Long run for 5:00 IM mary??

That was on April 8, 2007 before my IM CDA which was June 24.   That was my longest run of the entire season.  I never hit my final 3 runs, including a 2:30, 2:45 and 3:00 hour run.  I was a nervous wreck. 

Race day I went 4:50ish in my first marathon and my first Ironman.  Have faith in your training and body. 

Another Rich Strauss disciple here.  I didn't run over 2:15 before IMLP last year.  Most distance covered was just over 16 miles.  Ran (OK, walked some ) a 4:09 marathon at LP.

If you pace your bike well, you'll have run plenty far in training (but run as often as you can).  Go too hard on the bike and it won't matter how far you've run in training. 

Honestly??  No more than a 2 hour run.  Seriously.

Why?  Because the amount of people that are actually doing anything close to resembling "running" after the first half of the marathon are few and far between.

I'm saying this based on what some coaches and pros/elites over on that "other" site where we had a discussion on long run pacing.  Most people are freaked out about the long run after the swim/bike and therefore put a lot of emphasis on getting some solid marathon-like training in.  Their point is that you are NOT training for a stand alone marathon and that if you cannot come off the bike fresh, then there is no point in trying to train for an "x" time when the reality is that more than 50% of the field will be shuffling with a combination of walk/jog by the end of the first half.

It has nothing to do with run fitness and everything to do with your swim and bike fitness.  Just look at me as a prime example.  I went into FL with the ability to run a sub-3:15 stand alone marathon.  Yet I went too hard on the bike and was relegated to a 5:45 marathon stroll.  My run fitness was obviously there.  Didn't matter ......

What they were saying is that for the typical age group IMer that you should put as much effort as you can into your swim and bike fitness so that you can even give yourself the ability to run off the bike.  With maximum long training runs of 2 hours you will get enough adaptation to be able to run a reasonable marathon if and only if you you come off the bike fresh.

And I'll say that is going to be my approach once my marathon training ends next month.  Swim and bike, with some run maintenance, that's it ........

I agree with everything said.  Run fitness doesn't mean jack if you come off bike wasted.  I ran a 4:58 IM marathon and I did a marathon 7 weeks before the IM.  For the fall version of IMAZ, I am going to do a steady diet of 1.5 to 2 hour runs on weds 3 out of 4 weeks. 

Need more swimming and more riding....

OK, feeling much better (not just from the responses, but the caliber of athletes who are responding)

So, Lance was wrong.  It is about the bike.  I am working petty hard at getting that bike fitness. 

Thanks all.

ETA - btw, here's Coach Kevin Purcell's blog and his thoughts on IM swim fitness.. interesting read in line with this thread.  http://www.coachkp.com/cgi-bin/config.pl?read=4562

ETA II to add - I had seen the discussion on the other board, and the questions re: long run for a 3:30 mary vs. long run for a 4+ mary, and how they might differ, which is kinda why I asked the question

I would disagree with Rick slightly and say that it is also about run fitness; but first you have to use your swim and bike fitness to get to T2 ready to run a marathon in order to access that fitness.

However, I agree with the statements that there is no need to run longer than what you have been - depending on the athlete I would typically use a long run in the 2:15-2:45 range.

It is your weekly, monthly and annual running volume (in combination with a well paced swim and bike) that will allow you to run the IM marathon.  Using frequency and consistency to build volume will set you up better than one or two "marathon" run days

Good luck with the last few weeks of your training,

Shane

That's a great point that KP makes.  I think many overlook the swim because it's such a modest proportion of the total race time.  What they miss is that faster swimmers are generally working relatively less than the slower swimmers and thus have more resources to spend on the bike and run (where, of course, you can save the most amount of time in the race).  You probably can't "make" your day on the swim, but you can help "break" it.

Personally, I think one of the reasons that I became decent at triathlons fairly quickly is that I spent more time in the pool early on than many beginner (or even some seasoned) triathletes seem to do.  And I know I'll need to spend even more to reach my longer-term goals.

This is interesting to read. My coach had me do a 15 mile long run before my HIM last year, and before every half mary I've raced since working with her. (I'll be running the 2nd one on 2-16).

I need to ask her what my long run will be getting ready for IM CDA. I'm inclined to think she'll have me do at least 20, since I did 15 for the HIM.

The only stand alone mary I've done I did a long of 20 and blew up at mile 23. Of course, I was much much slower then and was suffering through 6.5 hours. I even expect my IM mary to be much less than that...

We're having dinner tomorrow so I think I'll ask her what my long run will be and why...

My normal plan is to build up my long run to around 2.5 hours by 16 weeks to go.  Then I'll run long every other week.  On my off weeks I'll go semi-long = 1.5 hours.  Ocationally I'll stretch my long run to 3 hours but only if the next day is a total rest day.

Most of the year, I'm trying to run 1:30 - 2:00 for my weekly long run.  Doesn't always happen, but I certainly ran in that range for at least several months before IMLP.

My training plan called for a 3 hour run  (I ended up at 3:07 because since I was close, I wanted to hit 20 miles).  In retrospect, I wouldn't do it that way again.  If the plan called for something over 2:30, Joanna Zieger said do the 2:30 and than later in the day add another 30-45 minutes, you body would get the same adaptations and benefit but would not be as hard on the body or recovery.  I took my first ice bath after that run.

I ended up with a 4:18 at IMFL 

Good info.  Last year my longest pre-IM run was 18 miles but after about 13 miles, all form was gone and I don't think there was any 'training' value. 

This time I'm gonna use the "2 hr limit" philosphy of this thread and focus on speed and form for the 2 hrs.  And if I tank on the run in my IM, I'm gonna cite this thread as being the fault!

~Mike

I have no problem running 20's and can usually hold my form well throughout (I'm used to 3 - 4 20+ runs per marathon training cycle) but I honestly don't see a need for them for my training.

I'll do something along the lines of Fleeb, but going up to 15 or 16 miles for my long run (2 hours or less).  But I may do 2 of those in a week during my peek training.  I'll really just focus on 8 - 12 milers most of the time this go round.