a mystery

[crumpyb1]

I was wondering if anyone could help me solve a little mystery. 

How in the world did I run the 10K last Saturday in 50:49?

I thought my "gold medal" performance would be an average of 8:40 a mile.  And I wasn't so sure I'd get that.  I don't feel like I've really been training.  I barely started running over 16 miles a week again.

At the end of the race, I felt like I was going to crash any minute, but I didn't.  Is this how you are supposed to run races?  Have I never really run a race before?  Or did I run a normal race and my legs were on fire because I'm out of shape?  Or is fast pace due to the pickle I ate before the race?

[Blaine Hawkes]

What I have found is that with my races I tend to run faster than what I was training at. The more mileage I put in the better my endurance so I am able to push myself longer at a faster pace for a longer distance.

For the 10K that I ran last Saturday I had been training around a 7:40 pace yet I was around a 7:20 pace for the race. I attribute this to the fact that I am now competing with others so I like to pass or hold steady rather than being passed (I drive this way too so it could just be me) and the adrenaline factor comes into play.

You could also test the pickle theory at another race...you could be on to something.

[crumpyb1]

Blaine, I do like to pass and to not be passed.

And now I've learned even more information about my past month and a half of "training."  Two to three times a week I run with a friend that has a Garmin.  She told me yesterday that we average 11:30 minute miles!

11:30 miles in "training" can produce 8:11 miles in races?

Or did all my past years of training stay with me through pregnancy and a c-section better than I thought it would?

[Bonnie]

Adrenaline is a great thing.  Crumpy - it is not unusual to run up to 1.5 - 2 mins/mile faster in a race than your training pace.  As a matter of fact, if you run a majority of your mileage easy with some race specific pace-work (maybe 10% of your mileage) thrown in, you can pretty much be assured of it.  As a matter of fact, it is much more common to NOT be able to run that much faster in a race if you run your "easy" runs too hard. 

Congratulations on your race!!

[Sasha Pachev]

Adrianne:

Some thoughts. Your previous PR of 50:46 was reached on a beast of a course at a higher altitude. It was also reached off the training that was not that much better than what you've been doing now. So really not that much of a mystery.

Some of the past fitness carried over, and also the training was not that much worse. You can run most of your miles in the 11:00 range, especially if you do it with a stroller, and race around 8:00. Aerobic fitness is developed as long as the pace is somewhat reasonable, and it does not need to get anywhere close to race pace for those purposes. Specific race pace training helps develop muscular strength, neural drive, running economy at race pace, and mental toughness. Your performance is determined roughly 90% by your aerobic conditioning and only 10% by race specific conditioning.

As to what you could do off more consistent training. My rough feeling is that you could run a 3:20 marathon off consistent 55 miles a week if you did it for a year without breaks. 5 K would get up to around 21:00, half around 1:34.

[crumpyb1]

Thanks Bonnie.

Thanks Sasha.  Thanks for making this mystery history!  However, I have a couple more questions. 
1) Would strides and tempo runs be the 10% race specific conditioning?
 
2)Should I try to pick up the 11 minute pace just a touch when running without a stroller, say by a half to a whole minute?

[Jon Allen]

Adrianne- just because Sasha says 11 minute pace doesn't mean you have to run "11 min pace".  Just run what feels comfortable and at a pace you can recover from the next day- Sasha is just guessing that means about 11 min pace for you.  Some days may be faster, some slower.  Don't get hung up on the pace too much and try to run exactly that speed every day..

And yes, you will run 30 sec-1 min faster without the stroller, but with even effort. 

[Sasha Pachev]

Jon had good thoughts.

Running faster than 11:00 OK. I was just saying that the aerobic conditioning will still happen at a pace as slow as 11:00. So if you need to slow down to 11:00 to go further, then slow down. Tempo runs/pickups are OK at this point if you feel they do not make you cut your mileage.

At any point in your training you can be limited either by muscular power/neural drive or by the aerobic fitness. Most people who run less than 60 miles a week will be limited by aerobic fitness. I have seen cases where the limit appeared to be neuromuscular in a few people who have not been running quite that much, but they were women over 50 years old, and they were running around 40 miles a week, but not 20.

So it is safe to assume that right now your limit is aerobic. Thus the goal is to improve aerobic power. So we do everything we can to increase the mileage. Everything else is an add-on. If we can do it while increasing the mileage, we get a little bit of extra benefit. If not, do not worry about it.