Memorial Hermann Ironman Texas 2012 : Official Thread

Champion

10471

Dallas, TX

Subject: RE: Memorial Hermann Ironman Texas 2012 : Official Thread

GMAN 19030 - 2011-10-28 6:20 PM

I'd certainly agree with that and 3 hours isn't WAY more than 2.5 hours. Nevertheless, I think designing a plan that caters to distance has the *potential* to be negligent depending on the abilities of the athlete.

Let's say the athlete runs 12 or 13 minute miles and you want them to run 18 miles... that's nearly 4 hours of running. I don't know about you but I wouldn't want to long run for 4 hours every week. That would be the equivalent of running a marathon (or more) every week for me. My body would give up after a couple of weeks of that. Recovery would quickly become an issue and risk of injury would skyrocket. I'm a firm believer that time is what kills you, not the mileage. Your body doesn't really care that you ran xx # of miles. Your body cares that you ran for xx amount of time. All that said, why do we expect slower folks to spend that much time running? If faster folks who are arguably in better shape and probably recover better don't run 3.5 or 4 or 4.5 hours in training, don't you think it's a bit over the top to ask that of people who aren't as fast or recover as well or might be older or might be heavier or whatever the case might be? Let's leave pro triathletes out of this discussion for obvious reasons of genetics and endless time to rest and recover.

The problem is many triathlon coaches adopt their running philosophies from running coaches who coach distance runners. The only thing a marathon and an Ironman marathon have in common is 26.2 miles and that's where the similarities end. That "long run for xx miles" stuff is fine for marathon training. That's because they're just running and not training for three different events. The recovery from a 3.5 to 4 hour run would take away from my ability to ride my bike and/or swim the next day. Either I skip the ride/swim or I ride/swim anyway (because we're stubborn type-A triathletes) and start putting myself into a recovery blackhole. Then my future workouts are in jeopardy because my body is completely thrashed and I can't recover like I want or I'm missing key workouts so I can recover. All because someone said I had to run 18 miles. What about training during the summer? Running in the heat takes a lot more out of you than when it's cooler and pacing slows down. Using my 13 minute per mile person example - now that 18 mile run takes 4.5 hours to complete because it's 95 degrees out.

Well a few things... a client will NOT run 4 hours week after week. The longest runs, in the 16-18 mile range only happen towards the very end, and only a couple of times.

Also, a good coach ramps their athlete up properly. I am very conservative when it come to running and I ramp athletes at 10% per week in overall run volume, and 10% each week for the long run. So the ramp up takes place over months. A proper training plan has base building, build and recovery weeks. The key is to push the athlete to the edge, but not send them over it.

Otherwise, running 16-18 miles during IM training is standard IM training stuff. It's not marathon training.

Here is a great comment one of the coaches on our team had about this discussion:

One thing to keep in mind; the Endurance Nation guys do a training system that relies on sort of generic plans and a forum for feedback. They do a 90% solution and will even tell you that it's a 90% solution. I'm not sure how much active, one-on-one coaching they do. With a generic plan and little monitoring of the athlete, saying limit the run to 2.5 hours makes sense.

Another issue I have with their arguement is the concept of risk. There is risk in everything we do not just with the run. As coaches we have to mitigate risk and injury - yes. But at the same time we have to place enough stress on the athletes so that the proper physiologic adaptations happen. Being too risk averse can be as much of a problem as being too risky.

With active coaching you need to learn how much training stress your athletes can handle. This is the 'art' part of coaching.

There are many ways to get to long run:
- 2 runs in one day. I've done that in my own training. It's not the same as one long run.
- Run/Walk for the long run. I'm a big proponent of the run/walk. The main reason is that very few athletes actually run the entire IM marathon. If you know some walking will be done in the race, then it makes sense to practice run/walk in training.
- I agree with xxxx and xxxx about seperating the long run and long bike by several days. It makes no sense to 'run on tired legs'.
- Of course, there should be a build up to the appropriate long run time/distance.

At the end of the day though, only YOU know YOUR body. If running up to only 2.5 hours works for you... then go for it! If you ever use a coach, you would want someone who will train you that way, because that is what you believe.

I believe tri training is a bit like cooking. You can have 5 different cooks bake a cake. They will all have their own spin on it, and they will all make their cake a little different... but the basics will still be there and they all will have made a cake.

Memorial Hermann Ironman Texas 2012 : Official Thread (Page 10)

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