I have been running for the better part of 13 years now and from day one I have been a student of the sport. I don't remember exactly when it was, around age 13, I picked up my first running book at the library, Running to the Top by Arthur Lydiard. From then I never stopped learning about the sport of long distance running, over time picking up books by Martin & Coe, Pfitzinger & Douglas, Joe Vigil, Tim Noakes, Jack Daniels, Bill Rodgers, Rob de Castella, as well as articles online by Renato Canova and a plethora of articles on Peak Performance Online, and I am certain I am forgetting a ton of resources. In addition to reading I have talked to lots of people and learned from many coaches over the years, and equally as important if not more importantly I have learned through trial and error, testing the limits of my own body specifically. I will never go as far as saying I know all there is to know about long distance running, nor will I say that having a great deal of knowledge about yourself and the sport is better than having a very good coach, but I will say that being a student of the sport allows me to be confident in my training when I do not have a coach.
Over the years I have tried many different ways to train and always reverted back to running really long hard workouts and enormous amounts of volume, but rarely running really high intensity workouts, and so I am underdeveloped when it comes to 5 or 10k type 'speed.' I still believe and always will believe that to be able to run well in the marathon I have to run a lot of volume, however in the future it will be limited to specific periods because I really need to develop the faster component of training if I am to ever achieve my long term, even short term goals. This is actually somewhat contrary to the philosophy I have grown into over the years, where I believe you should work all systems at all times and run a large volume at the same time, but this idea assumes each component of training - VO2, LT, Long run, overall Volume - are at least somewhat equally developed.
The reason I have brought this up is because I have made a big step this past week from a mental standpoint if you will. With three weekends of 10k races, I have decided to take the opportunity to work on my 'speed' by cutting out my medium long run so that I am more fresh for the 10k races, and shortening up my Intervals to 1/2mile with 1:1 rest. By doing this I hope to more easily run a fast pace at Lactate threshold and Marathon Pace. Naturally you cannot expect much of a training effect in two weeks but I hope that the races and faster paced workouts will 'unlock,' if you will, speed that is buried by volume. It is difficult to explain, but I am confident it is what I need to do. And this is why I say it is a big step, because I have never had the confidence to come down from really big mileage. The reason this has come about at this time is because when I was in Toronto, Coach Hugh gave me a mileage cap so I didn't really have a choice, and subsequently started enjoying being fresh and running faster in all my runs. Now I am cutting back even more(from volume and strength) because I am confident I am more than strong enough for the marathon after doing a 30mile run at sub 6min/mi easily, 2days after running a hard half marathon. So now I have two high quality 10k races, with workouts to prime my legs for them, which will be, in my opinion, the best possible training stimuli to work my biggest weakness. It appears as tho I will be neglecting any specific marathon work however I will be modifying my long runs from being progression runs to running them at a base speed of 6min/mi and dropping down to 5:00-5:10min/mi for 3 long intervals(~10mi total) within the run to stimulate LT and simulate MP. Well this entry didn't really come out like I thought but I hope it was interesting!
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