50+ Masters Training and Racing Open Forum

Joining NDJY on congrats to CM. 10 min ahead of the 2nd place in the AG 65+, terrific!

NDJY, congrats to you, too! Half marathon is too long for me (mostly mentally) and I always pay due respect to people who challenge it.

The post-Boston report... I put in a 50-mile taper week with 4x mile / 75" tune-up on Wednesday. I figured I was about 2:38 fit on a neutral day.

It was an incredible weekend in Boston (my first time running Boston, 2nd time out there for the race). We enjoyed all the pre-race pomp and circumstance throughout the weekend and felt really well prepared come Monday morning.

Based on wind and light rain predictions, I planned to try to go out in 1:20 through the half, pick up a bit through the hills, and then hammer home after Heartbreak. The race went relatively according to plan early, hitting the water stations and getting a gel down every 26'. I was a little quick at 1:19:32 through the half, but felt like I wasn't as comfortable as I wanted to be, so just try to conserve and chill out through Newton and hopefully be ready to roll home.

By the time I got to the first of the Newton Hills around 16 miles I could feel I was working a bit harder than I wanted to but managed them. Then at the bottom of Heartbreak my left calf started to cramp, and by the top my right quad joined in. It was all I could do to keep them from completely grabbing, so instead of pushing to the finish I went into survival mode the last 5 miles. Left quad started cramping at 24 miles, held it together long enough to get to the finish. Not the race I wanted but it's what I had on the day, and the atmosphere and crowds were absolutely amazing! It was a good day, no buts about it.

5k splits: 18:44, 18:48, 18:56, 18:55, 18:50, 19:33, 20:14, 19:57, 2:42:43

Hey, all! I've been off the thread for a few weeks, so catching up today.

DickM: Congrats! You didn't let your late-race issues slow you very much, by my estimation. Very impressive!

Rtype: Good to "see" you again. I'll be 64 this summer. Seems there are a number of us here, all close to that age.

Sonogno: You're bouncing back nicely after your ordeal (to which I can relate from my own recent past, if you recall).

amkelley: Always good to see your posts, and that 1.1-mile continuous run is indeed encouraging! Where were your hilly loops back your Upstate NY days? My undergrad years were at RIT, and I never really noticed any significant hills. Well, that is until I ran a half marathon in Rochester a few years back, ha! Been living in the "flatlands" too long, I guess.

Charlie: I'm really looking forward to your upcoming track races.

CM: Always impressive! Wishing you another great year of racing. You're another "formerly and briefly" upstate new yorker as I recall!

Meanwhile, with no racing plans, I'm struggling to find sufficient motivation. I'm still nearly 20 pounds over "normal" weight, and 30 pounds over "race" weight.

I've been procrastinating, so my back issues remain undiagnosed and unresolved (constant pain, lack of mobility ... a routine pre-op x-ray showed multiple spinal fractures last September). Knees still limit me to three runs per week, but, oh well. I've been on the bike, though, even a couple road loops during our recent brief bit of summer-like weather. Snow since then.

Be well!

Odd to see my 800m time from yesterday is #1 in the U.S. rankings. I finally raced a 800 !

Actually, looking at the M55 rankings, that time would be like 9th in world right now- not that it makes any difference and I get it, it is early and there are many fast times to come. I am no match for the top guys.

Well, the first 16 weeks of the year I averaged 16 miles a week. I'm counting all junk recovery 100, 200 jogs between intervals! LOL. Total 256.75mi.

Time to up my mileage to a whopping 20 per week. I have done speed work, but nothing specific really to the 800m a400m400 for the most part is the longest interval.

I should knock 6 seconds off my 800 time over 6 weeks with targeted intervals (I think).

Cheers!

Wow, knocking 8 seconds off is A LOT! What is your current time?

Greetings!

DickMargarita: great result, my congratulations! Your “survival mode” pace is a dream for
absolute majority!

Amkelley: good to read your posts and know you do not give up!

Allen1959: best of luck with resolving your back issues and return to your “normal” weight.

AG%: can share your 800 m result with us? What was the race?

My week was easy (after the hard previous one) to avoid overstress before the road race on Sat. in my home village.
A regional race with only1.5K participants for all distances this year, but a well-organized one because it is dedicated to the first manned spaceflight (happened back in 1961), and the national space authority sponsors it quite OK (no fees, gifts to all, good services, concert, etc). My son and two elder granddaughters participated, too.

Signed for 5K just to check whether 5 or 10 km is a better distance for me now (ran 10K two
weeks ago in a similar weather). Used the WMA-2023 age grade calculator to compare. The time was 18:28 for which it returned 87.5% for M64. For 38:03/10K on Apr. 9 it was 88.07%. So, for the first time I performed (a little bit) better at 10K than at 5K. No surprise for me though, did not yet work on speed at all after a long winter, and only logged 80 miles of running this season as of today (all the rest was cross training).

There were no age groups here and no “master monsters” to fight with, but all the guys in front of me were young boys. Hope to have the same level of fitness by the fall when I switch to the M65-69 age group and become more competitive in that “campus”.

Happy and injury-free running to all!

A quiet week. That in and of itself is another small step in the right direction.
min reading each of your latest posts, I see similar positive steps. Steady and forward is good.
M: 5.5M @ 10:59 pace

T: 10M @ 10:38 pace

W: 9M hill run @ 10:17 pace

Th: 3.5M @ 11:40 pace

F: off - reduced work pile

Sat: 20M @ 10:02 pace. Very little heel whip and hips/ankles held up just fine on a very hilly long loop.
enjoy the week

Easy report this week. I haven’t run since Boston. I could barely stand up or sit down through Thursday, and it turns out nearly my entire running club who traveled (including me) came down with covid in Boston. Hopefully resuming training today with a very short, easy run.

Happy and safe running.

Coyote, congrats on an excellent race!

DickM, nice job at Boston even if you didn't quite hit expectations. Sounds to me like you held it together really well. Don't push the recovery.

Allen1959, I continue to be amazed at your toughness and determination.

I managed to jog a total of about 8 miles this week, including 2.0 miles continuously this morning. It feels very hard but I'm doing it. It's hard to believe that early in 2020 I was running 10 miles most days, but I haven't run 2 miles at a time since sometime in 2021, so this is huge progress. I think I'll continue jogging every other day, to the extent that I can, and try to slowly increase the distance. (Hey, maybe pretty soon I'll be able to run a 5K--whoopee!)

The Boston Marathon occurred at an ideal time for me on the west coast. I watched some of the early parts at home on TV while eating breakfast and getting ready to go to work, then caught some of the latter parts streaming on my computer, with the race ending just before I had to go teach my Monday class. There's no way I was going to catch London live (1:30-4:00 am) but it sounds like it was a wild race and I hope I can find a replay somewhere (YouTube?) to watch today. I'll paw through the message board to see if anyone has a link.

Happy spring to all!

Congratulations to all who had great race results the last couple of weeks, and congratulations AMK on the continuing improvement in recovering your running ability. I put in a long, slow mileage week to get back on my training plan. It was my first 60+ mile week in several years. 63 total -

M- 9.5 mi with AM 7mi of 400 run/400 walk, PM 2.5mi walk

T- 9.5 mi with AM 7mi of 400 run/400 walk, PM 2.5mi walk

W- 9 mi with 4mi w.u., 5mi at 9:05/mi

Th- 9.5 mi with AM 7mi of 400 run/400 walk, PM 2.5mi walk

F- 8.5 mi easy

S- 6.5 mi hilly trails 9:02/mi

Su- 10.5 mi very easy

Good running to all!

Someone just posted on another thread that 59yr old Jenny Hitchings from NorCal ran 2:49 at the London marathon. That's about 6:27/mi pace. Very impressive!

outstanding! great to hear that you're running again.

and congrats DickM on Boston -- really impressive race.

I had a good week with no significant calf setback -- did have achilles soreness for first time in a long time, but subsiding after a couple days:

M 1:00

Tu 1:15 + 1:00 x-t

W 2:00 with strides + 1 mile at marathon pace (more like half-marathon probably) 7:04

Th 1:10 + 1:00 x-t

F 1:10 + 1:00 x-t

Sa 1:00 with 4 X 800 (200 jog) at 5k effort -- average 3:10

Su 1:05

I course marshaled at a 10k this morning and was right at the 6-mile mark. Having been severely gassed by 800's at 3:10 yesterday I made it a point to note when people were going by at that pace (38:00). Looked like they were moving for sure, but looked steady/doable, not crazy fast. There seems to be some disconnect between the visual and the feeling!

have a great week,

Dave

I course marshaled at a 10k this morning and was right at the 6-mile mark. Having been severely gassed by 800's at 3:10 yesterday I made it a point to note when people were going by at that pace (38:00). Looked like they were moving for sure, but looked steady/doable, not crazy fast. There seems to be some disconnect between the visual and the feeling!

Very interesting you should say that. I course marshaled the Modesto Marathon for the first time four weeks ago and was positioned on a long out-and-back section at about 10.5 and 18 miles. I was surprised at (a) how hard people looked like they were working at the 10.5 mile mark of a marathon, and (b) how slow everyone running slower than about 2:55 pace looked. Only about the first half-dozen runners looked good!

Orient- you mean like submit it in Mastersrankings? I guess it would give me a little false ego boost for like a week. LOL. Not all that great of a time, but would lead outdoor rankings for now I guess.

No comments except to say I enjoy reading / following everyone's adventure of one.

Thanks for posting!

Goal Race Hayward Classic Mile May 7th 2 weeks!
Sub 6 to keep sub 6 streak going at 66
Stretch goal under 5:38 for a 60+ mile PR

Calf tightness
Thursday 10 minutes into a treadmill easy run right gastroc tightened so I STOPPED running and STARTED the massage gun . If I had been outside running I would have been tempted to run thru it.

Sixth tightness in 4 weeks. Six different trigger points. Call me optimistic but I feel like I am making progress one tp at a time!

Monday easy walk bike

Tuesday,Wednesday Zone 2/3 mill 15x2 minutes with 1 minute walk recoveries

Thurs treadmill easy but bailed tight calf after 10 minutes

Friday easy walk bike

XTRN Quality

Saturday bike calfs felt fine Sprint on the bike 4x30 seconds R4minutes , 7 x 2minutes at LT R1 minute

Sunday bike 3 mile hill climb high end of zone 4 most of it out of the saddle. 90 second PR!

Onward!

No mileage to report this week. The traveling and concurrent rest period are in full swing. Lots of walking, but no running except for when I had to hustle back to my room after forgetting my camera. Almost missed the tour bus! The hip is getting better, but there is some lingering soreness in my right ankle. I’m planning on at least one more full week of rest.

Congrats to those who reported impressive race performances. All the best!

Electric bus or did you purchase carbon credits for your trip?.

Oldest finisher at the London Marathon: Age 90. 7:16.