have done this for a long time. I just never tried it for running initially, to my mistake, because guys would tell me "how you gonna run a 5k if you never do 5k pace". I stupidly listened. I wish I had stuck to my guns initially, as my gut reaction to running was TSS was TSS, which creates CTL (to use the terms I'm familiar with from training peaks) which is what creates fitness. For the individual, you can create a training score and to within maybe 98% your fitness will be the same.
As an extreme, I could probably achieve similar with running twice as much a week, but all easy pace with maybe one tempo run. But that would take double the amount of hours. But in terms of training load/CTL, would be the same. Id probably still be the same in a 5k. This is why you hear stories of guys running insane hours a week, mostly all easy (training for an ultra maybe) but then setting PBS all over the place in shorter distances.
You can't compare other people's training loads, it's all individualised, as training score/CTL is just a number. But from what I know about myself in two sports + a lot of friends I have spoken to, that individuals score of say "60" (this is a random number) equates to roughly the same times for say a 5k-10k for that person. The only really issue is digging into the weeds and working out the fastest way, to get to that training score.
Google brought me here wrote:
Really good read, was googling running TSS and brought me here.. I think I know who sirpoc is?. He used to post on cycling forums and was way ahead of his time when it came to the stuff to do with CDA about time trialing? The times he did of time crunched training and marginal gains were insane. If it's the same person? 😕 Theres so many running or tri podcasts out there , if anyone has one I'd love to hear someone get him on there. I'm sure he will keep improving.
This running approach is kind of what I am looking for, something that will push up my threshold from below and stop them injuries. At or just above threshold in that "super" threshold zone than Friel prescribes just beats me up too much.
That is probably me 🙈 hard to hide on the internet these days. Probably should have got a new running username. I could push the limits of cycling as an amateur;
1. Because you don't need much time to time trial. It's much like the time per week you need to train for 5-10k running.
2. Cyclists didn't really know how to train properly 10 years ago, so I had a big advantage even though naturally I'm average aerobically. I got to my maximum potential, a lot of guys the way they trained were nowhere near it, but they were way more gifted than me.
3. I understood that reducing CDA would make you waaaaaaaaay faster than any I icing on the cake training could do. Again, I believe everyone has caught up. But I still notice I have a few course records ha ha
I just like to share what I have learned over time and help people improve. I'm not a good runner. I'm not really in amazing shape anymore. My weight is what it is, doesn't go up or down but it's not optimal for running. But I do know what has changed how I feel, train and compete and running. I've definitely got faster. I'm pretty average but if I can get to sub 17 I will be happy, I think 16:45 might be about my absolute max potential at my age, weight and time I have to train. I don't have the cda advantage in running ha ha
I haven't read Friels book for a while, it's actually really good the HR training one. But my experience playing around with this system, is that "super threshold" zone as he calls it really taxes you quickly . It doesn't really add much more on in terms of bang for your buck in TSS but you really feel it the next day, even if you don't go far into it. I experimented with this with some 5x2k reps. I deliberately went over when I was in testing phase and had the lactate meter, on the last rep. It was only one rep of the 5 at the end, but I really did feel way more trashed agree and felt horrific the next day on the easy run. So it is playing with fire in a way, but as I said if you know what you are doing or are over cautious and just make sure you go a bit under, it's all good.
lexel wrote:
You are definetely an enrichment for this forum and there is finally a discussion here.
There is the base phase and, more closer to a race, the race preparation phase. I was talking about the 'base phase'. Other people call it differently.
The race preparation phase should be a (little) different, because there is also motor learning involved and i am definitive in favour (based on experience and papers), that training at or around race pace is important too.
Lexel, all I can say from my experience is that I do zero race pace work (as all I do is an average course parkrun, which is 5k) and it doesn't seem to matter , I just dial into 5k pace on the day. Same for cycling, the guy who posted above might remember my posts (sadly the forum is deceased), but I did absolutely zero 10 mile TT efforts. In fact barely did any FTP stuff (around 25 mile power, equivalent to 10k running in terms of time it probably takes me). All was around sweetspot, absolutely non ace specific really as you can get, just maximising training load.
If there have been in depth studies in it, I don't know know. But I helped coach friends the same way , all of who also improved. Nobody reported they then couldn't hold race paces. The key is keeping your race paces and zones updated, so when you do race, you know what splits you can and will hit.
shirtboy2022 wrote:
To your previous observations about Ingeb's older brother, he rarely does the 400s since he's mostly focusing on HM type races, so you could easily drop the X factor workout and replace with 3-4x3000m in your buildup if you are a more HM type focus athlete.
20-25 x 400 could be more of a focus is your race distance is 5K.
The hills, the trackwork, and even the 400s are designed for primarily 1500m guys.
If you are not looking to be needing a ton of speed 2k-3k repeats might be a better bread and better distance for your goals
I could definitely drop the 400s. But I don't have many sessions on rotation and it can get quite boring, so I do it every other week it tends to work out. Interestingly I did try 20x500 as I saw the older brother did that, but my lactate was always too high. However , I messed up as I realised he gave himself 40 seconds not 30. I might try it again, but I don't have any lactate strips left on the meter I borrowed and they are quite expensive 😂
lexel wrote:
If you do treadmill running you have to adjust the grade of the treadmill according to your weight and speed to have about the same effort as running outside (compensation for air resistance). And you have to calibrate the treadmill as the readings on the display is off in most cases. So we do not know what he has done exactly.
I am not aware of a study showing that doing 95% LT pace, creates 97% of the training effect. But the point is, that speed/power and duration are interconnected. If you can hold 300W for 60minutes, you can hold 290W for a longer time. So if we improve the duration we can hold at 290W, we indirectly improve the time we can hold 300W and that shifts LT up. We can then hold 300W for longer time as 60minutes.
Sirpoc84, you said you have 3E, 3Q and 1L running sessions/week. What is your training distribution between (3E+L) and 3Q? Do you follow around 80-20%, or what do you have? Same proportion with cycling?
Yes, you are talking about pushing up your threshold from below. I'm mentioned this a few times I probably sound like a broken record, but this is something cyclists have known for a while now and with the advent of power meters it makes it insanely easy to train in that area, not go too hard and recover. Someone mentioned cross country skiers, applies to them as well and I've heard of speed skaters as well who have trained like this for a while. If you are a time crunched cyclist, if you aren't doing quite a bit of this training on your turbo trainer, you are behind the training curve.
Good question about training distribution. Again, as I posted above Seiler orginally (20 years ago) said 80/20 was split into sessions. As I said before, you can never tell exactly where he stands but he's started to come around to the idea that for hobby joggers and cyclists, time in zone he would accept. Mainly because we aren't running doubles, so it's not realistic to have as much easy. I've looked at studies more recent, they usually include "time in zone" , although that is almost complicated in the sense it could be power on the bike, pace for runners or HR as the metric.
Anyway, for me, on the bike I always just went on power. It's the easiest of all the metrics to collect meaningful data on. I was usually around always between 70/80 - 20/30 on the bike. This would be the same pretty much, no matter how many hours I did.
For running, I've been going on pace. I live in a very flat area. So I can go on loops for 15k with like 10 meters of elevation on a road run. Again, if we are going in time on some, just having a look now, the last 6 weeks average out to 74/26. With the schedule I outlined above . This is polarised in the fact there is nothing aimed in the 3:58-4:57/km range other than what you might catch for a few seconds changing paces or whatever. But again, Seiler originally intended for sessions not zones (but has conceded a point as I mentioned) and a lot of the "longer" 2-3k reps are going to be also in the zones he would probably tell you not to run. But I like the idea of trying to fit 75/25 or 80/20 or roughly whatever you want, into just under LT1 and then in that just under LT2 threshold for the harder stuff, to push that up from below. This is a pure rough estimate that won't apply to everyone, but for me that's about anything 90-91% of LTHR up to 98% LTHR. So you have quite a wide margin of error. But if I'm somewhere in there, I'm seeing lactate numbers that are going to be giving me good stimulus for my "20" work , without wrecking me.
hs coach here wrote:
This is a really great thread. At first, having read the first few posts, like all these Norwegian threads I rolled my eyes a bit. But it's actually put forward in a really clear way, although may need to read through a second time. A lot of content here from quite a few posters. I do sometimes think about baseball when I think about stuff like this. Not saying it's made baseball better to actually watch it's robotic now, but how sabermetrics have helped improve players or scouting of players. The old scouts saying how this is how it's always been done, you think in 100 years we couldn't have worked out a better way? Discipline has been mentioned . I think you would have to change the mentality of groups of coached runners over time, because no doubt people will ruin these workouts quite quickly and go to hard. Which I guess means they aren't blowing THAT workout, but the next one, or the one after? If I'm understanding this right.
Yes that's the point. You aren't going to die or your legs fall off and or you'll never be a be able to run again if you go into super threshold, or beyond 😂
But you will start to cross that border where fatigue seems to accumulate fast, real fast, and then suddenly it's not easy to do an easy 10k the next day and then go again the following day with another session. I mentioned before, I had a friend do this. His claim was he was "feeling great" and pushed way past 12-15k that we had worked out for him should create the lactate response we wanted. He did this a few times back to back and then suddenly the week after , he's trashed. The whole principle is living on the edge, not falling off the edge of choosing to jump off the edge. Maximising training load, whilst maintaining something that can be recovered from, relatively quickly. It's why I really wish there was a good power solution for running. With cycling is very easy to just say I don't care how good you feel. This is the power zones for the workout, stick to it. It's why I posted the paces up that I work to, as for where I live and it being flat it's probably the best I've got without having to buy lactate strips week after week as they're expensive (although if I was a pro I obviously would).
would like to know wrote:
Whilst this thread is still well alive and kicking without JS even ruining it yet I have a question. So, I heard you mention Friel, this running would equate to his zone 4, of the 7 zones he has? Some in his zone 3? Which is all in zone 3 of the classic and Garmin type sense? And you are saying this is good for accumulation of tss or fitness score or whatever metric the software you use computes it as?
Ok, I'll try to answer this and bring it around back to TSS. TSS is just the trademark training peaks uses that Andy Coggan came up with. I've had run in with the man before on the time trialing forum. I do, however, think he stumbled onto this either by chance or genius. As I started out with this thread I said if I can get to about a CTL score of "60" ( this is irrelevant to everyone else, but meaningful to me) then I will be in 98% of where I wanted to get, no matter HOW I trained to get there. This applies to running and cycling. I don't have much to go on with other runners, but it was very relevant to others I knew as well, in cycling.
Right,so this would be in Friels zone 4. Or you are correct, zone 3 in a traditional sense.
Let's say I do a session, just above the threshold. This might be a super threshold session in Friels book (zone 5a). Let's say I do 40 mins work, in blocks of 4. With a small amount of rest. This is gonna be pretty hard and might give me a TSS for that 40 mins if maybe around 66. You have your warm up and down, you are looking at 90 for the session.
However, let's then decide we are going to run the session at 90-95% if this is a little under LT2, Friel's zone 4. I'm probably going to accumulate maybe 53 TSS for the same amount of time. Again, let's add a proper warm up and down the same as before and say we are maybe at 76-77 TSS for the session.
We've accumulated a little bit less, overall. So why do it? Well it's quite simple. The other session whilst generating more training load, is way more taxing on the recovery. I would probably need two easy days after that, whereas the second session in the example, I only need a day's recovery. So I can run three of those in a week for 228 worth of TSS, whereas the harder session realistically I'm capped at 2 a week. And let's be generous and say 180 worth of TSS (total session). Over time that adds up a lot, to more training load. Doing 3 slightly easier ones a week.
Then when you consider a lot of training programs get you to do a hard vo2 max session, vo2 max gives you a big TSS score, but you can't do much of it. Because it's actually really hard. So it's a high score per hour, but nobody does an hour of it. So it might leave you with even less of a training load as you probably can only handle that + a threshold session + some sort of straight tempo 30 min run if you are lucky, but you are still quite a bit under your TSS score with that combined, compared to the 3x sub threshold (Friels Z4). TSS in my experience going full circle feels like it's created reasonably equally, but the recovery is not weighted accordingly. So much as I said before like cycling, there seems to be this lovely sweetspot if you hit it right and disciplined, where you can create a huge bang for your buck, which is basically what the Norwegian model is in this hobby jogger version I outlined .
would like to know wrote:
Whilst this thread is still well alive and kicking without JS even ruining it yet I have a question. So, I heard you mention Friel, this running would equate to his zone 4, of the 7 zones he has? Some in his zone 3? Which is all in zone 3 of the classic and Garmin type sense? And you are saying this is good for accumulation of tss or fitness score or whatever metric the software you use computes it as?
Ok, I'll try to answer this and bring it around back to TSS. TSS is just the trademark training peaks uses that Andy Coggan came up with. I've had run in with the man before on the time trialing forum. I do, however, think he stumbled onto this either by chance or genius. As I started out with this thread I said if I can get to about a CTL score of "60" ( this is irrelevant to everyone else, but meaningful to me) then I will be in 98% of where I wanted to get, no matter HOW I trained to get there. This applies to running and cycling. I don't have much to go on with other runners, but it was very relevant to others I knew as well, in cycling.
Right,so this would be in Friels zone 4. Or you are correct, zone 3 in a traditional sense.
Let's say I do a session, just above the threshold. This might be a super threshold session in Friels book (zone 5a). Let's say I do 40 mins work, in blocks of 4. With a small amount of rest. This is gonna be pretty hard and might give me a TSS for that 40 mins if maybe around 66. You have your warm up and down, you are looking at 90 for the session.
However, let's then decide we are going to run the session at 90-95% if this is a little under LT2, Friel's zone 4. I'm probably going to accumulate maybe 53 TSS for the same amount of time. Again, let's add a proper warm up and down the same as before and say we are maybe at 76-77 TSS for the session.
We've accumulated a little bit less, overall. So why do it? Well it's quite simple. The other session whilst generating more training load, is way more taxing on the recovery. I would probably need two easy days after that, whereas the second session in the example, I only need a day's recovery. So I can run three of those in a week for 228 worth of TSS, whereas the harder session realistically I'm capped at 2 a week. And let's be generous and say 180 worth of TSS (total session). Over time that adds up a lot, to more training load. Doing 3 slightly easier ones a week.
Then when you consider a lot of training programs get you to do a hard vo2 max session, vo2 max gives you a big TSS score, but you can't do much of it. Because it's actually really hard. So it's a high score per hour, but nobody does an hour of it. So it might leave you with even less of a training load as you probably can only handle that + a threshold session + some sort of straight tempo 30 min run if you are lucky, but you are still quite a bit under your TSS score with that combined, compared to the 3x sub threshold (Friels Z4). TSS in my experience going full circle feels like it's created reasonably equally, but the recovery is not weighted accordingly. So much as I said before like cycling, there seems to be this lovely sweetspot if you hit it right and disciplined, where you can create a huge bang for your buck, which is basically what the Norwegian model is in this hobby jogger version I outlined .
shirtboy2022 wrote:
What's funny is youre either on the 'cutting edge' or 'it's been all done before'. Either way your main point stands: Ego is the problem in implementing this system.
This isnt sexy as a program, just boring. Your not going to be taking any KOMs or generating any buzz unless you are at the TOP of the pile here. But if you are just a hobbyjogger that likes to feel good 95% of the time and is not absolutely chasing the 5% to define your life and make it part of your personality as a runner, this system will be incredibly beneficial.
You can see the progression in the workouts. You recover. You see the results in the races very consistently. All you need is patience and some trust in the long term process, not a 24 week schedule.
If your ego can handle that load, this is for you.
Absolutely sums it up perfectly. Obviously that 5% you suggest, for a top athlete, that's the difference between sitting at home for Paris 2024 and winning a medal. But 99% of us are hobby joggers. You are right, it is quite boring. I actually listen to a lot of podcasts and stuff and just dial in on my easy runs and focus on the pace and nothing else on the sun threshold runs. Telling myself, no matter what, stick to this narrow pace zone on my Garmin. It's hard, some days I could clearly do more. But have to remind myself, this has to be done again in 48 hours.
As a small aside, there's a lovely mile waterside running stretch where I live, that I tend to do intervals on. Or even just easy runs. You'd be amazed at how many people I probably have 1-2 mins on in my local parkrun, come tearing past me. I had a conversation with a guy the other week, at parkrun. He said oh "I saw you out on my easy steady state run the other day, I came past". I was doing like 5:05 per km and he came tearing past me like I was standing still. I think he's like high 19 low 20 for the 5k. I explained to him I was also on my normal run, I run that pace like 4 days a week. He genuinely was baffled and thought I was joking. This goes to back up what someone else said in a great post a bit further up, about making sure the easy days are also nice and easy.
Curious1! wrote:
When doing this kind of training would you still have a medium long run between workout days? And would the long run be easy then so you can recover? And on what days would you do strides?
I literally do the same thing every week.
3 sub threshold sessions (all last about 65 mins with a warm up and down) 3 easy runs of 50 mins and a long run of 75 mins. All are the same pace roughly. 65% of MAS (well current estimated based on my 5k time, but will get you within a few seconds per km of it).
No strides. Nothing. The way I do it is so simple. The only thing I would/ might change is maybe add on 5 mins to the easy days and long run. The only rationale for this is there's a point where I saw Jacobs hobby jogger brother increase volume a bit, the odd extra rep here and there and he kept the overall rough 80/20 ish (more like 75/25) time in zone to the same ratio by then just making the easy days slightly longer. So it slowly moved him up to where I am now (just under 7 a week) to up to around 8 hours on average. For him, 10x1k has slowly become 12 etc. 5x2k has become usually 6.
Shirtboy made a really good point. This is pretty boring. Pretty robotic. But it's by far the best jump in performance I've had after quite a while being around the high 18s. I really have changed nothing else, not weight, time training , literally nothing. Except the make up of the actual training load of the week.
Follow up question wrote:
Probably a dumb question given the intricacies of the info but can someone clarify what you mean by sub threshold? For instance my watch estimated threshold HR is 164, with my threshold zone being 157-167 bpm. Would that mean it’s more optimal to shoot for closer to 157 heart rate while doing the reps or even slower? Thanks in advance for the help!
If you know for sure (within a beat or 2) that your threshold is 164, then you have a starting point. It won't be perfect, but you can certainly so the 1k and up intervals probably by heart rate. I've never looked at heart rate during, as I do it on paced but this was married up to my lactate testing I did, which as a result I know will almost always keep my HR under threshold.
But you could aim for between 153-163 (absolute max) for longer reps, say 5x2k. If you start out the reps and try and keep the pace the same and after the first one you are nearer 153-155 by the end, you probably will keep the whole lot under. I've not really tried to do this, but you could experiment. Just looking at my runs, my LTHR is 175, I'm usually in the mid to high 160s by the end of the first couple, and the low 170s by the end of the 5th. Definitely don't start out too hard, what you don't want to do is go too far over your LTHR. It defeats the purpose. I posted way back on another page, but I purposely once went over by upping the pace in the last rep, spent almost 6 mins which doesn't seem like a lot, but I was trashed the next day compared to what I usually am. I couldn't have done that 3 times that week. So it's a fine balancing act, very controlled, very measured, as others have said, very boring.
Side note: you just wouldn't be able to control anything under 1km by heart rate. I've never tried but I don't see how you could really. Someone might be able to correct me on that. Even at 1k it might be tricky.
HR q wrote:
I usually run 8:20 pace too. I've inadvertently done this sort of threshold work in the past, as my speed is poor even in workouts. For example my 400 repeats would usually be 6-6:05 pace and my 5K 18:07, yet I have also run 36:39 for 10K and a 1:20 half. Is the secret to do threshold 3 times a week rather than 1? I probably can't do it without getting injured.
Everything is run at sub threshold state, the pace is going to be whatever pace it takes you to get there. You wouldn't be able to do 3 true threshold runs a week, even 1 + a vo2 max session is asking a lot. But these take less out of you, but you need to know you are running in the right area.
Let's say the 18:07 is your most recent, you are running you 400s a little faster than I would, as you are right bang on about CV. If you've run that 36:39 and that's more like your most recent fitness, then for you it might just require a slower % than me of CV for the 400s (which for me let's say 98% of CV). You are likely going to fast I would say and probably at least the last 5-6 reps are pretty rough? I'm just guessing as that's all we can do without measuring lactate.
Perhaps try 10x1k or a couple less if appropriate to your mileage. But run them around 6:15-20 per mile. See how that feels.
This is where once you get going with this, as a few others have said it becomes easier as you can adjust based on the repeatability of your workouts. The racing helps as well so you actually know where you are at, not guesswork, or what you might have done a year ago (not saying that's necessarily the case for you).
yet another fan of this thread wrote:
I would do for Friels benchmark test, for LTHR. Run as hard as you can for 30 mins in a time trial, so pick a distance on Tinmans calculator as it as a wide range of distance conversion, that is closest to 30 mins. Crop from 10-30 mins and use that as your LTHR. He says to take that as your LTHR. Personally, I feel 98% of that is more accurate. It's always proven a great benchmark for me. Either way I'll be in the range of what a hobby jogger needs.
I'm happy to update where I'm at, if anyone finds it interesting. I plateaued completely at around 18:50-19:00 no matter what I did. In fact I felt like I'd just completely burned out. So looked at this probably around this time last year and went from there. In that year I've come down to a 17:27 and yesterday a 35:50 , so I think I might be able to dip under 17 soon, especially as the 5k course I do has 3 dead turns (only 5k I've ever fan, but done it like 25 times, which also helps at plotting progress). It's little gains, here and there. There was no big leap apart from the first PB. I had been doing this maybe about 6 weeks and nothing seemed to happen. Then suddenly I pb'd by like 25 seconds out of nowhere. I guess that was my body adapting and then the door opened.
I think I mentioned before, if I increase volume I will do it incrementally and proportionally to my 75/25 easy /sub threshold load. So it might be I add on 5 mins to all my easy runs and then that adds on maybe an extra rep somewhere to my sub threshold intervals, in it's most simplistic form. What holds me back I'd time. This week I was at 6 hours 45, maybe I could stretch the whole week to 8, but with life etc that's likely my limit. But that still gives a bit of time to play around with.
And to the other guy, ex cyclist - I don't want this thread to be about me. For a number of reasons, but mainly I just happened to be the first one to post up what in doing and I was pretty open I just kind of combined what I already knew from cycling myself and stealing what Kristoffer did/does. But I'm glad you found it useful. But there's many other people in this thread who have probably been running longer than me and doing this for longer than me who are all adding in fabulous contributions.
peekay wrote:
I hadn’t looked back at this thread since initially recommending Kristoffers strava. I assumed it would be the usual misinterpretation and obsession with double threshold.
Great thread guys. I think finally people are understanding the true mentality behind “Norwegian” training. I once heard Jakob say on a podcast (some non running Norwegian company podcast or something) - his goal is to run as many miles as he can, as fast as he can. And he can’t run fast every day because he will get injured.
The goal is essentially to do the most training you can sustain.
Id be curious how spoc will progress his training. Kristoffer has very gradually increased volume over time - almost imperceptibly but over years it leads to big changes.
One other thing to note- KI was doing some shorter and quicker reps over this past winter, and 1k reps around 3:20. He sustained it but eventually posted that he felt beat up so slowed down a bit and increased the volume. So even Henrik is experimenting with what might work…and tracking it.
I have no problem with this. A bit like TSS and CTL, whilst almost 2 decades old now I'm not convinced anyone has come up with anything better.
Remember , this should be done on your own. The problem with doing it in a race is there's so many more factors involved. Naturally elevated HR from adrenaline, the overall race day feel + also just pure motivation.
To lay this out, I pretty much know my LTHR at this point to within +-1 ish. But if I took the 10-30 min range of my 10k yesterday, my LTHR would be in the 180s. There's no way I could do that for an hour. Ok the flip side, I could also not have done that run in a non race situation on my own. So whilst not very scientific, I actually agree with Friel's reasoning of to why to do it on your own. I also agree, if you are good at pacing, finding a distance on Tinman's conversion race charts closest to 30 mins makes perfect sense and an excellent idea.
I spend a lot of time (or did) reading the intervals icu forum , which are amazing for anyone who wants to look deeper into all of this btw. They all analysed a lot of data, also the conclusion was that doing this by taking the best 20 mins of the 30 mins, 98% of that is very, very close to LTHR. That included people who experimented out of interested but who knew for sure, what their LTHR.
Also if you do this test and take 98% , to follow this training, you are almost certainly being on the safe side. I don't think this will overestimate. Which is key, as we are looking to stay UNDER LT and we've given ourselves quite a wide range to do so, running these intervals at even up to 90% under and still pushing up lactate threshold from below. So you have a reasonably big window to play with and if there's errors and you wanted to do all of this by HR, errors on the lower side and you still will get a huge amount of the benefits, but estimate LTHR over and be less cautious, you will totally trash yourself fast. Really fast.
data-nerd wrote:
Glad I happened to visit LRC when this thread first popped up and have been following since.
I've been reading more and more lately emphasising the importance of LT-pace training, and taking serious interest in the Bakken/Ingebrigtsen approach. This discussion has generated some great lightbulb moments for me.
The talk of CTL, heart rate zones, maximising time at LT pace etc. has got me wanting to properly monitor changes in my own performance and fatigue metrics. Has anyone got any tips for how to get the most out of tools like Runalyze for this? I think it was sirpoc early on that mentioned he uses it.
Hi data nerd, your username suggests you have come to the correct thread 😂. I think there's quite a few people here who can help with different things, but I can definitely help with this.
I don't use runalyze, but I hugely recommend either Golden Cheetah for the PC version or use intervals icu for mobile (it's browser based, but works fantastic in mobile brave on my android).
This IMO will open things up to what is happening in your training. You'll start to see patterns and understand why you stagnate or when it's time to just do things like I suggested, like time to add on 5 mins here and there to easy runs before you add more reps. Intervals will also give you a visualisation and breakdown each week of your time in zone breakdown. This is hugely valuable. You can customise that breakdown in a number of ways.
I would suggest using time in zone, pace as the main metric, with heart rate as back up and also if you have a reliable and more modern watch, select in the pace settings in intervals icu , gradient adjusted pace.
You can use HR, I don't think it matters too much, you will see slightly different numbers. For me, it evens out (roughly) But the TSS per session seems slightly less for me in the easy runs by HR and slightly more in the workout sessions, than by pace. Overall, I mentioned the other day I have re evaluated the last few hundred runs and basically it ended up the same. Just stick to one though. Once you have picked , just stay with it.
Obviously pace isn't as good as a power meter in cycling, which is the ultimate tool , but I can still use the PMC (it's under the fitness tab in intervals, but the same thing) to index my current fitness) roughly to my training load. The main takeaway in basic terms for me, I could only make it to maybe around a CTL (FITNESS score in intervals icu) of 50, training a more traditional running approach, on around 6.5-7 hours a week. It was only as I started to train like this for the same hours, which made my CTL increase, for no more hours. So obviously I could experiment with how to push the envelope and understand why I have gotten faster.
You mention fatigue, FWIW, the fatigue/tsb score in general I've found quite accurate over the years. I once was cycling and really felt terrible from a training block, had a TSB of like -50. Over the years in cycling it gave me a pretty good idea of where I was at. I could train hard still on about -15 to -20 ish. So for me it was a good metric to use, as again I could index that score and use it for patterns over time. It was as good as telling me when I needed a break as my body. My issue was always I didn't want to believe my body, I was weak and could just push through. The numbers reigned me in. One more thing, training like this for running, you don't need to worry about this too much. I've never accumulated a fatigue score over -10, in intervals icu. That's primarily because this is so controlled, it's basically the same thing every week or at worst ramp it up a tiny bit. Cycling is a bit more variable, you might do some crazy 7 hours ride , it feels easy, but actually that load is huge under the hood and has trashed you in retrospect, more than your body initially tells you. You'd probably find this to be the case in running. That I could easy go out and run 75% of MHR for my long run, it might feel OK as an individual run in isolation, but actually if that becomes the easy standard over time, it will then grind you down (not horrifically I guess) but more than you realise.
Just make sure you are 100% sure you know your threshold pace to begin with and that you know your LTHR. Also, keep those updated the second you clearly know you have improved, through a face or time trial or whatever you benchmarks are likely to be.
Right, I was going to also post and bore everyone with what happened yesterday , as I got my wallet, bought some more lactate strips . Can't believe how expensive they have gotten 😭😂😂.
Ok, this thread seems to have a bit of life back in it. So let's talk about the easy run and power.
So I've said before, I like pace. I live in a flat area and I'm looking at around 65% of MAS for these runs. This is for the 3x normal runs and the long run of the week. This will normally amount to around an average of 70% Max HR, probably slightly under.
I totally concede, pace is not the best metric for some people. Living in the hills etc. So I bought a Stryd, as you can see a few pages back. Previously, I didn't have much luck. But I've persisted. I'm having trouble (or was) with the sub threshold stuff, but I feel I have some really good data to feedback for those interested on the easy runs.
So I did 4x easy runs blind, I just did my usual pacing and noted down the results. Then on my 5th easy run today, I tried to run ONLY to power , I didn't look at anything else but aimed for average power of the 4 previous runs. The result? The pace of the run was a bit more up and down. However, the power curve was almost flat and the result a run bang on 65% of MAS on average for the 55 minute run and 68% of max HR. Incidentally, the HR was a lot flatter. Much flatter in fact, due more even power distribution. All 5 runs it turns out were within a few "watts" of each other (let's use watts like that, as it's not really watts). This was at 78% of my FTP.
This seems to make total sense. In the stryd zones, this is the upper end of zone 1. Much like it would be for pace and HR. So all matches up very nicely. Now I'm not saying that is the case for EVERYONE. But I know there are some guys out there interested in using power . And if you have a pretty decent idea of your FTP, I would suggest 78% is a really good starting point. This resulted in the top end of the MAS suggestion, for the easy run. So let's say 78% is the cap and work down from there.
jiggymeister wrote:
f wrote:
You can chose to believe that running your workouts at 6:00 pace versus 6:10 matters. But science can't answer that.
The small difference in pace (i.e. the few seconds you mention) absolutely matters and makes a noticeable difference.
I performed my LT stage test a few days ago to see how my lactate values changed since the last test which took place 7 weeks ago.
I will report back with a more detailed summary of the changes in a separate post, but I wanted to note here and now that a difference of 5 seconds per km between the last two stages made a huge impact. Going from 3:45/km to 3:40/km pace had my lactate shoot up from 2.4 to 3.8 mmol/L.
Hey jiggy. Would be really interested in this summary As it's something I have played around with. I've posted before about deliberately going over threshold, just so see if it would kill me 😂 obviously I didn't die ha ha but I did go about 7 seconds per km like you mentioned for the end of a 2k sessions and my lactate rocketed to well over 4+. I was otherwise in around the 2.5-3 ish range. What I really felt was it in my legs the next day, quite shockingly in fact for what was only a relatively short amount of time. The amount of fatigue is totally out of proportion to what seems like only a little bit of extra pace.
It's why I agree 10 seconds here makes a huge amount of difference. Once you get up in that high ish range just under LT state, it's a real balancing act to make sure you stay in that zone. It's why as boring (yet again) I sound, I would much prefer someone to run slightly too slow and pace on the cautious side, that to push the limits where the risk reward just isn't worth it. Even if you lactate is only 2.0 mmol or just above as a random example , you are still going to be getting a huge amount and % of the benefit as if you are at say 3.3 mmol, to pick another arbitratory point as the example. But the issue is say you are regularly hitting the 4+ range. There's no way anyone could handle this 3x a week on maybe 7 hours like me, for almost a year. The 4+ might be giving you a a slightly higher TSS per session , but the value just isn't there if you can only do it twice a week instead of three times.
Charlesvdw wrote:
Sirpoc, since it is better to run a little slower than too fast, do you think the benefits of this approach would still be there if a runner ran at marathon pace for the treshold sessions ?
Especially if "marathon pace" is a little bit faster than actual marathon pace, more like target marathon pace. So what at first would be tempo pace might become marathon race pace as fitness increases.
Asking this because as an older athlete my muscles don't tolerate HM or 15k pace two times a week, that would result in injury.
Definitely worth it. I have still seen lactate of 2 and slightly above mmol when I have tried longer reps (say 4x10 mins at the longest end depending on how much you do a week, but something like 4x 8-9 mins is fine) at marathon pace. This would usually gets me to within 85% max HR by the end and whilst it might be a bit slower pace wise, you still will get a huge amount of the training benefits in this range. This is the really good thing about training sub T, there's a window probably right down to where you are asking about in marathon pace, to collect a lot of the benefits. Which is why people doing doubles will often start the day with a session at somewhere around this pace to try and hit around this lactate. I think, that roughly matches up with Jiggys amazing post above. He's seeing 2+ lactate at around the end of his tests at around 85% Max HR which is about where I do or have in the past. I'm not sure what that equates to in terms of pace relative to himself or if that is around his marathon pace, maybe he could give us an idea. I would imagine the paces are just a guide for the individual, as I doubt his paces match up exactly to mine, but what I have seen no matter what , is how people's data all shoe the same. Pace really, really and I mean really does matter once you are hovering just below threshold. It gets out of control quick for what even seems like a small fraction of change in speed.
I was helping a friend out recently who used to be a lot faster than me. He blew a lot of these workouts and got tired really quick. I would say right, today run 5x7 mins at HM pace + 2 seconds per KM and he would be like "it was awesome! I felt amazing so the last two reps I was around hour pace!!" As if I would be impressed. He just didn't listen that he was burning himself out really quick. Within a few weeks he was wrecked as he was doing stuff like this every session. The same on 10x1k would end up around 10k pace. Going back to Jiggys post, you can see quite quickly how much lactate would have been building up session on session towards the end, which, just isn't sustainable long term for 3x a week.
I haven't dipped into this thread for a while. With regards to how often to do a 5k park run, TT or whatever. I think my average still sits at maybe 4-5 weeks. My reasoning being:
1. It's fun.
2. Gives me a reason to train. I don't enter many proper races, so it keeps my motivation higher on a lot of these boring training runs.
3. It's really easy for me to then know where I'm at, then adjust my paces without having to buy more lactate strips. I've spot tested this approach now and again to lactate, and for me, I'm confident in its accuracy.
4. It does give me a small amount of "harder" work. I have gone about 10 weeks with no racing I think before, or something long like that. My improvement in that period was the same. So how much this helps is totally up for debate.
Note, the reverse of point 3 applies here, my training tells me almost certainly when I'm going good and 90% of the time translates into a PB in the 5k. So I guess I'm picking when I run my 5ks, it tends to be when I feel I have stepped it up, which in turn happens to be every 4-5 weeks. Final note, now the winter is here (like last year) I'll probably race park run less.
I'm glad people are still finding a good thread useful, I'll try to keep and eye on it a bit more. Although the Strava group is pretty busy, not everyone I am guessing is on there. I'm still hilariously baffled that anyone would find my Strava interesting. It's nice to have other runners that I follow now though, not just cyclists. Maybe I'll actually be a runner first and cyclist second, soon. Who'd have thought it , ha ha .
A lot of it has already been covered. But I haven't posted in a while so I will over my morning coffee.
Firstly, I find it hilarious people think I might be secretly doing some "special" work, as if I would come on a niche internet forum to lie about it ha ha. No, just 4x easy (including easy "long") and 3x sub threshold, with the odd parkrun thrown in to keep me honest, see how/if I've improved and just to stop myself getting bored. It's very boring, I've seen that mentioned. But I enjoy getting better, this is the best way , I believe, for most people to get better. I was cycling roughly like this 10 years ago. So after a bit of disappointment messing around with Daniels style, this is where I am at.
Someone also mentioned consistency. Absolutely spot on. I've said before, if I wanted to get fit in maybe 8 weeks, this is probably the worse way to train. But if you don't have a specific distance in mind from 5k (maybe less, I haven't tried) through HM, it's a really good generalised plan, with little risk. But you really do have to think long term. Miracles aren't going to happen overnight. As I said, if you maybe only have 6-8 weeks, roll the dice and do a more aggressive plan and see what happens. But if you are thinking 6+ months, then this in my opinion, is the best go to.
On the subject of talent, I don't think I'm especially talented. I have no evidence of that particularly. But I do know I have zero natural speed. It was the same on the bike. I could train myself to go from untrained on the bike to 320w FTP at a pretty light weight, but my max 5 seconds power was like 750w pretty much no matter what I did (trained or untrained).
It's the same with running, I can pretty much fill the distances in between 5k -hm on predicted pace, but I doubt I could run 600-800m at what now my 1500m pace comes out at. In fact, I know I can't. But , the good news as someone mentioned , threshold is easily trainable, it seems. On top of that, managing training loads etc happens to work really well (if done correctly) around these paces. So if you stick to it, I would say more people than not, will make the big gains long term.
Final thing, FWIW, I think the best gauge of talent was when you were a kid. Here in the UK we run cross country as almost a punishment in PE at school. I wasn't over weight as a kid, played football, but wasn't great in these races. Worth remembering I think those "races" are a good talent spotter, as nobody ran or trained (like nobody at that age here) and I used to finish just under halfway in the field, maybe 70 out of 120 would be a normal result for me. Anecdotal, but indicates I was never even remotely spotted or picked up like the faster kids were to maybe taken their running further and actually train. I wasn't fat or anything really when I started running 2.5 years ago and suddenly was a sub 20 runner on little training. It took a while to get there and even for a lot of months I was slow, doing 5k time trials in maybe 24 ish. It took me a while to get sub 20 and then just as long again to grind myself down further.
Anyway, good to see some life into this thread, still going strong!
I just thought I would post up whilst I have a chance today, as there has been a bit of renewed talk here this week and a few questions that have come up.
Firstly, would I be quicker if I did X instead of Y? That's difficult to answer, but again I feel that this comes back to to specificity is a very small factor in the bigger picture. If anyone is in the Strava group, Hard2Find has made an absolutely amazing spreadsheet where you can run models and prepare different training weeks and calculate what load it will bring. He is way smarter than me, myself him, jiggy and shirtboy started discussing something like this only a few days ago and its already made and into version 3 or 4. This won't necessarily answer what makes someone quicker, but is probably the best and most powerful planning tool I've seen made specifically for runners, maybe ever.
Which brings be onto a second point, about how I don't specifically feel sub threshold is anything magical, just how my experience from cycling shows it gives the best bang for your buck when it comes to CTL. Now, I have been speaking to a number of old friends who I used to communicate training ideas and sharing of data with when cycling recently, talking to them about training makeup and how it matches or indexes to overall CTL and performance. The difference seemed to range from virtually no difference for me (in terms of getting to a certain CTL was all that mattered, no matter how), to most other people over years of data, seeing some difference in training makeup to get to a certain CTL and what power output that resulted in. So the spread in all of our data, was from about 0% difference right up to 11%. One of the guys had a lot of data on swimmers he coached and found the same sort of thing. His suggested was that a reasonable training plan (he mentioned a Maglischo as a baseline) would probably sway around 5% up and down based on the worst conceivable way to train you could think of (totally unstructured) to the best bang for your buck on around 5-10 hours, which appeared in most cases to be sub threshold.
In case anyone is unclear on what I am saying here, the example might here my FTP might be 300w on a pretty normal looking textbook training schedule, for a CTL of lets say 80. A totally unstructured and just riding/running randomly makeup, might mean I need a bit more CTL, lets say 85, to reach 300w. But it might only take a CTL of maybe a bit less than 80, to reach 300w when doing sub threshold work. Now, one thing it also does appear, as the hours increase and you are less time crunched, the gap looks to probably close a bit and the options you also have of makeup of training, shrinks as well as you will be doing 80%+ or more very easy work, whereas I am sticking by to 75-25%. Why is this the case? who knows, probably all TSS isn't created equal, maybe a traditional training program for any of the aerobic sports has more vo2 work than you need and it tires you out for everything else. Maybe there is another reason.
So the big question is, how does looking at top amateur riders and a bunch of swimmers (which I must stress, is not pulled from scientific studies) transfer to running? Well as I have said before, I have seen the same play out in my own running training. Will it be the same for everyone? probably not, but if we had another data long term, I am sure we would see the patterns there. One of the main problems is runners don't seem to collect data about their own training accurately, which is the main issue. Even if they have years worth of data, they aren't updating thresholds, zones (sorry Coggan, I mean levels) so their actual daily TSS and overall CTL lacks accuracy.
Could you probably ice the cake better if you want to train for a specific event? Probably. If you absolutely only were going to do 5ks, should you try and find a balance of some sort of 5k pace or vo2 max work? Probably. Is it going to be the limiting factor for a hobby jogger? Probably not. The other good thing about training like this is you can pretty much be in peak shape for a range of events , 5k to HM I am within a few seconds of where I want to be.
Right, that's long enough on that, but it's something quite a few people have asked me about lately so thought I would spend some time going through some of where I am at on it.
A couple of other of small notes. I've come to the conclusion this is about 5-8.5 hours max here as the sweetspot, to running this sweetspot stuff, excuse the pun, on this singles approach. You could maybe do a touch less, but having thought about it more I don't think you will be getting the benefit . The third session is the key to creating that extra bit of load, week in, week out that all adds up in the end. Anything much less than 5 hours, realistically you are losing the benefit as it just doesn't give you enough hours for 3 sessions and to keep things fresh and sustainable.
Two other updates. No I don't run 400s anymore. They didn't create anymore or less lactate and they trash my legs for the next day more (I've dumped them for a while and still improving at the same linear rate in the 5k) and I've upped the rest to 2 mins on the 3200 because in the week in the route I run after work, there's a road I need to cross and it takes more than the 1 minute rest to get over it ha ha so literally no special reason. Same with doing 1600s not 2ks. No actual reason other than that I don't have to cross a road mid run. A bit random, but I saw these questions somewhere in the thread a while back and forgot to answer them!
P.S I'm not sure who made me guardian of the thread. There's other guys way smarter than me here. My only skill I think is learning quite quickly what works and what doesn't when it comes to training. If this has all helped anyone over the last 7-8 months, that's awesome. I'm under no illusions myself that I am as good as running as I was cycling, but I am still enjoying it and still improving. I turn 40 next month, fingers crossed I can make it to Sub 16 before then.
Alfie wrote:
Thanks for your post.
My only query, if you are finishing just under your LTHR, should it feel as easy as this?
I would have expected it to be getting towards the comfortably hard, at the end of each rep.
I can't speak for anyone else, but there's been some discussion on this lately on Strava as well. This is how I see it. The sessions are 4-6 for me on the basic RPE scale your Garmin gives you .
I had a 7/10 recently, that was a Saturday leading up to my 10k where I pushed the boat out a bit and finished in like a 3:10 or something like that? That was just to see what that pace felt like, as it was roughly the target for my 10k. I think that's the hardest session I've done in well over 18 months and it felt like any other session for the first 8 reps. So it shows you even 6 minutes pushing the boat out at the end can really change how a session feels.
Anyway, back to the point. I would never say it feels easy. But it doesn't ever feel hard. When I get to 6/10 on those days, I feel like I could easily do at least another 4-5km even, no problem. I've had days where it's felt 4/10 and in my head my feeling is "wow I could do all of that again!". It's usually more like a 5/10 or 6/10 though, even if the last rep when looking back after you might see you touched very close to LTHR.
7 for me is. I could definitely do another rep. Maybe one more rep on top of that if you offered me financial reqaed. When I did this the other week, I actually felt it for a good few days after and it was really in my legs for my long run the next day.
8/10 is I probably could do another rep if you paid me more than before and another after that maybe, if you held my family hostage (this is where I used to do most of my workouts 1.5+ years ago). But even with that jeopardy I don't like my families chances.
9/10 is a badly paced race where I probably ended up with too much in the tank, I think I've done one session of 8x800 a couple of years ago that sat here. I think that's my only ever training workout that hard and I genuinely thought I was going to die. 10/10 is something you will never do in running training and I don't think is possible. It's basically the end of any 5-10k I've ever done where I've got the pacing spot on. I just don't ever imagine I could push myself that hard running. (note I've done workouts on the bike that are probably 10/10, where it's way easier to fight through a brick wall)
I know it's not quite what you were asking, but feel it might add some context to the thread. Also, someone like Jiggy for instance, his perception due to climate might be totally different. It's all very personal I think who considers something easy and who considers something hard.
Secondly, just to state for the wider audience; I don't think there is inherently anything special about sub threshold. At all. I just think it's probably the easiest range to control, as well as the easiest to access or qualify in some way , along with seemingly fitting the various "load" models the best. The key being you can easily build more in, you should know where your fitness is, which will also lead to better performance.
I will however, probably die on the hill of saying until I've seen evidence otherwise, for the aerobically underdeveloped runner, this is probably as good as you are gonna get in terms of bang for your buck on 5+ hours a week (with the odd tweak here or there for individuality or how a good coach might adapt slightly). Once you get to maybe 8.5-9+, again there are better ways to train (doubted t at a lower intensity). Under 5 hours (apart from just starting out) I would probably just roll the dice and do something aggressive from a Daniel's book.
So that already takes out a large percentage of the population who could be doing this. Inside of that though, I do think as a cut and paste regime off the shelf, it's as likely as anything if not more so to give you success. I think, as you mention poster above, consistency is as much the key to this as any other single factor.
One other point of note, yes I did say there's probably a 10% swing or so in either direction. Guys much smarter than me when it came to looking at cycling data (and some swimming) for guys who had trained various ways over various seasons - found there was actually not a huge amount of difference between plan A versus plan B versus plan C. Say a 300w on a pretty standard cycling plan of 20 years ago might get you 300w. A totally unstructured plan might get you 270-280w and something that gave you best bang for your buck, over a potentially shorter but more condensed time period (sweetspot), might gain you 320-330w. Again though, this is for time limited guys - not elite level. FWIW my data was the most outlier, in that it was almost identical for me no matter what - and I did try a totally awful training plan of just riding 2.5-3 hours a day at zone 2 (but took way longer).
Is this going to be the case for running? Who knows. Runners are bad record keepers in terms of accurate data. Myself and Hard2find also talk about this most days and know that the original model TSS was built on probably has some flaws , which come down to expected power duration curves. Hard2find, if anyone, might find an alternative. If anyone can, it would be him (and to make it running specific).
The other thing I will mention is cross training. If you are going to cross train I would be pretty confident in doing this plan but across whatever method you are doing alongside running. What makeup that is in terms of balance, I don't know. But shirtboy has been doing something similar and he's basically not gotten worse at running - and he's barely a runner now (I don't think he will mind me saying that 😅). Following the same plan whilst injured, or something similar with lots of cycling sweetspot also probably is a smart thing to do. Jiggymeister came back quite quickly from injury and was pretty good quite quickly with a large TSS load from cycling.
So I would say the next natural progression of the thread is other people sharing not just their running experiences but also how or why maybe they have cross trained using the same basic principles.
training peaks for the win wrote:
CTL is just the average of your last 42 days training.
No this isn't true. I think this is where a lot of people are getting confused. It's a exponentially weighted average, about 90% over that time frame. But all the data you have ever put in, contributes to it, just the further you go back the less weight it carries.
It takes a long time, but eventually for the most part your CTL will just become your TSS average for the previous 42 days.
But imagine you started at zero, the way it works is let's say you did 100 TSS a day. After 42 days your CTL would be 63.7. It would take you 316 days to finally reach a rounded figure of 100 CTL. After that, your choices are do more intensity, do longer durations, or both. If you stick to 100 TSS at that point, in simplistic terms , then you have plataued.
I've mentioned before, this is why the second year I trained like this, the gains have been harder to get. You have to be creative and try and do more. But still, essentially every session ever still contributes, it's just the stuff i did 2 years ago is now minuscule in the calculation.
I will also add, it's probably only useful if you are trying to compare like for like. If you are really mixing up your training outside of what I am doing, rTSS probably isn't going to tell you the whole story anyway. The consistency of it (much like with power) seems to really work around the sub-threshold level. Of course, I have said before probably easy runs are over represented in rTSS. But again, assuming you roughly run them at the same % of intensity relative to your current fitness you input, it'll stay consistently over represented in time, so doesn't really matter if our intention is just to use it as a practical tool (which is all I care about). I'll happily leave the science to the much smarter guys than me.
It's likely why the graph I shared on Strava fit so neatly, in terms of load versus performance, because my sessions are still for the most part comparible in intensity going right back (with a few changes to sneak in extra load) but also a decent invease in overall training time.
In absolute simple terms , my daily average per session a year ago was 60 TSS per week and now it's 70. There's probably no real suprise that I'm fitter now, because I'm doing the same thing with a sprinkle of pushing the limits of sub threshold intensity, or just more or the same but longer. How you make up that increase is for you to work out, but that comes with experience if training like this.
Piocycling wrote:
Sirpoc with 3x5000m (about 3x15min) lately. Those were run at 3:17 pace which must be pretty close to his FTP!. Even assuming his 5k pace is 3:00 already then FTP would be 3:11 (Sirpoc mentioned he uses 94% of 5k power as FTP) so 3:17 is 97% of FTP. He used to run 3200s at this intensity. It's slowly becoming more threshold than subthreshold it seems to me!
I saw someone mention the power stuff I posted from ages ago. I would ignore that, by the middle of the thread I had given up on power (sadly) as it doesn't work how I need or would like it to. Or more to the point it is the absolute worst metric I had after I had 6+ months of data. Now I'm a couple of years in, I'm definitely confident power is useless, in my scenario. I'm not saying people won't find it useful, but it's not consistent enough across the board for me to be invested in it.
As for the longer workouts, they have been carefully designed so like the other workouts I am sitting a decent amount under LTHR for the majority and maybe finishing up around (but just under) LTHR.
First big session of these I dug the lactate meter back out, to give myself an idea of where I am at on these and I am pretty happy with the plan I have in place.
The pace or % of a race pace is largely irrelevant, it's the actual state I'm interested in. I'll probably never do enough of these for me to be confident of giving out a general guide for these extra long reps. But, it's a tad faster marathon pace. I also, suspect, because of my aerobic engine, it's probably tricky for people to replicate these sessions themselves like for like. I can definitely complete this at a paces faster to race paces, than I could even a year ago. I certainly wouldn't recommend or jump in on these.
Piocycling wrote:
Running power is proportional to pace though, right? There was a paper comparing power in W/kg to running speed in m/s and it was pretty close. I estimated your % of FTP for the repeats based on that, not on Stryd or w/e device available for measuring running power.
Btw, I have a question about lactate: do you have any experience or knowledge what happens when you go to too high lactate state too regularly? Is it going to be building fatigue of muscles making workouts difficult/impossible? If so can it last for days or is it easy to correct?
Power and pace don't really have much relationship, in my experience. It's good in the flat, with no wind. But the Garmin
wrist power is a mess and in the wind and the stryd doesn't make any sense. I can run in the wind and it'll give me 20-30w more for say a 10 min block because of how it overestimates power into the wind on the track (depite basically a total even effort). Nobody wants power to work probably more than me, but it's just too much of a headache for me to care about at this point.
It doesn't measure force. Until it does, it's just an algorithm really that is guesstimating a lot of things. If you run on a treadmill or in completely controlled conditions, it might work way better. I've never run on a treadmill in my life, so can't comment. I think a big issue is how windy it is where I am right on the sea and flat open spaces. The stryd really is comical with some of the stuff it comes up with.
In the early days I played around a lot with going right up to LT2 (if it exists, there's one to apart some debate lol) and beyond, testing on the meter to see what I could get away with. I spent a good number of weeks and months playing around with all combos before I settled on the amount of lactate I could generate and the pace proxys in place to replicate that (roughly) - and then feel OK to go again in 48 hours. None of this was done on a whim and a prayer, it was carefully planned out. But the big note, I only intended this for myself. I didn't intend, at any point to it blow up like this. Having said that, whilst some people have had to tweak things or start off with the paces slower, it's actually held up very well as a general one size fits all approach (obviously it's impossible to have a blanket approach for everyone).
In a microcosm, if I went deep past sub threshold the main impact was how much harder the next day easy run was and then carried over into the next workout day. Quite quickly, the hole gets dug and in simplistic terms it becomes unrealistic to then workout 3 times a week, for 2 years straight (not saying that is everyone's end goal , but that is pretty much what I have done). The Strava group has had a few people who have gone well beyond probably where they should on workout days , for whatever reason (deliberately or just making a mistake) and it never, ever ends well.
There's obviously a million ways to train. There might be a better one on 7 days a week and only an hour or so to dedicate to training in a day. But if there is, i'm yet to have tried it. I'm absolutely not the guardian of this system, despite what the internet seems to think. If there is another or better way to train and someone could show me that, I'll jump all over for it. After all I basically just stole this idea from my own training in another life as a cyclist, of which I just stole from others. All I've done really is lay it out or I guess communicate what I've done in a way people can interpret or understand. There's far smarter people than me in this thread who pick the bones out of the science of it.
stimulate dis wrote:
Someone said marathon pace is perfect sub threshold training. But won't the gap between, say, 5k and marathon pace become very big if you improve? How can, for example, 2:45 marathon pace (6:20 pace) prepare you to run a sub 17 (5:25 pace)?
Think of it like this. Your goal is to run 17 flat or just sneak under. You run 17:50. Nobody in the history of running failed like that, due to what they lacked being speedwork. Their limiter was their aerobic capacity is not yet up to scratch and should have worked on that, rather then killing themselves doing 12x400 or whatever things I see fellow 5k enthusiasts doing at my local track. That is a very basic example, but essentially the simplistic version of what is going on here.
It's much easier to push your ability up from below, until you run out of room to do so. Spoiler, I doubt most in this thread run enough to get to that point. The other as advantage is you are basically ready to just hop in a 5k-HM at literally any point.
If you are in this thread, you are a hobby jogger. We are in races that are just essentially glorified time trials. Everyone is for the most part doing their own thing. If you pace it correctly when training like this, the absolute last thing going through my head in the last 400m is me thinking in a 5k "oh wow I wish I had some of that top end speed right now".
Unless you are racing at a high level or really care about just 5ks, you are probably only giving up a handful of seconds at worst training like this. If you also consider the fact everyone is dying at the end of a race, this will probably counter that by keeping your strong and dying the least by the end.
There's a guy I race against sometimes. He has ridiculous raw speed naturally, or whatever you want to call it. He sat on me in a half once and I'm not joking, basically spirited off like he was usian bolt compared to me in the final stretch. Flip it my recent 10k I won. I am one of the slowest speed guys on the planet. But with not long to go, I pulled away from him with a tiny increase in pace. If he didn't know me, he would think he got out kicked by a monster. All that happened is he slowed down more and I sped up slightly - I was just aerobically stronger to maintain pace. That's basically all that is happening at the end of a race at this level, anyway.
A bit of a tangent, but I get questions like this a lot with people messaging me, scared, saying "BuT WhAt AbOuT SpEeD?!"
I'll post some more detailed thoughts back up at some point today if I get a chance, but no rest for me, back to work this morning and life goes on.
Hopefully everyone is happy that some questions have been answered as to "do you have to train like a marathoner to train for a marathon?". I'll talk a little bit about this "special block" as people have coined it when I get a chance. I took a look at what a classic marathon plan looked like for the mileage I was on or could get to back in January. For me, it would have finished me for real. I wouldn't have ran 2:24 off it. I'm not saying others won't, but I know I wouldn't have managed it off hobby hours. My best guess is I would have got injured.
A marathon is hard. But maybe not quite as hard as I was expecting. Nothing basically training wise helped for the last 25 mins. (I somehow didn't have any gels left at 30k, so that was a psychological blow but at that point I doubt made a difference).
But up until that last 7-8km point everything was nicely in control and just as I expected with all the planning going into it. Aside from the training, I assume a lot of failure is unrealistic goals and pacing. Again, this was to my advantage. I knew I should be able to run sub 2:25 on paper, was just a question of putting it together.
Probably at least a couple of hundred runners went nuts and just vanished up the road. It's so easy to do that, but I just ignored it all and relied on my watch. Feel is a total lie. I could have done the first 5k in 15:30 yesterday and it would have felt easy in a big group. But I'd have walking by 30-35k like I saw an insane amount of people doing (or at best swaying on their last legs jogging). Luckily even though there were hundreds up the road, I just started talking to people and asking if there was anyone looking for low-mid 2:20s which there was. So I figured they knew what they were doing and we got a smaller group together.
Really it's just like any race. If you get one thing wrong, it falls apart. Pacing, expectations, fuelling during and before etc. But it's exaggerated. Jogging in a 5k the damage might be 30 seconds, a marathon is scaled up to the point it gets nasty quick and you are into the minutes you need not just fingers, but your toenail-less toes to count.
MartyMonkey wrote:
Some questions to Sirpoc:
1. How did you feel the last three weeks of your marathon build, from the half onwards? Did you feel you were pushing more than your typical week(s)? How about the timing of this specific work coming much later in your marathon plan?
2. Was there anything you would change in a future marathon build?
I'll answer as I can. This will probably be easier than a write up anyway.
Last 3 weeks I found important. The 5x5k was the key workout. I knew if I could do that a fraction faster than goal pace , five days after the half, whilst the marathon wouldn't be easy I was almost certain I would hit my goal. I set 2:25 in January and figured as long as I didn't get injured, I had laid out a plan in place that would probably get me there. I figured I would probably run 31 flat in the 10k in late march and that would be the gateway to 2:25. When I ran 30:41, that again made me realise we were ahead of pace and goal peak load. Whilst it might not have looked fast, the 5k where I broke the course record at my local parkrun was probably my best performance along the way, it's a shocker of a course to run a good time and that made me realise on a good day breaking 15 is in play and again was a good sign.
The last special block or whatever we want to call it, was getting the last ounch out on tired legs and trying to add a fraction of specifity into the mix, but mainly to actually test what marathon pace should feel like. It was definitely pushing more than usual and the only time I probably felt training was harder. I think I marked a couple of workouts 7/10 which is unheard of. You probably absorb training load within 7-10 days. So that period was short, sharp and a touch of the specificity I usually hate, but not too late that the training wouldn't stick and not so hard a short nose dive taper wouldn't fix. The taper was about perfect, could even have made it shorter, I felt terrible for 3 days but the last mini workout on the Thursday I felt so ridiculously good. In fact I almost wish I had run the marathon that day, that's the best I've probably ever felt in two years.
I did a really long taper once on the bike as an experiment, it was a total mess. You can only exchange CTL for TSB and a performance boost for so long, the lower your overall load in my experience (and others I've shared data with), the less TSS you can cash in before you just actually feel like you've turned to stone. If I was doing 15+ hour weeks and my training had already reached dimishined returns, I would do a slower and more gradual taper. I could write so much more about this, I think it's part art part science and took me years in cycling to understand and get right.
Answer the second part. Yes I have maybe 1-2 things I would change. But that's pretty complicated and it's looking back in retrospect. I'll definitely so a full write up in time as well. I actually need to really analyse it in detail myself before I would 100% commit to putting my flag in the sand and nailing my colours to something.
From the January 10k, yes that was my cut off point - and I planned every single session up to the taper week,on January 1st this year, which is when I decided to do the marathon for definite. I think carried out every single run as intended. So I'm quite pleased with myself that first, I managed to stick to it no matter what anyone else thought, and secondly, it worked out probably a minute better than what I hoped.
I will say this, I looked at other marathon plans over Christmas time and thought "I just don't think this will work for me". I think I ran the best marathon I possibly could have run for my first attempt, on the hours I was willing to put in. The whole phrase that seems to follow me around is the original "best bang for buck" phrase I made a while back - well I think I got my money's worth out of this one. My main issue with the other plans I looked at, is I think too much emphasis was put into the long run. In my eyes, the best plan was to just run it super easy and replicate time on feet to goal time but not sacrifice the 3 workouts a week. Even at 2:25 long run , it's easy enough you can still workout 3 days, even with the stretching of the workouts and not feel beat up. This on hobby hours I think even for the marathon gives you the best of both worlds. Again it comes down to this, I just don't think scaling down what the absolute best pros do is the best approach.
I read the fantastic article John Davis wrote about Emile Cairess' training was for London last year and I honestly think something like that would put me in a body bag, even scaled down. In fact scaling it down, probably makes it not only worse, but harder.
I think the worst part was maybe doubting myself in the build up. I think when you see guys you know beating themselves up for London doing insane workouts or these crazy steady long runs, you think you just be doing something wrong. Especially when your goal is a good 10-15 mins faster and they do more mileage. But I kept thinking to myself I knew I would be fresh on race day, I knew I could handle the time on feet and all I had to do was put it all together and pace it which I know I can do. Again, there is so much more to this. Like so much more I could go on all day about pacing etc. but again it's part art, part science and takes a hell of a lot of understanding and skill to put into practice. Confidence as well to just ignore the madness going on around you in a marathon.
The mental side I don't think can be overlooked also in the days, weeks in the build up. One person who pulled me head out this was Hard2find who when I said I was worried I wouldn't break 2:25, as I had decided on by race week breaking 2:24 should be the target (missed by 8 seconds) as I would regret just playing it safe as things were ahead of where I thought , who said "I fail to understand how 2:25 would be a bad outcome here". That was probably the point I stopped worrying. I'm lucky to have made what I consider a few close friends from the mess that is this thread, in the end the only thing I was massively worried about was beating my own goal and not letting them down. The best advice I had day before was shirtboy telling me to go to the pub. In fact, as I was walking down the mall, jiggy from the thread messaged me telling me my time before I even realised what it was officially it was nice to have that support genuinely, as well from just people in general, including a guy from the thread/ Strava group within about 30 seconds of the finish who was a volunteer, shout-out to Matt for distracting me for a nice chat on the finish line who is a fan of the thread and in the Strava group, who at least distracted me for a minute or so from the fact I have no toenails left.