"There are no compromises." -Once a runner

Hey Man, what is you goal! Your pounding out some pretty impressive miles. Are you setting your sights on a PR/BQ marathon? Where do you find the time to get out and run while in Med school? What kind of nutrution program are you using to lose and maintain your weight at 150 lbs?

1/2 marathon challenge with 2 friends. I would really like to move to the next level with my running. Ive gone 1:18:47 for 1/2 but would like to take that below 1:16 or even below 1:15. Im in 4th year med school. The first 3 years are hard but the 4th is not so bad. Also right now im on a 2 week vacation. I have been hitting the miles hard but super slow so now im thinking i need to take a dif approach for a while. As for nutrition just counting calories and staying well negetive every day. Eat filling low cal stuff like beans and vegies. I was as high as 178 but now down to 157 but not really losing. Gonna step that back up in another week when i can control my diet.

interesting idea with the pace, although it definitely does sound like it goes back on "easy on easy runs" lol. see how it goes, but if you aren't recovering quite right, then idk. i think we were trying to do that over here, but without upping the mileage first... it makes more sense the way you're doing it, but still listen to your body and see if it's working for you.

i'm not sure how much of running fast for a long time is muscle memory. it's more about muscle endurance and power. I think it's good to spice things up a little and keep things interesting. it will be hard to judge which turns out better because there's no control for yourself. you did pretty awesome last year on high mileage alone. if you want to run sub 6, i'm not sure running 7 min pace vs 8 min pace will really help since 7 pace is not 5 min pace. i know henry's dramatic improvement with minimal miles at a faster pace may entice you to copy his routine but you can't fight superior genetics. you just need to find your event. i know if i want to be competitive i have to do trail races, and long ones at that. not only am i relatively better on trails but almost no one does them. you may be a gifted beer miler.

i also want to throw in about my dramatic improvement that i would not say it was from the faster miles at the start of the summer. i'm doing slower ones again now and feel like i will be able to perform more in the workouts, where it counts, because of it.

running fast for a long time is about efficiency. You can gain that a few ways. Train your muscles to be able to use tons of oxygen (best done with mileage, threshold, and vo2max work). You can lose weight so u have to put out less energy to move yourself forward. Or you can improve running economy (the energy it takes to move the same mass forward). I have done about what i can in the first department. I am working on my weight. But the economy is possibly the biggest piece yet the least straight forward to train. Speed, hills, drills, stretching, striders, and mileage are thought to improve efficiency. But pfitzinger thinks that mileage significantly slower than race pace doesnt help efficiency. Remember when we were training for that marathon you started doing your long runs at 7:30 pace because of what he said in his book. I think he is on to something and also ive maxed out what i can do in most other areas. Im not gonna see a huge boost by just continuing to pound out 80 mile weeks. As for workouts, i need a freaking treadmill. This weather is totally unacceptable to do workouts in. Gonna do 5k on saturday then find a gym to join in bham to do workouts on a treadmill.