UKH

What to do when you finish a training plan without the goal race?!

A bit of background. I have used the P&D training plans for a few years now. Typically for a spring marathon where I follow the plan quite religiously and then more loosely for a summer race or autumn marathon which I don't take as seriously but like the structure. When I am not following the plan it's a bit more haphazard but I would typically run 30-40m/week.

For those that know them, I have used the "up to 55m/week", the "55-70m/week" and tried the "75-85m/week". The latter was too much for me at the time and I picked up niggles too often to make it worthwhile. The biggest gains have come following the 18wk 55-70m plan.

So... This year, to mix things up I had no spring marathon planned and was aiming for a race in June. As I hadn't run so much over the winter I started the 18wk up to 55m/week plan accordingly. Despite the race being cancelled a few weeks ago I have continued the plan, this week being week 15.

The last cycle is the taper cycle so the plan is effectively coming to an end this week as there is no race.

I had already entered a second marathon this year due to take place in October. (Loch Rannoch). It hasn't been cancelled yet so with the June race being cancelled an 18wk schedule can kick off in a couple of weeks time.

I am aiming to follow the 18wk 55-70m schedule. I've surprised myself in the last lot of training and hit my target paces for the majority of the main sessions with probably some still in the tank.

Ordinarily I would come at these plans after a few weeks of up-ing the miles after a few months of more unstructured running. This time round I will be coming at it straight off the back of 15 weeks of quality training. 

Obviously this is a higher mileage plan but the first weeks mileage picks up where I am comfortably running just now. 

My question is, is this the best course of action? 

Is it best to kick off a new full 18 week plan where the focus for the first 5 weeks is endurance based with typically only 1 fast/tempo session per week with mileage that isn't too dissimilar to what I am doing now? The first weeks long run is down at 15m so I am thinking i should increase this.

Secondly I guess, how much do you realistically think you should expect to take off your pace? I see no point in aiming for the same time with 18wks to play with. i.e. 2 weeks ago it was an 18m with 14 at MP. The second week of the new schedule calls for 16m with 8 at MP. Would aiming for 10s/mile be ridiculous? (Not just for this session but with the accumulative fatigue trying to maintain the faster pace week in week out)

A bit long winded but any tips/advice appreciated.

Thanks, Mark

In reply to Mark020:

I'm in a similar place. No Boston and possibly Boston again in 16 weeks.

My plan is keep ticking over at 60 miles a week, but throwing in FKT and other long trail runs for fun. Long runs will be generally be 1:30-2:00 of running. Solid miles but I won't get fussed by marathon paced finishes or anything really. Boston is 16 weeks away but I cant see it being on, so I'm going to build a base and see after. I'm still doing track workouts but more because I enjoy them. I'm hoping by the end of June, start of July we should have a good idea.

Re how much to improve, I think 3-4 minutes per training cycle is possible so in the ball park of 10s, but depends how trained you were. I'd target a few smaller races typically and they should let you know what ballpark you are in by using a calculator like the Daniels VDOT.

I'd be wary of rolling training cycles together too closely without a solid fun base building time but i find dedicated marathon work mentally tiring as much as anything. 

However here its getting to 80-90F heat over the summer so longer harder runs just get unpleasant.

Strange times. I think the main thing is just stay consistent, stay motivated.

In reply to Mark020:

Why don't you do the taper, and have a go at some "races" in your own. Have you got any good local obvious challenges you could do? Or just map out a good looking marathon and do a couple of things like that? Then start the next cycle. I did have big plans to do a few things like that on dartmoor, but calf injury has stopped play. That'll teach me to not up my miles loads really quickly. 

I'm no expert, but it seems like a bad idea to go from one training cycle straight into the next without some recovery time. For your motivation as much as your body. 

In reply to Mark020:

Having being ill with probable COVID I have had a break in training and am nowhere near where I should have been for a now cancelled mountain marathon in 2 weeks time. The lack of access to decent sized hills at the moment means things are quite compromised. Nevertheless I will face a similar situation at the end of August and if that race is cancelled I suspect I will slip back to winter/busy at work levels (15 miles a week) as I am slow, relatively old and lots of training is hard on me. I might be tempted to buy a decent bicycle and mix it up that way.

If the PD plan is intense (based on a very specific target) without much in terms of down weeks, it might be better to get a plan which has more time off, perhaps two weeks up one down so that you don't end up injured or fed up.  Also be kind to yourself and perhaps use morning resting heart rate diligently and other metrics like sleep time to modify your plans.

The PD 18wk 55-70m plan would kill me if I repeated it and would be very tricky to get done in terms of fitting around work. My plan tops out at the 59 miles, but builds to that whereas this one is just straight in - what do between these plans. Are you one of those people who can pick up the mileage without breaking?

(edited after found the plan online)

In reply to Mark020:

I'm echoing jed there, map out a race as similar to the one you were targeting and get out there and test yourself. 

Do it really early one day to reduce the amount of hazards in play and try and persuade someone/family member to follow you on a bike with water and to cheer you on

In reply to Mark020:

I just entered Loch Rannock!

A proper taper seems pretty pointless, but dropping a little and starting at the new plan reasonably fresh seems wise. You can't expect to sustain a fixed level of fitness forever.

It's a lot more miles than I do, so hard to suggest how much better you time could be. Do the plans include advice on how to judge race pace based on how you do in training? Do you have a log of how you felt while doing the same plan previously?

Good luck!

In reply to Mark020:

Morning.

I used to be a climber who runs, now I think I'm a runner who climbs .

I was on track to get London GFA (maybe around 3:25-3:30) in Manchester in my first marathon on around 50 mpw, peaking at 60 mpw.

Since then, I've been focusing on improving my speed and running at 30-40 mpw with some harder intervals. My club had a mile race series; I clocked my first (since adolscence..) sub-6 mile, so that felt good. I think I'd like to get it down to around 5:40. I think I would find it hard to race anything above 5K on my own, not least because I live in a city and road crossings etc are difficult.

I follow a weekly plan with a coach, and at the minute I'm doing two "sessions" a week (intervals, hills, tempo) and one long run (10-14 miles). Will probably try and run 50-60 mpw over summer.

I actualy really enjoy running around the parks and streets where I live, so it's not a chore to go out in the sunshine and run easy. I hit 68 miles last week (with a longest run of 10 miles, I mostly doubled), but that was part of a mileage challenge - and I won a box of chocolates!

In reply to GDes:

I'm not sure about doing a taper and "racing" on my own. It doesn't instantly appeal. 

I think you are right though - a break from the routine is probably a good idea. I will probably lower the mileage for a couple of weeks and drop any speed work but keep the long runs as I enjoy them. I'm going to try and jump on my road bike to mix things up as well before getting back at it.

In reply to Roadrunner6:

It's a bit like being all dressed up and having nowhere to go!

I normally find following a long schedule mentally tough as it gets towards the end but I would normally be following it through the winter in NE Scotland.  2/3 of the runs are after work in the dark on the same old routes. Half the battle is getting started!

Recently though, as we've been forced to run everything from home I've purposely gone out and run different trails and roads that I haven't run before despite them being on my doorstep. I'm lucky enough to be able to run on quiet roads straight from my door - it's maybe wrong to say with all the turmoil that's going on but for me personally (from a running perspective) it's been refreshing and I've looked forward to getting out. Its not 80-90F though! 

I don't know if this is a fluke but I've just put in my last race time (a flat half) into the vDot calculator. The race was a wee while ago but I was probably in not too dissimilar shape and it's predicted 4m50s quicker over the marathon distance than my PB and the marathon pace is within 2 seconds of that last marathon pace session I ran. If I could take another 3m8s off that time after another long block I'd be a happy camper!

In reply to tlouth7:

My logs are terrible! I don't keep a note of effort. I don't even log the runs by type or change the name which has proved a bit annoying more than once when you try and look back at past intervals or tempos and everything is called "Evening Run" - argh!

Hopefully see you in October! Fingers crossed...

In reply to Mark020:

There's no time like the present to change things!

When I'm actually following a plan I like to record the details of my runs in a spreadsheet so I have all the data in one place. I find it good for seeing trends in tiredness or slight injuries etc.

Yeah, hopefully see you in October

In reply to Mark020:

Yeah I'm in New England so its similar here, lighter in the winter but more snow.

But for a fall marathon its now 80-90F most days and very humid. I think training through the summer is harder in many ways. Running for an hour is fine but anything over 80 minutes at that heat and humidity becomes a serious undertaking.

We call it east coast altitude though.

But I think just stay motivated, run some FKT's or longer routes that are fun as training runs.

TBH I can't see many races happening in the fall. There's an ultra here which is small and starts in waves so I can see that one possibly.

In reply to Mark020:

Boston just got cancelled. I suspect first of many rescheduled ones.

In reply to Mark020: I'd give myself a few easy weeks I tihnk.  I liked to take three easy weeks and start building again.

 Re. how much you'll improve, do you have anything nearby in the 10km  to 10mile range you can use for a time trial now and again later?  I don't like using anything longer as a time trial as 'external factors' and having  to taper start to impinge on max performance.  It's a good idea anyway to do a couple of these if you're not doing any shorter races in the buildup - very few people can race properly off just training.