P&D Spring Marathon 2019

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  • Good luck this weekends racers, SQ, Spoons, Jools and Chicksta, anyone else ?

    Look forward to hearing about the Arc Millsy, it sounds very tough from what little I know about it.  Yep, all being well I’ll be at SDW100.

    Exciting news on the P&D new edition Spoons and when the resident 100mpw ‘er (and others) cautions against over doing it, I listen.😁


  • AWCAWC ✭✭✭
    edited January 2019
    Blimey lots of good stuff going on here - glad to see people are considering the manmakers! I would have thought its right up Jools' street doing about 50 of these before a parkrun flat out effort followed by an afternoon of XC
    FBT: keep up those LTs and sub 3 is on (if you save up the £200 for the 4%'s)
    Millsy: I'm really excited about the SDW100 - hopefully an injury free 4 and a bit months now and it should be a good day. Thats a very fast 10km at Stubby as well.
    Joe: sounds like a lovely break - I love the scenery of the Cotswolds. The sort of place you can just wander about aimlessly taking it all in. Some good miles being clocked up too
    Spoons: interesting we are gonna get a 3rd edition. Not sure if the new stuff will amount to much or whether I can be bothered reading it all again!
    Just a 6 miler with a few hill sprints and strides at lunch today
  • The thread is really motoring along now. Great ultraing (my phone hasn’t tried to correct that, so I’m claiming it as a word) AWC and Macca. Congrats to everyone else who raced in the last week, apologies you don’t get individual shoutouts.

    Lots of great training as well by the looks. Although every time I see comments along the lines of ‘nice easy 10 at 6:xx per mile’ I have a mini panic and have to check that person’s target time. So thanks Jooligan for updating and bumping that up 🙂

    Everyone who is nursing injuries, I hope you’re back to full fitness soon.

    HR training - I have all the HR zones recommended by P&D for each run type saved in my phone to refer to before a session. For recovery runs my only aim is to keep below the 76% HR number. For other run types I use the HR range in conjunction with the pace range. I’ll make sure I’m at least within the bottom end of the range for both and depending how my legs feel I might decide to push a bit harder but won’t go over the top of the HR range.

    I’ve had a decent 4 days of training so far this week, although the definite high point is I ran twice before work (only 3.5 miles each, but I am the worst morning person so this is a win). I swapped the LT on Tuesday for strides after the advice here and I’m going to do an all out parkrun tomorrow. Then for the half marathon I asked about, I’m going to race Wokingham all out and see how I feel for the 20 with 14 @ MP the weekend after. Thanks to everyone who replied to my 2 questions previously, it’s really helpful to get advice from people with as much marathon training experience as this group has.
  • Looks like I'll be bumping in Jools at Fire Service College parkrun tomorrow (it's a bit of a mouthful, right?). Going to give a whirl and see what kind of shape I'm in, although not sure how fast a course it is. 
  • Interesting on people using HR.

    If I am getting fitter (so as training progresses hopefully) should my heart rate drop slightly for the same intensity  / pace run? EG at 7min miles should my current 168bpm drop slightly as I get fitter in a few weeks to say 164bpm?

    as Hyde park runner said it is good at keeping the pace down to aerobic rate for recovery runs. I like the recovery time it suggests as well (said 3 days after 10m LT run)

    Jools - I agree you have to run through mild pain (maybe back off) as if you stop it just comes back worse when you start again

  • FBT my HM PB (1:24:27) was run at 159bpm & Wrexham (1:28:05) the following week was at 150bpm. My previous HM PB (1:27:59) was set in 2017 with a HR of 163bpm. This improvement was achieved by running below 136bpm all week then hitting races/parkrun hard at the w/e. In the past I ran about 40-50s/mile quicker on average during training but had plateaued.
  • HydeparkrunnerHydeparkrunner ✭✭✭
    edited January 2019
    FBT - I’ll start off by saying I’m not a doctor, my knowledge comes from P&D, fitness articles and googling mainly. But my understanding is what we’re aiming to do in marathon training is improve running economy, which is the amount of oxygen the body needs to run at a certain speed. Physiologically I think this happens many ways, like eliminating unnecessary motions in your running style, recruiting fast twitch muscles to act like slow twitch muscle fibres, improving the efficiency of mitochondria (‘might not be 100% correct, it’s a while since I read up on that one) etc. Therefore if the body is using less oxygen to run 7mm, the heart needs to beat less quickly to get that to the muscles. Aerobic exercise also has the effect of improving heart stroke volume, the amount of blood pumped from each heartbeat, so another factor which would lower your heart rate.
  • TRTR ✭✭✭
    There's a Hadd article thats a good read re HR training  (Hadd isnt all slow running either), it talks about learning to squeeze your toothpaste tube from the bottom.
  • TRTR ✭✭✭
    Made a better fist of the P and D  20%,10% long run today, with 5 av 8.00, 5 av 7.57, 5 av 7.34, 5 av 7.01, 1 easy for 21 in total.
    Much better control, hammys were moaning by the end but i guess thats the point.
  • HA77HA77 ✭✭✭
    edited January 2019
    That's a solid LR TR. Nice one. I'm sure the moaning hammys just means they'll be stronger for next time.

    Just looked at yesterday's long run on strava again and I was lying when I said, I was mostly ticking along at about 6:40, more like 6:40 max.
  • Just a couple of cool kids hanging out this morning. Unfortunately Jools brought his mate who beat me in a sprint finish  :d 

  • RamjetRamjet ✭✭✭
    The Boys in Black are Back!

    Loads to catch up on but...

    Great 20 miler HA

    Nice tempo run George. It is quite rare for those LT miles to feel good!

    Sounds promising Spoons - good luck. I'll definitely be getting that book. As a "master" runner I need all the advice I can get!

    Awesome long run TR.

    Easy 10 yesterday. Recovery 5 today. Four Villages HM tomorrow. Conditions look very good (cold but dry and still.) I'll see if I can dip under 1:25 again.
  • chickstachicksta ✭✭✭
    edited January 2019
    Good luck for tomorrow, Ramjet

    Nice pic, boys and very impressive hair, Jools ;)

    FBT: Your HR zones stay the same but as you get fitter you run faster for the same effort. And I agree with the others. Marathon training is about improving that aerobic engine which is done by running in the lower HR zones with just the occasional LT and VO2 max sesh. There is a chapter about HR training in the P&D book.

    Excellent 21 miler TR.

    My P&L edition does already have a chapter for masters athletes. The gist seems to be that we need more recovery after hard sessions as we age. You have to find the balance between the demands of the sport and the limitations of your body. Definitely resonates with me. They also portray a couple of impressive masters athletes. I'm still going to buy the new P&D too though :)

    Never made it to parkrun as our roads were too slippery and I didn't fancy ending up in a ditch. Hopefully conditions for tomorrow's race are just cold, not icy.
  • HA77HA77 ✭✭✭
    Good luck in the half tomorrow Ramjet, also to Spoon and SQ and anyone else racing.

    Nice pic. I can't help thinking it's Joe and a representation of Joe after he's been stuck on a desert island for 15 years with no access to a razor.
  • HA77 said:
    Good luck in the half tomorrow Ramjet, also to Spoon and SQ and anyone else racing.

    Nice pic. I can't help thinking it's Joe and a representation of Joe after he's been stuck on a desert island for 15 years with no access to a razor.
    :D


    My race was a bit shit. A little over a minute faster than last time (1:35:54) but it was hard. We had freezing fog which always plays havoc with my asthma. So today was never going to be pretty. Lethal patches of ice added to the fun. Saw a couple hit the deck and nearly fell over twice myself. Ouch. Laps were 24:24, 23:44, 23:35 and 24:09. Had nothing in me to carry on the negative splits as I failed to get air into those lungs. Legs could have gone faster but rest of body said no. It was a lonely race too. Last time I had competition. Not so today. The woman in front was over a minute ahead and the next one over 2 mins behind. Deffo had more fun last time. Anyway, I beat my December time so I've got to be happy. Too bad I wasn't even 1st F50 today. The woman in front (who ran faster than me in the two preceding races too) must turn 50 this year as she's now listed in my age category. Must try harder ;)

    Hope the other racers fared better :)
  • Good 3 laps Chicksta & the 4th wasn’t bad.
    I had a disappointing race as I couldn’t hold pace. 39:50 but with near perfect conditions I should have been able to go quicker. Halfway in 19:3x. HR was never above 94%. Woke with a sore throat yesterday so maybe I’m slightly under the weather or possibly I ran a little too fast in training this week. 
  • Will catch up properly later, but a quick +1 for the Nikes. 54s PB at the LF5 today! 28:24 at the end of a 75M week  B)
  • RamjetRamjet ✭✭✭
    That’s amazing SQ! Well done. Might have to try some VFs!

    Well done on toughening that out Chicksta. Sounds like your time was good and no doubt a great workout.

    Bad luck Jooligan. You can’t have your best legs every race. You’ll be back stronger.

    So-so race for me. Started off well, died a bit during the hills in the middle and then finished strong in the downhill final miles for 1:25:51. Not sure what to make of that as conditions were perfect. My legs felt a bit heavy up the hills so maybe I wasn’t fully tapered.
  • SQ: Absolutely mind-blowing PB on untapered legs :+1:

    Not too far off Ramjet. Hills in the middle are a stinker :(

    Hope you're not coming down with man flu, Jools. I couldn't even get my HR near LT effort today which was a bit annoying. Guess minus 5 is not the ideal temperature for a hard effort :D
  • TRTR ✭✭✭
    edited January 2019
    Ramjet - how does 1.25 compar for you. You did 20m friday so were hardly tapered?
    Chick - those splits look decent to me.

    Jools - its difficult to push it over 10k untapered, even if conditions are ideal, it doesnt mean you will run to your potential.

    SQ - good for you, bodes well.

    6m easy for me today. 12 weeks to go.
  • Jools - hard luck today mate, sounds like it wasn't your day. I think going in with slightly fresher legs would've brought a good result, but it's all good training. 

    Chick - don't beat yourself up too much, not much you can do with the fog. Hard to push as well not having others around you to race. 

    SQ - huge PB over 5 miles. Awesome. I wouldn't attribute it all to the VF's though - give yourself some credit!

    Ramjet - Decent showing there. A mate from Chorlton Runners finished just 20 secs ahead of you, not sure if you were running with him at any point.

    As you can see from the snap above, met up with Jools in the Cotswolds for parkrun on Saturday. It was a fairly fast course, but overnight rain had left it pretty muddy and slippery. 3 lap jobby, from the off it was just me and Jools' mate, who quickly built a 20 metre gap. 

    Gap stayed the same until the start of the last lap, where he suddenly started to come back to me so I pushed hard to close it. Took the lead with half a lap to go, but with 500m to go he kicked hard and I couldn't stay with him. 

    Ended up with 19:03, but we were all in agreement that the course was slightly long, and my HR was the highest I've seen it in ages so I knew it was a solid effort. Great to see Katie back run as well, although still having trouble with her foot.

    10 miles easy arounds the Cotswolds this morning. Beautiful. 
  • JooliganJooligan ✭✭✭
    edited January 2019
    Top result SQ. A lot of those orange shoes in evidence at this morning’s Speedway 10K including the 2 women who passed me about 4M in.
    Decent result Ramjet after a big week.
    Obviously didn’t work hard enough this morning as went out for an MLR this afternoon on the hilly forest trails. Kept the effort easy & legs felt fine.
  • HA77HA77 ✭✭✭
    Great one SQ. Big PB, untapered. Agree with Joe, take same credit, you've been super consistent for a couple of  years now so not surprising that PBs are coming. 

    Jools, Ramjet, chicksta - good work on toughing it out. Can't read too much into an untapered race in January when you're aiming to peak in April. chicksta - Sounds like the field and conditions weren't conducive to a fast race anyway, good pacing though.

    Joe - Saw that 10 mile run on strava and it went past the place we're staying in Feb. Might have to try a similar route. Nice pr effort.

    Another good 70 mile week for me last week. Managed ~8 mile hilly, offroad tempo this morning, didn't push too hard though, just a good effort up the hills and steady down. I'm planning on doing something simlar next week, before switching to a flatter road route for tempos, trying to start hit a good rhythm. Disappointed to miss XC yesterday but with my wife working I was on kid duty - a good day out in the sun at least. 
  • Jools / Ramjet / chicksta - Nice racing early in the season!
    SQ - Superb PB, like others have said, it'll be your training not the shoes!
    18 miler on Saturday, but struggled and never really felt comfortable, but my longest run in a while. 90 minutes (24 miles) on the bike on Sunday followed by a 7 mile run in the Nikes, chucked in a LT mile to finish off (6:32) a 50 mile week.
  • Solid 10K there Millsy and sounds like you’ll have a decent base to begin marathon training from. Good luck for the Arc 50.

    Well done on the early runs Hydeparkrunner. When I first started running in the mornings I really struggled - I was not a morning person and the effort would feel much higher in the morning. After a while I got used to it though, and now I’m the opposite and don’t like doing anything longer than a recovery run in the evening! Sounds like a sensible approach to your upcoming races.

    FBT yes you’ll find as you get fitter the heart rate needed for a given pace will come down. Obviously there will be various factors (weather, tiredness, illness, stress, etc) that will impact individual runs, so it’s best to look at an average picture rather than worry about each individual run. Although that’s easier said than done sometimes!

    Nice long run TR.

    Great photo Joe and Jooligan

    Sorry you had a tough half chicksta, sounds like tough conditions though so don’t beat yourself up too much.

    Bad luck Jooligan, the bug could well have impacted you. 

    Congrats again SQ. Great stuff after a big week. Agree with HA and Joe, don’t let the shoes take all the credit. You’ve been very consistent since Abbo and that’s now being rewarded. Go type your time in to the Daniels calculator and see what marathon time it predicts :)

    At least you finished strongly Ramjet

    Sounds like a good week of training HA

    I often find the first big long run after a break tough Steve, I think it takes a little while to get in to the groove of them.

    I managed to sneak under 30 minutes at the Linda Franks 5, with 29:53. Nice consistent splits - 6 min/mi for the first four, then gradually ramped it up a little for a 5:47 final mile. Suspect I might have had a tiny bit more in me, but I was feeling cautious and not massively confident after a rocky week, so pretty pleased overall. 

    Happily the achilles was fine throughout, so much so that I joined SQ for an extended 5.5 mile warm-down afterwards. Seems all ok today, so hopefully my caution and the swift physio attention caught it before it became anything serious. All being well I can get right back in to things now, but will take it one day at a time and ease off if needs be.

  • AWCAWC ✭✭✭
    SQ: great PB there with no tapering. Big chunk off

    Steve: good job on the 18 miler. Takes a while for those to feel comfortable again

    HA: good mileage at this stage

    Jools & Joe: brilliant pic!

    Just a 12mi trail run for me at the weekend. Will try some LT and fartleks this week I think as my 12w P&D plan doesn't start till mid Feb. I feel the one thing a 12w plan is lacking is the gradual LT build up from 4mi to 7mi so I'll factor that in I think.
  • Well done Spoons.
    Sounds like your fitness is back Steve even if the endurance hasn't quite caught up. Obviously you recovered fine from Saturday if you can chuck an LT mile in at the end of Sunday's activities.
    So I'm confused after the weekend.
    Thursday I ran a progressive 10K on the TM 8 m/m up to MP but HR was higher than I would expect. Friday I struggled with my usual weights routine in the gym then couldn't give either parkrun or the 10K full beans as HR wouldn't go any higher than 93%. I put the parkrun down to conflict of interest but Sunday ruled out that hypothesis. My 10M after lunch was easy & felt it. Legs were fine if a little sore afterwards but I did some stretching & rolling whilst watching telly.
    I then had almost no sleep last night - read late (2am) then couldn't drop off.
    Today I did my usual weights routine & was able to do twice as many reps per set as Friday!!
    Any thoughts?

  • Interesting comments there on HR and fitness thanks people - as I suspected I should hopefully see my HR drop as fitness improves and as Jools mentions need to run more runs a lower aerobic rate.

    16.5 miles at the weekend over hills, again my HR was 155-170bpm. foot hurts a bit so backing off for a day or 2

    Great picture joe / Jools

    SQ - awesome PB - and nice sub 30 spoons (even better about the achilles)

  • george_george_ ✭✭✭
    SQ and Spoon-Great 5 milers. SQ-the predictors put your Mara time at 2.44 so no excuse not to break 2.50!

    Joe/Jools-Nice parkrun and pic.

    Ramjet-Decent half and with a proper taper I'm sure you'll be near PB shape.

    FBT-Heart rate is an interesting one and some people swear by the maffetone method for example. Some really good runners work purely off heart rate to work out their marathon pace. I have some issues with it simply because a wrist based one can be inaccurate, so I work off the rather unscientific 'feel' of a run

    Decent 20 miler around Hyde Park yesterday, in absolutely perfect running conditions. 6 degrees, still and sunny.

    A rare day off running today with just a few core exercises in the gym this morning
  • Afternoon all

    Jooligan 10p is a bargain for such quality literature! Tough one on the racing results, but we all have days like that. I’d say don’t overthink it. See it as a good week of training banked, that will no doubt have a positive effect come A race(s). With good conditions you’ll definitely trouble you PB at Wokingham and give sub-3 the best bash yet. You’ll have the long-distance conditioning in the bag, and hopefully another sub 1:25 to your name.

    Good going on the early morning running, HPR. I’ve learnt to love it! Nothing better on a summer’s morning. I’d agree with the general advice that racing a half and trying 20 with 14 at MP may be too much on consecutive weekends, but see how you feel nearer the time.

    Nice to see a forum photo jools and Joe. Well done on the parkrun and looked a nice Cotswolds route. I’ll head over to the Fire College sometime if you both recommend it. The 10k in Bourton on the Water is lightening fast, although sold out for 2019.

    Good progression on the long run, TR. I like how the P&D long runs, without MP sections, are still solid workouts. Something I am focusing on more this time round. Too early for number of weeks to go countdown!

    Hard luck, chicksta. All good training. Ditto for Ramjet.

    That’s a great week from you, HA. Which races have you got pencilled in?

    Well done, Steve. You’ve built back up superbly.

    Good long run, George.

     

    Thank you for the nice words of congratulations, still delighted with yesterday’s PB. A brief race report for the Linda Franks 5M:

    It is organised by own club, Almost Athletes. Superbly slick and well-communicated. Friendly volunteers and plentiful marshals. Puts a recent local race to shame really. A shocker of a night’s sleep dealing with sick (not my own) from 3:30am, meant I was getting the excuses in as I teamed up with spoons for a warm up. Took a pretty relaxed approach, knowing it was coming at the end of a 75M week, so even extended the warm up a bit – 3.3M easy with a few strides and a couple of strides. This relaxed mental approach and zero self-imposed pressure probably helped.

    Went reasonably hard from the gun, knowing at least that it was a short race, so any spectacular blow up would be short-lived. Managed to settle into a nice little group, enjoying the perfect weather. 3-4C, very little wind. First mile came in at 5:49 which was PB pace (set in the same race last year). Second mile was faster 5:36 and mentally I felt good. Before I knew it, we were on the second lap with only a couple of miles to go. Had a look at the total time on the mile 4 marker, and realised sub 29:00 was on. Got overtaken by a couple in the last 400m, but still managed to increase my speed. Amusingly, one of the overtakers once my neighbour, so I can’t even claim to the fastest time from my road… Pushed hard to finish in 28:24, a 56s PB. Really delighted, especially as it was so unexpected.

    Wanted to get to 14M for the day (to replace a MLR from midweek) so enjoyed an extended warm down. I put on my NB Zantes for this and felt a real difference. Much more ‘feel’ for the ground than the Vaporflys, but certainly less of a cushioned ride. I hope that yesterday’s good result can act as good inspiration for consistent and sensible training, and steering clear of all the biscuits.

    This morning I ‘enjoyed’ a lie in until 4:30 before cleaning up sick… So, no recovery yet. Was supposed to be the first double of the plan. Hope to get out later if possible, then stick the shorter recovery in somewhere else in the week. Legs feeling remarkably un-battered today, certainly compared to wearing minimal race flats. But I will still knock tomorrow’s 5M at LT on the head and stick in some strides or similar instead.


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