5:30PM On
Dracut dumbbell loop ¼ mile easy from truck to start, 5 miles easy,
33:05(started at about 7:40 for first mile) shifted gears and ran next 3
miles at goal mp, 15:00.6(4:58, 10:02) ¾ mile back to truck, whole run 9
miles in 54:54 tot.9
Sunday 9AM woods 9 solo easy, 1:02:20, tot.9
5PM woods
8 solo shakeout, 1:06:40, stop at 1:02 for back fig.8 and four 100m
strides tot.8++
XT
rubber band hip stuff, 4x2 mins backward figure 8 running w/ 2 min walk
Rests
Summary 138miles for
the week, One **** workout, Three good workouts and a session of hills, Good
cross training.I’m much fitter then
when getting ready for the trials.I
think the hammy is stronger too, and its getting stronger as opposed to getting
weaker as I get ready this time.So
hopefully it will be at minimum where it was for the trials last year or better
yet better by the time NYC rolls around.I’m real fit though and I’m pumped about that. Now Gary, the UML coach/my college
coach, gives me advice every once in a while.I should just stop questioning it.He isn’t of the medaling type and when he decides something is worth
telling me he has thought it through. Plus he is a hell of a coach.But of course I’m stubborn prick and think,
oh no I’m so much better then when he was my coach, or oh ya that’s a good idea
but it wasn’t mine so I better not useit or whatever.Anyway long story
short I would have had a better week if I’d listened to Gary and not tried to do that workout on
Monday.
I don't take nearly enough ice baths. As I got fitter I got much better at recovering from workouts and being able to bounce back better and quicker. That said i also do believe in helping recovery with a bit of quick food post race. So after every run i try to get something within 15 mins. My favorites are 20oz chocolate milk, 1 oz protein powder w/ a piece of fruit or a cookie, Kefir. You want something with a good bit of carbs and some protein, a lot of protein after hard workouts, 20g or more.
tell me more please
3:36 AM, September 15, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
Nate, from reading your blog for some time now I understand that you are a student of the lydiard method but that you've also integrated methods from other people as well. Recently I was able to buy an original copy of "running the lydiard way" from 1978.
In this book he lays out his principles for training and points out howcertain physiological aspects need to be achieved through training in order to increase your performance level for race day.
However, when he described his schedules he never provided certain paces or chart tables, you know the way Dr. Jack Daniels correlates vo2 max levels to pace times. Lydiard was never a big fan of the stopwatch and uses terms like steady state, feeling pleasantly tired, or 1/4 efforts. What exactly does this mean?
and by the way, what exactly is kefir? maybe I should buy some.
thanks
Kefir and Lydiard
12:02 PM, September 15, 2008
.. Posted by nateruns
Kefir is a super awesome super delicous milk/yogurt cousin crink/smoothy that has been around for thousands of years, it is available at most, but not all, grociery stores in either the dairy or health food section. its available in most the flavors that yogurt is. It is available in fat free, low at and normal versions. I prefer the low fat but the full fat is good too. Taste wise the fat free is fine but I always am low on fat in my diet so...
Lydiard. The man was an absolute genius, now I feel his methods have been tweaked and improved by others since, he thought so too by the way, see what the eithopians, kenyans and now most top americans are doing. The effort thing is a tough concept to right about but it is also demonstrates a big part of why Jack Daniels was a good D3 coach and Lydiard made Olympic champions. Pace charts and what not are a great visual but they are meaningless and cause more trouble then good by people unwilling to adapt for conditions, both those of the environment but also those in their body on a given day but also in general terms. Ever notice how two guys can do the same workouts at the same paces and get different results out of it? Some people are better at workouts, some are better at racing, its just nature, also 5xmile at whatever is a ton better workout when done during a 105 mile week then when done during a 56 mile week. All things must be considered. Lydiard was spectacular at this and made a great point of it in his books, he made one mistake- his words not mine- he put schedules in his books. He didn't want to basically got talked into it. He makes a big point that they are idealized and generalization and that they shouldn't be followed exactly ect.. ect.. but what does everyone remember? the schedules!!
So first your questions 1/4 effort is real easy running, as slow as you want to go, 1/2 effort is normal training run, 3/4 effort is like a tempo run, full effort is a race or time trial.
Pleasantly tired means you don't feel like you just jogged but nor did you hammer in and finish and have to double over and grab your knees think of the description he uses for the ideal pace, you should be able to talk but not in full sentences or about complex subjects. If you think about it thats a pretty good effort.
Now a few pet peaves
Lydiard means 100 mile weeks. No! he used it cause it was a nice round number and many of his runners built up to 100 in singles during their main session. leads to point two
Lydiard only did single runs, wrong again. he says again and again that you should be doing easy second runs of at least 15 mins, that these should be extremely easy, wow just like the 10 min a mile easy runs the Kenyan's do, wonder where they got the idea from? Also he makes a point of saying you should be doing some easy hill bounding and springing during some of these second sessions during the base phase to get ready for the next phase and not get super sore from the transition. which leads to the next thing.
Lydiard was all about easy running. you couldn't be more wrong!! Lydiard knew that easy and md. running was the real key, the big thing if you will. If you did it you would improve the most, in comparision to if you did only one type of training. But even in his base phase he called for a weekly tempo run or time trial and a set of very extended strides. Plus supplementary work on hill bounding and springing (which are balistic drills to build speed and still the major thing missing from almost every american training program) leads to the next thing,
Lydiard had them do a lot of hill repeats after the base phase. NO!! they did a lot of muscular development exercises, bounding springing ect.. and yes some hill repeats. Now most coaches these days mix this into there base phase and have found they get less injuries and get the same results with that. Basically you can build the aerobic base and the muscular skeletal systems at the same time very effectively and lose less aerobic conditioning before you get to anaerobic training and you get less injuries. A lot of Lydiards guys got hurt during the hill phase, in fact John walker, no lydiard didn't coach him- Davies who lydiarded coached in turn coached Walker- didn't do a hill phase in his training simply because he had trouble getting through it healthy. This is also why Walker is the only pure Lydiard styled runner who had significant Achilles problems. Hill springing is the greatest exercise ever invented for the prevention of Achilles issues. Now after giving that little shout out to the greatness of Lydiards exercises let me also say that downhill running which he also advocates in large amounts is the best way to screw up your ITB. Great exercise if you can do it but use caution.
Ok I could go on for pages so i'll just stop now. One last bit there is a lot of Lydiard stuff out there but some of it is crap, consider your source- if they really know Lydiard they will have had real success as a coach. Remember the man took a few kids from his neighborhood and in 5 years four of them won Olympic Medals. There was nothing freaky in the water, they didn't have a lot of talant, one of them was a partial cripple, snell was the 3rd best 800m at his school. If it happened today the whole world would assume it was doping but it was the late 50's and that wasn't an issue yet.
Untitled Comment
1:09 PM, September 15, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
I did listen to my coach, coach jenkins, I should have listened to my old coach.
Untitled Comment
3:18 PM, September 15, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
Exactly, thats my point. I should have said Gary.
elite runners life
8:47 PM, September 15, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
Hey Nat
With all this effort, high mileage and hours spent training do you have time any free time for anything else apart from training,eating and sleeping?. I admire your steel hard strength and determination to succeed at any cost.How do you prepare your mind man?
I will admit that I don't have the most exciting life most of the time. I read a lot and spend way way too much time on the internet. I do some online coaching. I pretty much don't go out well training. I do party a good bit after a season is over. I had a book of running quotes in HS and I remeber one that was something like 'world class marathoners are monomaniacal people who have little times in their lives for anything but running sleeping and physical therapy.' I find the closer I get to world class the truer that statement rings.
That said its absolutely what I enjoy. I can go get drunk later, I can watch more tv in the future, go on trips all that stuff. I get to run against some of the best runners in the world and travel all over the country and parts of the world for free to do the thing I love so its a great exchange. Its no sacrifice at all, simply an easy choice.
thanks for responding
2:09 AM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
thanks Nate for clarifying the whole lydiard pace thing. I've read in interviews that lydiard wasn't completely interested in certain paces but more effort and he wasn't interested in measuring his athletes vo2 max levels.
There was only one error, a veyr small one, its that John Walker was actually coached by Arch Jelley. Jelley's plan was similiar to Lydiard but emphasized a little more on speed and power development, particularly more for mid distance runners. With davies I think you were referring to Dick Quax.
I really want to thank you clarifying to people the common misconceptions held about lydiard's method.
So if we already have ideas set in stone from lydiard on how to train, how do we progress from there?. Is it more a matter of peaking more efficiently, fueling properly, or recovering better?
i did flub that one it was jelley not davies, sorry about that. Still a very much lydaird system.
Now as far as where we go now. Well first things aren't set in stone and many coaches have taken what L. was doing and improved on it and are continuing to improve on it. Nowadays aerobic quality is one area that L. used but has been greatly greatly expanded on. Look at what the kenyan's and eitho's are doing they aren't beating us by doing some sill **** they are doing some crazy quality training. Now in part it is misleading because they have such a great base under them from there upbringings but the point remains. also coaches, cook being an extremely popular example at the moment, and many others have greatly expanded on the muscular development side of the training. and like i mentioned in the previous post the incorporation of this stuff into the base phase. Beyond that the biggest thing to be learned, in many ways, from lydiard was that nothing is set in stone, each athlete each season ect. has its own set of issues and what he did was really become the first one to show us an integrated way of putting all the ingredients together to best approach that problem but coaching is still way more art then science. You can't look at it like a cooking recipe if you put x y z ingredients in in this order and way you get great soup. No there is so much more to it, each athlete is an individual and they are a constantly changing on. but what you need to learn is what each type of training improves and how it works and how it effects the athlete and other training. Then figure out what each athlete needs and how much work they can handle and work towards your goals, short term and long term from there.
As to where to go from Lydiard, look at canova/gigolti, the stuff fabian roncero did, the kimbia stuff, dieter forgot his last name for the moment, look at cooks stuff and brad hudson and the japanese, look at Mahon and that whole group. look at the eitho nat team.
Many of these guys have found ways to train as effectively or more so then lydiard while allowing more racing at a high level, this is important for americans with the 3 season thing killing us. I'm a real believer that you are going to have to train through at least one season to reach full potential but better to have some decent results while doing it then run like total ****.
Listen if your young build your miles. No matter who you are start thinking about aerobic quality. The biggest thing holding back the development of American distance runners, other then video games and generally inactive childhoods is the mentality that the only quality is anaerobic intervals.
I honestly believe that if tomorrow if a crazy new law was enforced that hs and younger athletes were not allowed to do intervals that it would lead to a massive improvement in both Prep times and the success of these athletes post hs.
Its not that intervals don't have a place in HS training but they are so chronically and outrageously over used that they cripple the development of athletes. Coaches if your kids are doing more then 20 interval sessions a year, not a season, rest assured it is too many. Most kids are doing great workouts and simply not absorbing the training.
If coaches were suddenly forced to find other ways to train their athletes they would have to stop thinking in terms of there being regular runs and workouts and start exploring the grey area in between. This grey area is the key to success. While that and a ton of miles. Tempo's( the idea partially fostered by daniels followers) that there is one kind of tempo run at one specific pace is a travesty and a huge killer in peoples improvement as well. long tempo's short tempo's hard tempo's medium and even pretty easy ones. Progressions short long hard medium steady increase, not so steady increase. these two types of training encompass literally hundreds of different types of workouts that are invaluable to the development of a freak of nature type runner. Want to find out how good you can be start running relaxed but quickly explore aerobic quality.
the other area that we are horrid at developing is the muscular skeletal system. we do 200m repeats, 400m repeats and think they will make you faster. How??? they have no effect on basic speed, none! so how do you get faster, hills! ballistic, plyometric exercises, lifting- not with your arms people- these exercise done in great numbers with terrific frequency among our HS teams would give us a generation of runners who were vastly more able to handle heavy training without injury and more over capable of running very very fast. Particularly on the last lap.
Almost all the Ethiopians kick like mad demons yet they have only one serious 1500m runner and no legit sprinters. Do you think they were all born with a special kicking gene? No they do at least one session, often of an hour or more, of drills,plyo's whatever every day! from right when they start training.
Now I have gone completely off topic but the point(s) are valid. The info is out there. We need only free ourselves of the need for a single right or wrong answer. A great quote says "that for every problem there is a simple and wrong answer." or something to that effect. The key is in the grey area. Find a good scientific starting point and they make art with it. Ever notice most of the great scientists in this sport don't ever succeed in coaching any great champions. There is a reason for that.
Kick ass comments Nate!
12:41 PM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by Dave
I recently quit helping out at a high school because the coach is all about repeats--often more than 2x a week. Their 4th runner overall is a girl who runs 21:00 5k's. Regardless, the top 5 runners are out their attempting 5:00 pace repeats!
Insult to injury the woman was offended when I tried to talk to her about the issue and held a grudge on me for the remainder of the time I was on the team leading me to quit for her lack of reason or openness to change.
awesome
1:57 PM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
Nate, been following the blog for a while, and I just wanted to say thanks for being so accessible and answering everyones' questions so thoroughly. You are the man.
Thank you both. Dave I hear ya I rode out a season as an assistant at a HS and it was rough. At least the guy I was working with was a great guy and really terrific with the team, just unable to understand long term development and modern, or even less antiquated training theory. It seems most of the HS coaches out there think Emil Zatopek still has all the world records and that Mihaly Igloi is still the cutting edge coaching leader in the world.
I read recently an artical in Running Times, great issue this month by the way, about the training of HS cross country athletes and it compared the schedules of 1954 Indiana state champ and the 2007 state champ and they were almost identical. Now my hope is that a large part of that is that it was just one week and in the competion phase, which hasn't changed as much. But still my gut reaction is this is what is holding kids back. Sure the truely talanted can really grit it out and be good but for god sake the 2007 kid is doing two very tough anaerobic workouts and a race and only 40 miles a week! Now he is handling it so fine. But 99.9% of kids won't becuase you need a massive natural aerobic system to do that. Now if kids were out building that aerobic system they would also be able to handle the workouts and get something out of them. Not just survive them.
The other part is that these kids do all these workouts and they are always straining and it gives them awful form, where easy aerobic running and quick relaxed running and drills/plyo's all smooth out form and make it more efficient. And the workouts lead to major muscle imbalances. this is a big part of why US runners have so many injury's.
HS is really getting late in the development of an individual but it is our last real chance and we are killing these kids by trying to build them like an upside down pyramid. You need the base first. Never mind these awful meat grinder middle school teams. I understand it is easier to organize workouts then runs but frankly I don't care. You are hurting kids, no that is not too strong a word, by having them do workouts and no real running. It is bad for their running, bad for their overall health, and it makes it less likely they will make it a lifetime sport which is exactly what running should be.
what about latino's?
6:13 PM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
nate I have a question about Mexican runners, or latino's in general. Being a Latino American, I don't understand why there aren't anymore Latino runners standing on top of the podium like like there are Kenyans. I think that we have so many similarities with the Kenyans : small frame, high altitude, a long history of running(think the tarahumara indians), and a very plain diet in rural areas(maize, tortillas,potatoes,cactus, fresh beans, and other tropical fruits and vegetables.
I know we have had some success, some names that come to my mind are: vanderlei de lima,ronaldo de costa, marlison gomes dos santos, arturo barrios, and the Mexican dudes who won NYC Marathon like 4 times in the 90's.
I tell you there is so much untapped potential among latino's, especially here in the US. I think that we are just obsessed on soccer, baseball, and boxing and we arent disciplined enough. There are so many more potential Jorge Torres's and German Fernandez's out there.
latino's
6:17 PM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
pretty interesting article here about training in Xinanetcl
http://outside.away.com/outside/magazine/1196/9611fevo.html
in reply to thanks response
9:05 PM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
Agree about the state of US young runners and pushing workouts which can destroy and injure them. As a HS coach I have implemented a Japanese style of training which involves a steady mileage build- up at a steady pace. This means simply high mileage at slightly higher than jogging pace. Thing German Fernandez followed a similar pattern this summer base period- hours of steady miles only! Early signs are that this pilot scheme is paying off with improved results.
First to the HS coach, thank you!! and congrats. Stick it out and keep experimenting believe me by exploring the aerobic potential of your athletes you will reap huge rewards. The improvements don't come as quick as they do with anaerobic work but they continue and build on top of each other and grow much greater rather then dimishing year after year like they do with the anaerobic stuff. As your kids get stronger add in some aerobic quality stuff, tempo's progressions and the like you'll be glad you did. Running quickly and easily is an art and teaching your body it reaps huge rewards.
Ok Latino runners. Not sure what really happened from the mid 60's on there was a small but strong group of runners, mostly mexican that did real well and then it really seemed to peak in the 90's and they were toe to toe and tooth to tooth with the top kenyan marathoners at the time. Then they retired and no one else took over and the kenyan's next generation exploded.
couple links on those guys
http://www.juanjosemartinez.com.mx/files/Gomez_training_log.pdf
http://www.juanjosemartinez.com.mx/volcano_runners.html
Now what happened? I don't really know, they never got much sponsorship money ect.. but neither did the kenyans, perhaps success in other sports drew them away I don't know. there is a great group of marathoners coming out of brazil the last 20 years or so, de lima and dos santos being the biggest examples but they have done very well, also silvio gurero (im sure that is mispelled) was running real well for a few years.
I think the potential is there but I have no knowledge of what is going on down there and why runners aren't coming up. Madia Perez being the exception of course.
just wondering...
10:08 PM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
I was just wondering, just in a wild crazy scenario where you won the NYC Marathon this year. What would you do with all the money.
I bet paying off college loans would be first on your list.
I know it would be for me.
nyc cash
11:36 PM, September 16, 2008
.. Posted by nateruns
ok lel cracks after coming back from the olympics on short order same for gourmi but there fast early pace busts eveyone else up meanwhile I have a day of days hit 20 miles in 1:39:20 and climb through the field running 4:55's through the very rough bronx and central park hills and steal the show in 2:09:55 winning
total prize purse with time bonuses of 155,000 and a new toyota prius(not sure which one this is but a new car, a toyota to boot is pretty darn nice.
Now my shoe contract bonus for winning and being the top US runner will pretty much cover my student loans almost exactly so I can say thats covered without having to publish what I owe for student loans or my bonuses are, sweet.
so 155,000 left
10% tithe- 15,500
30% to uncle sam, give or take, 46,500
so that leaves 108,000, so i'll spend the 8k on taxes and ins. on my new wheels, books, various bills, and silly wastes of money and christmas gifts for everyone i know.
then 10k to pay for some place not in lowell to train for the winter.
the last 90k would go a long way to a town house or condo and i figure with the bump in my base salary and the appearance fee i could expect from my next marathon would make sure I could pay off the rest.
To be honest I am horrible with money and I don't have a ton of material desires so i know that is real boring but it is what I would probably do.
what music inspires you?
12:17 AM, September 17, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
you were bit of the day a couple of weeks ago on lets run with those super crazy mileage weeks.
just out of curiosity, what kind of music do you listen to?
Thanks for the music links I'll check them out, always looking for new stuff.
Generally i listen to a lot of indie type stuff. I currently and listening to a ton of Kings of Leon, vampire weekend, Rilo Kiley. As far as music for inspiration I like Frou Frou, holding out for a hero, Rilo Kiley Better son daughter, Spoon The Underdog, Jimmy Cliff the harder they come, and in a strange way Crash Test Dummies Superman song and Van Morrison Days like this.
so that is the quick what I listen too and what inspires me from the music world at the moment lists.
MORE MUSIC FROM THE MUSIC GUY
2:58 AM, September 17, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
yeah I was just curious as to what you listen to for running, I read your blog about once a week, hope you do good in NYC
5:07 PM, September 17, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
Time to hanker down and get a job when you don't win NYC--admire your training, no life and ability to drink once every 5 years but realistically it will never happen so after NY--move on and enjoy your life--not your addiction to attention..Until then good luck--keep up the hard work and keep your rumswabs happy
I'm sorry you don't understand what it is all about. I really wish you did but you obviously are clueless and I have given up wasting my time trying to explain it. Just again let me say I truly wish you had a clue. Or even just the balls to put your name up.
nate
tell em nate, tell em
2:11 AM, September 18, 2008
.. Posted by Anonymous
one of the best parts about this blog is that complete and utter strangers like myself are capable of communicating with one of the countries elite marathoners. Then it sucks because there are losers out there who talk smack since they are sitting behind a monitor.
everyone wants to critique everyone else.
Nate this guy wasn't even worth the time for writing a post, when you see crap like this, just skip to the next comment, because it does you no good.
Dont let stupid **** said by strangers effect you before NYC, you know your goals.
Great insight!
11:24 AM, September 18, 2008
.. Posted by Bruce
Nate, I just wanted to pop in and say this page is one of the best I've read regarding coaching and the BIG scheme of things.
Coaching is an art, and individuals need individual coaching (even within a 'system', whether it be Lydiard or 'new' Lydiard, or Jenkins, or whatever).
You're doing a great job with yourself, so keep going. Do all that other stuff later. World class running can be done, even at 38, and you're a long way from that.
What I'm doing is hardly the "Jenkins" system its just Canova as I understand it. which as much as he denies it is a lydiard inspired/based system. But you hit it 100% dead on with your middle sentence, so perfect it bears repeating
"Coaching is an art, and individuals need individual coaching (even within a 'system', whether it be Lydiard or 'new' Lydiard, or Jenkins, or whatever)." bruce
So succinctly too. Saying stuff well with a few words is never something I mastered.
Your reference to Constantina Dita-Tomescu (just in case anyone missed it she is 38 and just won the gold medal in the olympic marathon) is timely and funny, I was just looking at a career outline on her and I couldn't decide if it was a good or bad thing for me to be reading. Quite incredible really. She set all her PR's after the age of 30, didn't have a real good marathon until she was 30. Didn't have a world class performance before she was 29 and didn't win a major marathon until she was 34. When she was 28, the first year she showed up on the international radar at all she ran 32:26, 1:12:42, 2:34:35. Fine times but not really world class considering she has since gone a minute faster for the 10k, 4 or 5 mins faster in the half and 13mins faster in the marathon. Now I don't know if she came to the sport late but as a guy who has had a frustrating year and will soon be 28 it is nice to see someone making big improvements after that age.
Nice Race
3:38 PM, September 21, 2008
.. Posted by Richie
Nate, It looks like things are getting back to where they used to be. Nice race yesterday and best of luck at New York. Since I started reading your blog my running has changed drastically. You have been the topic of conversation on many runs just from an insanity point of view. Too bad things didn't go better for you this summer it would have been awesome to see you at twin cities this fall. Keep up the good work.
Thank you richie. I agree it would have been nice to run up to par this summer but hopefully with the change in diet I'll be able to avoid another **** show like that in the future.
