rules of running



"schuburg" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> 1.- the 10% per week mileage increase rule
> 2.- the do-not-run-within-2-hours-of-eating rule
> 3.- the 1 minute slower than marathon pace rule
> 4.- the once a week speedwork rule
> 5.- the do-not-run-for-a-month-after-a-marathon rule
> 6.- the 90% of miles are easy miles rule
>
> etcetera... what other rules can you think of?

One easy day for every mile raced, to insure recovery. It takes a minimum of 48 hours for a youth's
muscles to recover, more for most of us. Seasonal periodicity helps performance. Legs recover faster
from runs on natural surfaces.

These, and other rules all attempt to regulate volume and pace to allow sufficient recovery between
efforts, so we improve and avoid injury. Maybe, we need to adopt methods for training horses, except
for the part where they shoot them.
 
7- "A group of girl scouts appears from around the bend when stop behind a tree to pee".
 
On Sun, 7 Dec 2003 16:31:58 +0000 (UTC), Donovan Rebbechi <[email protected]> wrote:

>In article <[email protected]>, rick++ wrote:
>> 7- "A group of girl scouts appears from around the bend when stop behind a tree to pee".
>
>I think a better name for this thread would have been "Law of Running" (-;

Well in Donovans case it's because he's hiding in the bushes with his pants down.
 
On Fri, 05 Dec 2003 23:21:58 GMT, schuburg <[email protected]> wrote:

>1.- the 10% per week mileage increase rule

Makes sense, but is somewhat overly simplistic. For example, it certainly does no harm to run 25
miles one week, 15 the next, and 25 again the next.

>2.- the do-not-run-within-2-hours-of-eating rule

Depend on what you ate.

>3.- the 1 minute slower than marathon pace rule

If you're training for a marathon by running 26.2 miles, that would make sense. For normal training
runs, I stay within one minute of race pace for whatever distance I'm running.

>4.- the once a week speedwork rule

That should be the absolute minimum.

>5.- the do-not-run-for-a-month-after-a-marathon rule

If you're injured, maybe. If not, maybe a week would be reasonable.

>6.- the 90% of miles are easy miles rule

Do that, and you're wasting ~60% of your training time, unless you're tapering or you've just
recovered from an injury.

>
>etcetera... what other rules can you think of?

Mr. Hanky says you should be wearing socks to sleep.
 
In article <[email protected]>, Radioactive Man wrote:
> On Fri, 05 Dec 2003 23:21:58 GMT, schuburg <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>1.- the 10% per week mileage increase rule
>
> Makes sense, but is somewhat overly simplistic. For example, it certainly does no harm to run 25
> miles one week, 15 the next, and 25 again the next.

Under most circumstances, that would be a bad idea (it's a very inconsistent way to train)

>>3.- the 1 minute slower than marathon pace rule
>
> If you're training for a marathon by running 26.2 miles, that would make sense.

It makes sense anyway. That is a rule-of-thumb way to approximate 70% of VO2 max. It might not be a
terribly good way to do so, but it does have a physiological basis ...

> For normal training runs, I stay within one minute of race pace for whatever distance I'm running.

On the other hand, this has absolutely no scientific basis, and I bet you can neither find a
reputable coach who recommends this, nor explain what the purpose of such a training run is.

I'd argue that the distance you're racing has nothing to do with appropriate training pace, and you
should use the same training pace for a given run regardless of the distance you are racing.

>>4.- the once a week speedwork rule
>
> That should be the absolute minimum.

Wrong.

>>6.- the 90% of miles are easy miles rule
>
> Do that, and you're wasting ~60% of your training time, unless you're tapering or you've just
> recovered from an injury.

Wrong.

Cheers,
--
Donovan Rebbechi http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/
 
"Bill" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:<[email protected]>...
> "schuburg" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > 1.- the 10% per week mileage increase rule
> > 2.- the do-not-run-within-2-hours-of-eating rule
> > 3.- the 1 minute slower than marathon pace rule
> > 4.- the once a week speedwork rule
> > 5.- the do-not-run-for-a-month-after-a-marathon rule
> > 6.- the 90% of miles are easy miles rule
> >
> > etcetera... what other rules can you think of?
>
> One easy day for every mile raced, to insure recovery. It takes a minimum of 48 hours for a
> youth's muscles to recover, more for most of us. Seasonal periodicity helps performance. Legs
> recover faster from runs on natural surfaces.
>
> These, and other rules all attempt to regulate volume and pace to allow sufficient recovery
> between efforts, so we improve and avoid injury. Maybe, we need to adopt methods for training
> horses, except for the part where they shoot them.

Dear schuburg,

I wonder wheere some of those rules you listed come from. Did you make the list or get it from
somewhere on the web? You'd do well to consult the Running FAQ www.faqs.org/faqs/running-faq There
you can see the 10% rule is listed for beginners for example. And the notions of variation between
runners is noted also.

HTH,
Ed
 
Donovan Rebbechi <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...

> > Makes sense, but is somewhat overly simplistic. For example, it certainly does no harm to run 25
> > miles one week, 15 the next, and 25 again the next.

> Under most circumstances, that would be a bad idea (it's a very inconsistent way to train)

What about 100, 100, 70?

And 100, 100, 70; 100, 100, 70; 110, 110, 80; 110, 110, 80?

OTOH, an increase by 25% doesn´t have to be a bad idea, providing you´ll plateau for 8 weeks or so,
you have a good solid base and asome sort of hard/easy (days/weeks) rotation.

Even a 100% increase mustn´t have to be completely loony: a 100, 200, 50, 150, 100 can be used with
good effect *once* during a training phase.

> I'd argue that the distance you're racing has nothing to do with appropriate training pace, and
> you should use the same training pace for a given run regardless of the distance you are racing.

FWIW I´ve stumbled on a variation of the "for a 5K/10K/
21.1K long training run your pace is n % of your 5K/10K/ HM race pace" "rule":

"When you train at your 5K/10K/HM race pace, the length of the run is n % of 5K/10K/21.1K. For
intervals, the sum of your repeats is n+m %."

I cannot recall the percentages, but I´m sure you get the idea:)

This rule of thumb is not entirely silly, but...

> >>4.- the once a week speedwork rule
> > That should be the absolute minimum.

> Wrong.

Not necessarily speedwork as such, but surely *some* kind of faster running: a fartlek run or a
tempo run?

Or put this way: over 85% of HRmax once a week?

(And outside the three or so months of base building, over 85% once a week and over 90% ditto?)

> >>6.- the 90% of miles are easy miles rule
> > Do that, and you're wasting ~60% of your training time, unless you're tapering or you've just
> > recovered from an injury.

> Wrong.

Provided you get those two weekly intensity sessions in, you cannot, in principle, really do too
much running at around 70%.

(Which is not to say, that the percentages would have to be anywahere near similar for runners at
vastly different stages of their running career and life...)

Anders
 
In article <[email protected]>, Anders Lustig wrote:
> Donovan Rebbechi <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...
>
>> > Makes sense, but is somewhat overly simplistic. For example, it certainly does no harm to run
>> > 25 miles one week, 15 the next, and 25 again the next.
>
>> Under most circumstances, that would be a bad idea (it's a very inconsistent way to train)
>
> What about 100, 100, 70?
>
> And 100, 100, 70; 100, 100, 70; 110, 110, 80; 110, 110, 80?

Hence "under most circumstances".

The 10% rule is really talking about milage ramp-ups anyway, not intermittent variation. As I've
pointed out, I believe this should be restated along the lines of 10% every 3 weeks as an upper
limit for a milage ramp-up.

> Even a 100% increase mustn´t have to be completely loony: a 100, 200, 50, 150, 100 can be used
> with good effect *once* during a training phase.

I wouldn't do this. It's probably effective, but also risky. It's a fairly extreme example of
over-reaching.

>> I'd argue that the distance you're racing has nothing to do with appropriate training pace, and
>> you should use the same training pace for a given run regardless of the distance you are racing.
>
> FWIW I´ve stumbled on a variation of the "for a 5K/10K/
> 21.1K long training run your pace is n % of your 5K/10K/ HM race pace" "rule":

There is no scientific basis for this rule, and probably no empirical basis either.

> "When you train at your 5K/10K/HM race pace, the length of the run is n % of 5K/10K/21.1K. For
> intervals, the sum of your repeats is n+m %."

See above. Especially for 5k, the idea of doing 1/4 the milage you'd do for the HM is just silly.
That's like saying that 15mpw for a 5k runner is comparable to a 67mpw program for a HM runner. I
would bet that the 60mpw HM program would produce much faster times for both the HM *and* the 5k.

> This rule of thumb is not entirely silly, but...

(-; I think we're on the same page.

>> >>4.- the once a week speedwork rule
>> > That should be the absolute minimum.
>
>> Wrong.
>
> Not necessarily speedwork as such, but surely *some* kind of faster running: a fartlek run or a
> tempo run?

Not necessarily.

First, for beginners, it's not at all necessary, and perhaps not even desirable to do any speed
work. It's more important to build a consistent training base. For a beginner, the "base building
phase" could well go for a year or so.

Secondly, as you noted further down, a long term program could include a base-building phase.
There isn't any real "minimum" anmount of speed work required for base building, or none that
I've heard of.

Cheers,
--
Donovan Rebbechi http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/
 
In article <[email protected]>, Big **** wrote:
> Donovan Rebbechi <[email protected]> wrote in message
>
> Imagine a TREADMILL JOGGER giving advice on REAL running? I guess I've seen it all now.

Yeah, a "treadmill jogger" like Ingrid Kristiansen or Chris Clark, or Bob Glover as opposed to a
"real" runner like an anonymous usenet moron. Suuuurre.

Cheers,
--
Donovan Rebbechi http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/
 
Donovan Rebbechi <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...

> > Even a 100% increase mustn´t have to be completely loony: a 100, 200, 50, 150, 100 can be used
> > with good effect *once* during a training phase.

> I wouldn't do this. It's probably effective, but also risky. It's a fairly extreme example of over-
> reaching.

It does smack a little of the 1970s when the ships were made of wood and the men of iron...

OTOH when you have a few years of running behind you and that hundred is truly a 100 and not a 150,
so to speask, it doesn´t have to be: you just have to go easy on intensity and take care of daily
recovery a.d be really conscientous about not exceeding the 50.

> > "When you train at your 5K/10K/HM race pace, the length of the run is n % of 5K/10K/21.1K. For
> > intervals, the sum of your repeats is n+m %."

> See above. Especially for 5k, the idea of doing 1/4 the milage you'd do for the HM is just silly.
> That's like saying that 15mpw for a 5k runner is comparable to a 67mpw program for a HM runner. I
> would bet that the 60mpw HM program would produce much faster times for both the HM *and* the 5k.

The idea of this rule having anything to do with total weekly mileage is so silly it never
occurred to me:)

The rule is supposed to apply to the length of a single run/session.

Anders
 
In article <[email protected]>, Anders Lustig wrote:
> Donovan Rebbechi <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...

> The idea of this rule having anything to do with total weekly mileage is so silly it never
> occurred to me:)
>
> The rule is supposed to apply to the length of a single run/session.

It's still absurd. That means that if the half marathon runner's "typical" training run is 10 miles,
then it follows by this "rule" that the 5k specialist should do 2.5 miles on his typical training
run, the 3k specialist should do
1.3 miles, and the marathon specialist should do 20 miles (not on a long run, but on a *typical
training run*)

It's a stupid rule with no basis in physiology, regardless of how you look at it.

Cheers,
--
Donovan Rebbechi http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/
 
Donovan Rebbechi <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...

> > The rule is supposed to apply to the length of a single run/session.

> It's still absurd. That means that if the half marathon runner's "typical" training run is 10
> miles, then it follows by this "rule" that the 5k specialist should do 2.5 miles on his typical
> training run, the 3k specialist should do 1.3 miles, and the marathon specialist should do 20
> miles (not on a long run, but on a *typical training run*)

I´m absolutely sure that the promulgators of the rule never implied anything about the lenght of
"typical training runs", and I´m pretty sure nothing that I wrote suggested it, either - but since
I´m not a native speaker I cannot be *quite* sure:)

The rule never even addresses the runner´s specialty! All it says is that a single run at any given
race pace should be a certain percentage of that race distance (and it claims, as such rules of
thumb claim, that percentage to be the same for runs at all paces.

(A 5K specialist would, of course, do a lot of running at other paces, some of it faster and some
slower, as would the marathon specialist, but the rule never proposes to say how much in weekly
total or in what combination etc.)

> It's a stupid rule with no basis in physiology, regardless of how you look at > it.

Well, a rule that states that you shouldn´t run, for instance, 5K at 5K pace in training can never
be *completely* stupid:)

There is, quite probably, for every training pace a certain run length/race distance ratio, which it
is, for quite sound physiological reasons, not sensible to exceeed.

Whether there is a ratio at which it would be *optimal* to train is more questionable (and at that
point the rule has turned into "old coaches´ wisdom" in the pejorative sense...).

Anders
 
I would classify these as guidelines and conservative at that.

"schuburg" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> 1.- the 10% per week mileage increase rule
Even following this in 8 weeks one would double the mileage one is running. A better guideline
might be "not to exceed 10%, although for some people that might be too conservative.
> 2.- the do-not-run-within-2-hours-of-eating rule
Well it depends. I can run within an hour of eating oatmeal.
> 3.- the 1 minute slower than marathon pace rule
Maybe, but this seems incomplete
> 4.- the once a week speedwork rule
When beginning speedwork perhaps, but once a base is built one can do two sessions per week.
Now I do not recommend this for beginners.
> 5.- the do-not-run-for-a-month-after-a-marathon rule
Maybe do not run "hard", but as with the others, this is individual. I bet Doug feels great
the weeks following a "mere" marathon.
> 6.- the 90% of miles are easy miles rule
Depends on one's goals. But that is pretty high to me.
>
> etcetera... what other rules can you think of?

The only rule I say is a rule is "Listen to your body."
 
"Bill" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "schuburg" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > 1.- the 10% per week mileage increase rule
> > 2.- the do-not-run-within-2-hours-of-eating rule
> > 3.- the 1 minute slower than marathon pace rule
> > 4.- the once a week speedwork rule
> > 5.- the do-not-run-for-a-month-after-a-marathon rule
> > 6.- the 90% of miles are easy miles rule
> >
> > etcetera... what other rules can you think of?
>
> One easy day for every mile raced, to insure recovery. It takes a minimum of 48 hours for a
> youth's muscles to recover, more for most of us.

A few papers have shown that the recovery period is on the order of 36 hours, but as you note it
depends. I know that at my age I am not recovering as fast as when I was 20.
> Seasonal periodicity helps performance. Legs recover faster from runs on natural surfaces.
>
> These, and other rules all attempt to regulate volume and pace to allow sufficient recovery
> between efforts, so we improve and avoid injury.
Maybe,
> we need to adopt methods for training horses, except for the part where
they
> shoot them.
 
Sam wrote:

> A few papers have shown that the recovery period is on the order of 36 hours, but as you note
> it depends.
And interesting discussion on the "36" hour recovery by Owen Anderson from Running Research News is
at http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/0002.htm

I know that at my age I am not
> recovering as fast as when I was 20.

You ain't seen nuttin' yet. Wait till MENopuse hits. ;)

--
Doug Freese "Caveat Lector" [email protected]
 
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