Sept 15-Oct 15 "Daniel's Running Formula" Book Club (Page 2)

I really like your idea about the roll call, Steve. I think we should definitely start there. 

As for the structure-- I don't think it needs to be predefined per se. Let's just assign a block of reading and a date to be done by and then have an open discussion (questions, comments, follow up, personal experience etc.) 

Maybe we do this for the first few weeks and see how it goes?

But immediately, let's get going on roll call. Just write a little about yourselves per Steve's above requests.

My turn.  I've been running for about 35 years.  Ran my first marathon when I was 15.  Ran track and XC in high school.  Seriously got back into tri's about 5 years ago.  Struggled for several years with nagging injuries due to stupid training mistakes.  I'm on a stretch of about a year building base and just now starting to feel like upping the intensities of some of my workouts.

I am currently focusing on a marathon in three weeks (my 11th) but run lots of 5k's, HM, etc.  The last four years have each focused on a June HIM with plan starting in January.  Before the next training phase in January I want to make some big gains in my running ability.

I studied the first few chapters and have experienced a lot of this when I was younger.  Dusting off the cobwebs and hopefully have a few more glory days.  I look forward to learning more.

I have been running since 2009.  I did XC in school, ran track, but never any long distance.  I ran a marathon in 2010 and have since run about 3 HM as well as a couple HIM.  I was injured late last year/early this year, Achilles.  When I came back, I started out super slow, built super slow.  But ran 6 days a week, all Z2-ish.  By the time my half iron mid July, I had only gotten up to a 12.5km long run.  But, because of my consistency, I was able to run the 20km in just a few minutes slower than my open HM time.  Firm believer in base here!

I have read a good part of the book already, and to be honest, a lot of it is over my head, and over my current training ability.  I am injury prone despite my best efforts at smart training.  But I do find the discussion interesting and expect to learn a lot from all you runnin' types.

I am loving reading these roll call histories. 

I'm thinking about mine, but when I try to write it it sounds like more of an intro at an AA meeting or some sort of group therapy session--ruh roh.

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Wbayek--glad you'll be joing us :)

I think this is definitely a hard copy kinda book.  Lots of charts and tables.

This has helped explain the I-pace Intervals. I-pace works VO2. T-Pace works threshold. I tend to think more in terms of those for harder work as it greatly simplifies things. Be careful not to mix the efforts and the work/recovery patterns. In the link it explains the I-pace part. You're not going hard just to go hard, but trying to go at a specific effort to work a particular part of the aerobic system. In this case it's the performance at VO2. Notice in the Figures that the time at VO2max is called out specifically. That's what this type of intervals are targeting. You want to reach this point and hold it there.

While one can go longer than 5 minutes at a time at that pace, Daniels felt this was a good upper limit in order to fit in more repeats. Longer and each interval will take a lot out of you, thereby shortening the amount of work that can be done, possibly considerably. Injury is most definitely a concern, but it's not the only one and stopping just short of injury isn't really the goal. Cycling doesn't have the injury concern and we don't do these things indefinitely there either. It's the work/recovery balance. One could do more in one workout, but the recovery cost goes up. At some point the hole becomes too great to be worth any gains that might be achieved. And also with the type of work being done, one can not continue to go hard enough to stimulate the targeted area of the workout, even though one could continue to work at a level that feels quite hard.

C'mon Switch, let's hear it.  Not like you to hold back.  Inquiring minds want to know.

This is so ridiculous.  I have literally tried writing this five times now.  WTF?

Short version:

I'm naturally a sprinter, but I have been running long distances for >20 years.  I have never read a book about long distance running, had a coach, or really given it much thought.  I have done somewhere between 10-15 marathons (I really can't remember--is that weird?) with a prekid PR of 3:20.  I am just coming back to running now that I'm done having kids and am emerging from the baby cave.  I have one season of tris under my belt--one sprint, two olys and a HIM.  According to JD, my VDOT based off a 5K I did in May is ~45 (I think). I'm excited to learn how to run with a method to the madness.

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Long version:

I'm a sprinter who tries to do endurance sports.  I am actually a "gifted" sprinter and ran very competitively at an early age 10-12yo and burned out from the pressure of racing (National AAU level) 100s, 200s, 400s, 1 x 400 (anchor), 4 x 400s (anchor).  

I came back to running as a way to get time by myself, first in boarding school, and then in college (I went to a service academy for the first two years--not your typical college). 

I ran for lots of reasons, none of them were to improve my running or to compete in running.  I ran at one speed almost all of the time, which in retrospect, was threshold or just below--every run, every time.  I ran to be by myself, to have control, to process bad stuff that was happenning, to feel that burn because that burn made other stuff not hurt as much.  Running has been the cheapest and best form of therapy for me, and that's the only way I used it for years.  I didn't want to race because I still had race pressure hold over from my sprints as a kid.  I didn't want to train for anything because I really needed running to just serve the therapy function. 

I can still get into trouble with running because it still very much serves that function in my life.  Cycling doesn't do it.  Swimming doesn't do it.  Running does though, and it's a little bit like crack for me in that way, and I certainly abuse it.  I'm flirting with an overreaching period right now most certainly because I'm also dealing with some significant personal stress.  So there it is.

Do you ever have one of those times in your life when lots of things line up that make you feel like your on a path to figuring some big thing out--kismet, serendipity, something like that.  Yeah, OK, I'm kinda feeling that way about reading this book.

So I'm about 30 pages into the book and I'm loving it, mostly because, holy crap, have I been doing it wrong! Frick.  So I guess I'm loving it because it makes a lot of sense.  I'm loving it because there's a lot of science and physiology (I'm a scientist, so I dig that).  I'm loving it because I believe now, more than ever, that I have significant room for improvement. 

RIGHT ON.

Anybody else have any initial response, thoughts or questions?

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Salty, I saw your altitude question the other day and grabbed some popcorn for the responses, but saw you didn't get many.  Then I saw the JD section on altitude early in the book.  I had no idea that the benefits of training at altitude could last for years.  Woah. 

So when are you gonna go somewhere high for a month?

I had an initial response to this that was similar.  I've been working really hard, even doing core which I've always hated and considering changes to my diet, and while I've had formal coaching/training when I was young I didn't have to think too much just do what I was told.  Now, since I have no coach I have to figure stuff out for myself.

What I have read so far makes so much sense and is giving me a great foundation for discussion with my local runner friends.  I can also see very clearly many of my mistakes and why I made them over the last five years.  Most of my miles were way too fast.  No wonder I was always injured.  To be honest I never really believed that easy miles would make me fast.  What is so important is learning (in a convincing fashion) that certain physiological adaptions occur at an easy pace just as well as fast.  I am still having trouble slowing down but I am trying and this allows me to run more miles and be fresher for the occasional quality work out.

I also have not really done tempo runs correctly.  Again, understanding the purpose of this type of workout has helped me correctly lay out the pace and duration of this.  Intervals too.  I did my first real quality workouts over the past couple of weeks and while they were harder than what I was doing they will provide greatly more benefit.  The VDOT charts were a great tool to establish pace for these workouts.

I'll probably reread the chapters I've been through before moving on.  It is helpful to read, apply what you've read, and then go back with greater perspective to really let it sink in. 

Good stuff.  I managed to get through a few months of training against the intent of JD, so I guess the answer is that I have a faster race in me, and I need to learn how to suffer better.  Seeing the runners that beat me it definitely feels like they're prepared to endure a lot more than me.  Hopefully my marathon training will make me better at that.

And for the roll call (warning, this can be lengthy):

I played football and ran track in high school. In track I ran mile, 400, and mile relay.  My best mile was a 4:50, but I could run a 50 second quarter.  I could have probably been faster in the mile if my coach (who was my football coach) knew more about running. 

In college I gained about 45 pounds (yeah....), which was a product of engineering school, Little Ceasars, and being too tired to workout anymore.  I'm 5'7, and I weighed 190 at graduation.  

Once I started working, I got tired of telling people how I used to be an athletic guy.  I felt like I was a shadow of my former self.  One day I found myself at a crossroads.  I was getting dressed for work, and noticed that my size belt was almost too small.  I told myself I had a choice: either buy a new belt and accept that you're going to get bigger, or do pack some running clothes and do something about this once and for all.

We had showers at my first job, so I was able to run during lunch.  That day I ran the hardest 3 miles of my life.  I ran, then I jogged, then I walked, then tried to jog some more, and spent most of my lunch break getting back.  I then got so sore that I nearly gave up again.  I decided I needed an ambitious goal to keep me accountable, so I signed up for a half marathon.  I trained for months and finished the half with a time of 2:32.  It was one of the hardest races I've done.  I lost 10 pounds in the 4 months I spent getting ready for it, which I felt wasn't fast enough at all.  

One day at work a friend of mine asked me to drop him off at a bike shop to pick up his hybrid that he needed work on.  He lived a mile away from the shop, so he wanted to just ride his bike home that day.  When we got there the place was packed!  I had to go inside to see what was going on.  It was like a party in there!  People were chatting and there was food and music playing.  I asked someone in the shop what was going on, and they said it was packet pickup for the Heatwave triathlon (half mile swim, 40k bike, 10k run).  I thought to myself "one day, I'm going to do that race!".  

Luck would have it a month later there was an info session about a beginner tri training group that one our running stores was putting on.  It was training for a sprint.  Holy crap did my body react to that training.  I lost 20 pounds within 3 months getting ready for the sprint tri the group was training for.  I raced Heatwave two weeks after that, and have been racing since (just finished my 4th tri season).

Me:

I'm actually relatively new to all of this running stuff. I've been running about 2.5 years now. 

I was a pole-vaulter in High School and played some hockey in college.

After college, and even during, I gained weight and become pretty inactive just trying to figure life out. I probably gained 35 lbs or so (Right there with ya Matt ) I was also really depressed and I just seemed to have all this negative energy wound up inside. I started working out, without much effort or direction. A friend of mine talked me into signing up for a triathlon. I did that (which also brought me to BT) and found that I really liked the running part. I definitely didn't do things correctly in the beginning. In 2011 I  randomly won entry into a HM and ran it the next day. With minimal training I ran something like a 1:42 so, I decided to run a marathon. The running was/is totally my therapy. I love doing it. I don't know what changed, because I used to dread running. Now, it quite simply makes me a better person.

I've decided I really like the marathon distance and have made some pretty big long term goals. In the meantime I have decided to do things better. I joined a competitive running club and read everything I could get my hands on, including "Running Formula." I'm doing more periodization, planning to run track in the summers for speed, cross country for strength in the fall, build base and ramp into the marathon in the spring. The running club I am part of definitely runs the practices using his principles, so it is a double win.

My PRs are:

5K 19:12

10K 40:50

HM 1:27:26

Marathon 3:13:16

Now that I have some nice and easy miles under my belt, I am ready to start leaning into all of this and pushing hard. I want to understand exactly what I am doing and why. I know for a fact "Running Formula" will help with that but I think being able to discuss it with all of you fine folks will really drive it home.

What I really like about JD is that it provides an excellent foundation for a program, giving all the science and technical data to make good decisions. 

Additionally, I know there is an art to running and that is the part that I am good at. I am really looking forward to blending the two.

I need to re-read his altitude section. I was really disappointed with the responses here.

I'm not getting all crazy trying to live high and train low or anything. I just owe my parents a visit (they live near Mammoth at like 7,500' )and thought if I had the facts straight, I could time it appropriately for my Boston training.

I'll reread this section and ask you all questions.