- 165-by-cross and keep it there
- run consistent mileage. its hard to say exactly what i should be doing, but I think building to mid 70's by the second or third week in June seems reasonable. Once it gets there my goal is to keep it there (and possibly build into the 80s depending upon how my body responds) with the exception of planned down weeks
- abs 4 times a week
- sub 28@ clamfest, sub34 b2b
now for something slightly creepier: a few days ago, after i had taken a day off (oops) i went to bed and had a dream where ethan called me out for not running. so go run. ethan is always watching. even when even when he's a few states away
I like your anxiousness to be up at big mileage soon, but I don't know if it's a good idea to reach a plateau in both volume and intensity at any point during the year. I had a whole post put together, but then hit the back button and lost it. FML. Long story short...
ReplyDeleteIf you build consistently, you can reach 90 mpw from your current 40 by Alumni by increasing by just under 7% per week. And that's including 3 down weeks. Even at 10% a week, you'll be at 70 in a month and a half. I say this because I haven't found if very helpful to struggle to reach a certain mileage early in the summer then staying there for the rest of the year pretty much. If you get to 75 in 4 weeks and stay within 10 miles of that every week from July 1st to October 1st, that's a very long time. I think it makes sense to progress to August 1st and still have some place to go from there, like
June - 40 to 60
July - 60 to 75
August - 75 to 80
September - 80 to 85
October - 85, 75, 65, 55.
I suppose it would still be ok to progressively add training stimulus (up tempo, tempo, then track work) while maintaining your mileage pretty much constant, but holding both mileage and intensity constant for that long brings along the possibility of burn out.
just food for thought.
I agree that one's body constantly needs new stimuli, but it would be more beneficial for that to come in the form of more intensity via tempos, uptempos, and hills. If Hutch built mileage more slowly solely for the purpose of adding a new stimulus to his training, he would be less fit come xc. Why should he average 50 miles a week for all of June? That is nothing. It would be more beneficial to average 75 miles a week throughout that timeframe, barring injury, and he has already had awhile since track to build his mileage. Running 75 miles a week for 12 weeks would make him more fit than building up to that slowly and running 75 miles a week for only 4 weeks. Averaging 75 miles a week> averaging 65 miles a week, if the intensity in both is equal. I'd say running consistent "high" mileage throughout the summer while adding intensity is better. Obviously, the best of both worlds is to build mileage while simultaneously slowly adding intensity. Hitting a certain mileage for a week or two is not the goal, it's getting in consistent mileage throughout an extended period of time, and 50 miles a week is nothing. Maybe your best bet is to get comfortable running 75 miles a week, and then like Jeff says in his post try to build that up to 80-85 by August or September.
ReplyDeleteI guess my main point is that I agree with Jeff in that you should add new stimuli and build your mileage, but you should not do it so slowly. For example, average 70 miles in June, but as you get comfortable with the mileage, build into the 80s if it feels good by the end of August (simultaneously adding workouts).
ReplyDeletethat's a good way of saying it. i know 50 is nothing, and no, you shouldn't be averaging 50 throughout june. Running 70 through june starting in 10 days may be on the right track, maybe a smidge aggressive. What about maybe 65, 65, 70, 75, 60 with almost entirely easy running, nothing much under 6:45-7:00 with the exception of an impromptu uptempo when you're feeling particularly good. Then by july, you're ready to go back to a consistent 75 a week but add a tempo run every 7-10 days and throw in an up tempo when you can't help it. Down week, then 75 or 80 through August with a fairly scheduled uptempo, tempo, and long run (or any workouts we have by then) every 2.5 days or so. that would look something like
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Easy
Easy
Uptempo
Easy
Tempo
Easy
similar to how we do Sunday Tuesday Friday during the year on off-weekends.
Does that sound right?
yeah thanks for the thoughts guys. ideally i don't want to plateau out and run 70s the rest of my life. once i get there I figure i'll give my body a few weeks to adjust to the new load and then hopefully push more. as for adding in uptempos and quicker running, i'm not too concerned with having to consciously work on those. I find that in summer I usually end up hammering most of my runs anyway. if anything i think i should try to slow down some of my runs so that my body can recover
ReplyDeleteThat's called Maine Syndrome. Rod had it, too. What else are you gonna do up there besides hammer when you're bored out of your gourd?
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