ILX running running thread

my first mile is often my fastest. have read so many conflicting "warming up/down doesn't matter"/"it matters" articles...

I've been forcing myself to warm up slowly and build up to the speed I want, but sometimes I just want to get to speed much more quickly.

re: the conflicting articles, i feel the same about both pre- and post-stretching.

i usually warm down by bumping around the kitchen, trying desperately to fill a glass with water, and muttering "fuck!.......fuck!......god......fuck!" to myself

I really have to if I'm doing intervals. Like tonight I'm doing 4 x 1000 meters and 6:50 pace. No way I can jump right into that. I'll run easy to the lakefront at about a 9:30 - 10:00 min pace. Then do a few strides of accelerating to my interval pace. It's so shocking and sucks to jump right into the intervals.

i don't consciously do x mins at y pace or whatever but i try to start off holding back a bit so i can build up speed as i go along - during the run i'll ease off or push myself on a bit of an ad hoc basis (sometimes going by which bits of my route i've reached). i do try to go into a bit of a sprint up the hill at the end (though i jog the very last stretch down my road).

obv i stretch and stuff, don't really know how effective it is as it feels a bit half-arsed sometimes

I will warm up/down for a hard session by doing 10 minutes or so easy before and after. Otherwise I just head out and stick to a consistent pace.

For those of your who are metric minded, this spreadsheet has been fantastic in developing my training program. Just put in a recent race time and everything under the sun is calculated for you, primarily based on the Daniels Running Formula. Also throws McMillan in there too. I particularly found the weekly intensity distribution table helpful. Good for breaking up my mileage and making sure I'm doing the right amount of speed work vs easy miles.

hey willem, i saw you added me on runkeeper! and i also see that we both set distance records this week! :)

i just got back from mine. 5.2 miles at 7:55 pace, which is small beans for some of you but quite a feat for me!

jeff, i don't even know how to begin to understand that spreadsheet!

I probably read that spreadsheet at least an hour everyday.

I ran today and it was not terrible, but I have been a bit sidetracked by illness, biking, and walking. I sure did feel good afterwards, though! Trying to focus exclusively on that.

i used my garmin 210 for the first time today and it was fun. i didn't do a max hr test though because after my 30 min run was over and i started walking it was saying my hr was 43. the rest of the graph shows more realistic hr values so i'm not sure what happened there.

I'm wondering if it's worth investing in decent shoes or a knee brace if I'm just going to realize my knee can't handle it after one run. I know I pronate and have fairly weak arches so is it worth going to one of these nice running shoe stores to have them tell me the best type of shoe? Are knee braces actually effective? I have a nice track literally right across the street from me that I never use... seems like such a waste.

― Moreno, Sunday, June 24, 2012 11:37 AM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

fwiw some recent study showed that anti pronating shoes cause injury, and neutral shoes are best

man, science is confusing. i don't know what shoes to get, how long to warm up, whether to stretch...

just run man... run

Basically everything you do will be wrong.

i am visiting my parents in a much less hot location and i want to run but now i'm having horrific allergies :(

this is in a few uk cinemas now. looks great.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNuRQnp47cg

Running another damn 5K tonight. Don't know why I keep doing these. Going balls out.

Bah, that sucked. 2 mins slower than I did last month.

Tried a run commute last night. I've run home from work before but never carrying all my stuff. Got a running backpack, which worked out well, but I was carrying too much weight. The backpack plus my work clothes/shoes, iPad and a few other items ended up adding 8.5 pounds. Plus it was 97 degrees, which didn't help. All in all, a slow 5 miles.

Couldn't you leave your shoes and/or clothes at work?

Shoes yes, which I will do next time. Clothes is a little more problematic because I want to avoid walking back to my desk in my running clothes, to put them in my cabinet. I suppose I could make it through the day without my iPad.

Run commute home yesterday was much much better. 15 degrees cooler and a lighter backpack. Will do again.

That is if my foot would stop hurting. Stupid plantar fasciitis is such an annoying injury.

i really want to run to work but it's about 8 miles as the crow flies, and that route would mean going down oxford circus, a main shopping street for the entirety of london.

if i take a more scenic route it'd be 9/10 miles, i can do that but not regularly, been considering running 5/6 miles then jumping on an underground the rest of the way.

Mine ends up being 6 miles if I take the lakefront path. About 4.5 if I take city streets.

aren't you guys all sweaty when you get to work, though? i see running home, but running to work? or do you have showers there...

if i take a more scenic route it'd be 9/10 miles, i can do that but not regularly, been considering running 5/6 miles then jumping on an underground the rest of the way.

Could you you take the tube/bus to somewhere nice and then run to work from there? Then you don't have to be a sweaty beast on public transport.

I haven't run to work yet. But if I do there is an employee gym that I could use for showering.

oh man...i'm in seattle visiting family, and i was so excited to run in a beautiful park that the first day i did almost 6 miles (a lot for me) and then on the second day, at around mile 4 my hamstrings revolted and refused to run for me anymore. and now i'm so sore i have to hoist myself out of chairs or use my arms for anything involving my hamstrings. i hope it's more bearable tomorrow.

i think i pulled something. i think i pushed a little too hard since this was the first day running where i wasn't super sore... :(

i ran outside for the first time since that "horrific allergies" thing that was actually a 3-week-long summer cold. it made me have random coughing attacks and chest congestion forever. i tried to run for 30 min but i got weird ear compression feeling so i stopped at around 25 min. it was ok.

i didn't end up signing up for the half marathon group. there is another 5k group i might do though. the 5k is a 9/11 memorial. i might be too cynical to run in a 9/11 memorial race, i could end up exploding.

oh n/m the email that announced that was saying "it's not too late" so tomorrow would be the beginning of the second week of it and i don't want to start anything tomorrow.

my friend wants me to do a half marathon in the fall. kind of nervous, never done a half marathon before. my coworker, who loves marathons, promised to set me up with some sort of training schedule, since i am bad at that.

Do it! You have to have your first one at some point.

Woke up early to watch the women's Olympic marathon. It's really raining.

Not much happening in the marathon yet but it should be a good one. Decent preview here: http://www.letsrun.com/2012/women-marathon-0731.php

feeling self righteous here, just been lying in the bath post-run with the marathon on my ipad dangling over the towel rail

harbl, i get weird ear popping things going on sometimes during and after running. that thing when you cant really hear yourself talking properly. I HATE IT SO MUCH so sympths from me

rayuela - do it do it do it

kiplagat looks great and so easy. very obvious fore-foot landing there

Great writeup of the Farah-Rupp 1-2 last night: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/olympics/2012/writers/tim_layden/08/04/mens-10k-british-olympics/index.html?PID=4177151

my favorite kind of races to watch are 800 and 1500. how can i become faster than 10:00 at a mile? my brother can do it in like 5 min :(

Would usually assume one can get below 10 minutes by just training regularly but a standard approach to faster miling would be to do sessions consisting of segments that are shorter and faster than your target (like 6 times 400 metre intervals at 2 minutes or quicker) separated by short recovery periods (maybe try half a minute jog?).

The quantities I've used here are just pulled out of my hat but they might be a reasonable ballpark.

how can i become faster than 10:00 at a mile? my brother can do it in like 5 min :(

I did about a year of 3x weekly 4-8 mile runs at paces around 12:30-13:30 min mile, just plodding along, and when I did 5k or 10k races, I managed an 8:30-9 min mile race average by going all out. I have never gotten close to a 5 minute mile, my heart would explode.

If you followed seandalai's advice and did speedwork, you could probably improve even more, but just putting in the time running lots of miles at slow paces will give you the endurance and whatnot to finish races under the 10min/mile average.

yeah just doing regular training would be my main suggestion, I noticed harbl posted at the top of this thread 3 years ago so assumed maybe he/she(?) wasn't a novice in that sense and might want to try something new.

haha that's because i run consistently for a few months at a time then stop forever, that's how i am still slow after running for so many years. when i was 17 ("when i was 17....") i could run under 8 min. i'm just going to work on doing more miles per week slowly now. i think garmin is helping me.

2012 i have probably done more exercise than 09-11 combined :-/

i also joined the gym near me and want to learn how to lift heavy weights so i'm not sure how much running i will get done. maybe just gym 2x per week is adequate though.

If you want to get faster off minimal time spent running then intervals might be the best way. A sideline in heavy weights won't help you much, will make you slower if anything.

not like powerlifter heavy i just want to counteract my office worker slump