Question for Joel

I was wondering the same thing...   I really would like to get faster....     what is the secret?

hee hee hee! Everyone wants to know the secret....well, I'll tell you teh secret HOWEVER, I am NOT speaking for Joel in ANYWAY - but I have a pretty good idea of what he did - and its all documented under the Training Support Forum...and well here is the secret......














- there isn't any secret to 'hard work, consistency, and sticking to a plan'. That's "all" Joel did. He did exactly what he planned out day after day, week after week, month after month. When he had a hiccup, he asked me what I thought and we discussed it all publicly in the Training Support Forum. Take a look, it's all there. The guy is an animal, he understands how to work hard, never quits, and he has a good understanding of his body and how much he needs and doesn't need. Some of it is intuitive, but in my opinion, it's just his tenacity and consistency. He had a heck of a year and if he keeps his consistency up, he'll continue on the upward path.

That's the secret! hee hee hee!

so without being able to access those forums are my first assumptions correct? That is, did he go from a 9ish min mile to a 7.5ish min mile in zone 2?

Gotcha- I didn't know you couldn't access those forums - so if its worth $65 to you - then you could be a GOLD MEMBER - ok - just kidding, but hey its well worth it from what people say.

I don't know the starting point. I just did some research and I know Joel and I were using different zones when we started so I am not sure of the starting pace - he would have to answer that. I have seen athletes do that though. I usually go from 8:10 to sub 7:00 in the course of a season. That's not uncommon at all. It's just training the right aerobic systems at the right times to get the most out of your training.

I would do anything to run sub 7 min in Z-2! That is freekin awesome! To think I was all excited by a 10:54 Z-2 run! WOW!!! I know for me the trick has been to just keep running LOTS of base mileage and not letting my HR get out of Z-2. It works people... I have come down from 15 min + miles in November  to a 10:54 last night by following this same advice and doing the 20 week oly run focused plan... Nothing fancy, no secret, just consistently doing my thing day in and day out.

Brad - you are right on the money - just keep it rollin' - day in, day out! Have you lost weight in the time that you improved as well?

PS - you can throw in some Z3 everyone once in a while, especially on the hills!

so your saying I've got a chance! Currently running 9:45 pace on long runs, in zone 2, running 10 minutes and then walking 1 minute (repeat) for 100 minutes. That pace is with the walking breaks.

A chance for what? To get faster? of course! We ALL do!

a chance for sub 8s in zone 2

Just keep working my friend!

Things might be a little confusing and/or misleading if you look back at last winter.  Kind of a long storu but I think the backround might be important.  I ran track and X-country in high school.  I was average at X-country and had a pretty fast 400/800 on the track.  After highschool I didn't run on a regular basis for 10 years.  In 2002 I started to jog 20-30min at a pop as cardio work to help me get into shape but lifting weights was where I spent 90% of my workout time.  In 2003 I hooked up with the hashers and started running for fun 2x per week, 5-6miles at a shot at various paces.  Turns out I was one of the faster guys at the hash and I also started to enjoy running again.  In 2004 I got my first taste of triathlon with a couple sprints but I had no structured training.  I'd run with the hash, ride my bike once or twice a week for 45min, and struggled through laps at the pool once or twice a week.  I did 2 sprints that summer and finished in the last 1/3.  I also decided to do a local 1/2 marathon at the end of the summer just for fun.  I ran 2-3 times a week and did 3 longer runs of 10-12 miles.  I ran 1:45 but it wasn't enjoyable.  I tell you all of this to make the point that, yes, I have some running in my past but I certainly haven't been a speedster all my life.  Aside from those 2 sprints and the 1/2 marathon in 2004 I hadn't trained or run a race in over 12 years up to this past season.

Time to get serious.  Over that year I had been reading and spending a lot of time online trying to learn about how to train properly so that I might improve for 2005 when I planned to do an Oly tri or two and possibly a HIM at the end of the summer.  I found BT and learned a little about HR training.  I asked my girlfriend to get me a HRM for X-mas and I started using it religously this past Feb (after a 2 month break from all running to let an irritated ITB heal).  I went out and tortured myself through a max HR run test so that I could get some training zones.  My max HR was 189 and I established the following training zones based on a mix of information I had been reading. 

HR Zone		Range
1 - Easy/Recovery - <60%		0-132
2 - LSD - 60-72%		133-149
3a - Steady State Low - 73-78%		150-158
3b - Steady State High - 79-84%		159-166
4 - Interval - 85-92%		167-178
5 - Max - 93-100%		179-189

Do a little searching and you'll find that there are many opinions onhow to determine training zones.  So I started doing 3-5 mile runs inZ1/Z2 and I believe that got me something like 9:30/mile pace.  I stuckwith the plan (determined to give the HR training a fair evaluation)and sure enough, my pace started to increase slowly.  It tool 4-6 weeksto really notice the improvement but I was running longer and faster atthe same HR.  In May I won a BT drawing for one month of free coaching support from Mike and started asking questions and learning more.  Mike suggested I change to LT based training zones and explained what I needed to do to get the data.  I did a bike TT on my trainer and used a 10k road race for my run.  My new run training zones based on LT na d Friel are:

Zone		Range
Z1		0-149
Z2		150-159
Z3		160-168
Z4		169-176
Z5		177-192

So everything shifted ~10bpm from what I had been using but I was typically running my LSD at the top of Z2 with my old zones and switched to the top of Z1 with the new zones which happen to be the same HR.  And yes, between Feb 2004 and Nov 2004 I basically went from 9:30/mile to 7:30-7:40/mile at 150bpm.  I guess the key was trusting the LSD training and spending most of the season focused on base work.  Mike helped me ramp up my training for Diamondman in Sept but that was really only ~8 weeks of build and peak work.  I came off the bike and ran a 1:30 half marathon...not bad considering I just biked 56 miles and my open 1/2 marathon PR was 1:45 from a year earlier.  After Diamondman I took some time to recover a bit and then went into marathon training mode (my first).  I had a great base from the triathlong season and with ~7 weeks to get my act together Mike helped me put together a fairly aggressive training plan ( relying heavily on HR) that would get me ready.  With 4 weeks to go I was conficent that I could qualify for Boston if everything went my way on race day.  Sure enough, weather was perfect and I felt great.  I ran 2:58:33.

So that's a lot of typing to answer your relatively simple question but I thought it would be helpful to chart out where I've been and how I got to where I am now.  Like Mike said, I'm very focused and dedicated.  I'm eager to lear how to train properly and I need to understand why so that I can put my fiath into it 100%...train like a horse.  Mike was a huge help to me this season...no way I would have done so well without his advice and feedback.  I honestly think the Gold membership is the best $65 I've spent since I started doing triathlons.  Aside from supporting a great site you get direct access to one of the best coaches out there.  Mike and I have a long thread on the support forum with all of our discussions.  Anyone that has access to the support forum can read all about it: Ready to roll!!! And I'm very good about logging every single workout so you can look back over my entire season as well as seeing what I'm up to right now.  I've got big plans for 2006 starting with the Boston Marathon in April and ending with the JFK50 in November.

I forgot to mention something...

I've been using the same HR zones since June...never re-tested my LT.  Good chance that the limits are a bit higher after 6+ months of dedicated training.  I'm scheduled to have my VO2 max tested by Ken at Fitness-Concepts in 2 weeks.  Then I'll do another field test to compare.  I expect the 2 methods to be very close but I just can't resist checking anyway   I'm going to try to make a point of re-testing meself every 6-8 weeks this season so I can adjust my zones as appropriate.  I'm currently running 7:30-7:40 at 150bpm and can go 7:10 without leaving Z2.  I AVERAGED 163bpm at the Richmond marathon and I was actually running 6:45 miles in high Z2 for the first 16 miles before my HR started to slowly creep up, hitting 180 by the end.

How did you stay in your low  heart rate zones while bike riding outside (road biking on hills and mountain biking over rolling terrain) and keep your cadence up when you first started your base training? No problem on the trainer and I am sure as you get more base this issue goes away. While running you can just walk the hills but what about the bike?

What it really boils down to is like Mike said, just logging good solid miles in a focused manner. I've never really been that big of a proponent for "zone" training and tend to go by feel and PE.

But I have a similar history as Joel (albeit I'm a few years older ). I ran x-country and a season of indoor track in high school and ran x-country at the college prep. school I went to and while I was decent I was at most the number 5 guy on the team. I got out of running in '92 and focused solely on cycling which I did until '98 when I was so burned out that I didn't want to train anymore. I got back into cycling again finally at the end of '03 since I had put on almost 40 pounds and was sick of it.

I put my goal out to do the Baltimore marathon and started running again in March of last year for the first time in 13 years. I was running consistent 9's for my runs. After the (disappointing) marathon I kept my running focus up and got on here and started charting my long range goal of doing an IM with the first step as doing a HIM this coming June.

Long story short, by having a focused goal and running consistently (1,000 miles last year starting in March) I went from only having run a max of 13.1 miles at one time in my entire running career to running a full mary. under 4 hours, and within 6 weeks after running the marathon I posted my first sub 20 minute 5k since I stopped racing in the Fall of '91.

Smart mileage (whether you train in a zone system or not) and consistency will get you there.

Of course it doesn't hurt if you are a borderline genetic anomoly like Joel!

WOW!!!

The zones sound very similar to what I'm working through, but I get there at much slower paces!

Joel, I was glad to see you LT HR ranges as I just did a test this weekend using the Friel method on the treadmill. My zones are within a few bpm of yours. Based on Friel's description of the test, I thought my zones were pretty accurate but at least I have confirmation that they are not completely out of line...brutal test by the way.

Mark

Edited by Stone 2006-01-17 11:36 AM

Joel, thanks for sharing the whole story here. It's helpful for the more recent arrivals, those of us who only know you as an "after," to understand that there was at least something of a "before."

That's easy...you ever been to VA Beach?  Does "pancake flat" mean anything to you?  I have to be very creative in order to find any possible way to do hill work without driving an hour+.  Usually it's no big deal but as I start to train for Boston I need to do hill work so I'll either be on the treadmill or doing repeats back and forth over a bridge by my house...either way it's going to be Uber boring.

See if you can get permission to run the Bay Bridge/Tunnel, that's enough up and down.

I suppose there is a bit of genetics at play here but I honestly tend to think that it's 90% planning, training, and consistency.  I ran track and X-country 4 years in highschool and worked hard at practice.  Like I said, I was an average X runner...maybe #4 or #5 on the team.  I didn't run X at college because they jump to 10k which was WAY to far to run   I was typically top 1 or 2 in the 400m and 800m during track season.  In those 4 years of running I never saw anything to suggest I was particularly gifted beyond being one of the faster guys at my school.  I couldn't  compete individually at the district level. 

Mike,

Do you have any thoughts on taking walking breaks during long runs? I seem to be able to hold a more consistent heart rate by taking the walking breaks.

Snoopy - yes - 8/2 method. There have been studies done that reflect that if you take the break earlier, you will not accumulate as much lactate and you can run longer. For example, say you are running a marathon and you start the run/walk method at mile 20 b/c you 'have' to, vs that you 'want' to - well it could be too late to continue to clear lactate - that is how i understand the study. OTOH if you start out from the git go, using run/walk you will have more consisten pacing and like you said, a more consistent HR. There was just some guy who ran a sub 2:45 using the run/walk method. At each aid station he walked for like 30".

So you are for it?