The most dangerous moment in a running injury is apparently the day you feel ready to come back. That's because our cardiovascular system recovers from detraining much faster than our musculoskeletal system.

After a few weeks off, heart and lungs bounce back fairly quickly once you're back to running. However it's much slower for tissues: tendons lose stiffness and resilience during rest, bone mineral density dips. There are even changes to muscle architecture (fascicle length reduces, cross-sectional area shrinks).

That means you feel fit to run at threshold for instance but actually your connective tissues can't safely absorb that. "The engine outpaces the chassis" so to speak.

It goes actually further than that because when you're injured, your nervous system "rewires" your running kinematics to avoid pain. For example with a shorter stride, altered foot strike etc. Those changes become ingrained and tend to stay after the tissues heal and redistribute forces onto joints and muscles that aren't fit for that load.

Research shows this is how athletes enter a reinjury loop where they recover / build fitness /compensate biomechanically / break down / repeat. Many people cycle through this for years.

Objective measurement of tissue readiness and imbalances can be helpful and that's an area where how you feel (no pain, cardio back, energy level...) is not the best indicator. Anyone else been through this? Curious whether people here have found ways to tell when tissues are actually ready vs. when just the pain is gone.

Posting because I've been spiraling about this for a while and want some sanity check from people who actually train.

Stats first: 35F, running consistently for 8 years, marathon PR 3:15 (Chicago 2024), half PR 1:28, 10K 39:57. Hit 3:15 in October on what felt like a comfortable build, was projecting sub 3:05 for spring. Then November-December everything started feeling 30 seconds per mile harder at the same effort. Easy pace went from 8:00s to 8:30-8:45s and felt the same RPE. Tempo work that should be in the 6:40s feels like 6:55-7:00 and I can't hold it as long. MAF heart rate is creeping up at slower paces.

Build details: 55mpw average, peaked at 70 for the fall block, 6 days/week, 1 quality session, 1 long run, rest easy. Sleep averages 7-8hrs (Whoop confirmed). Eating, if anything, more than I was during the fall build because I was trying to support recovery. Cycle normal, no birth control. Not injured. Have done two real deload weeks plus a full 7 days completely off in February (came back worse if anything).

Things I've already considered and tried to rule out by adjusting:

• Overtraining/under-recovery: 70mpw peak was below my historical peak of 80. RHR is actually slightly lower than last year. Whoop strain has been normal.
• Underfueling: tracked intake for two weeks, sitting at roughly 2400-2600 cals/day at 110-115lbs. Higher carb than I usually run.
• Shoes: rotation is the same, new pairs of the daily trainer and supershoe both broken in normally.
• Weather: started in cool November, persisted through cold winter and now into warming spring. Not weather.
• Stress: job is the same, life is the same.

Went to my PCP in February and got the standard "you might be doing too much, consider stress management" which, fair but also I know what overtraining feels like and this isn't that. She ran a CBC, said everything looked normal, didn't run anything beyond that. No ferritin, no vitamin D, no full thyroid.
Before I push for more comprehensive bloodwork anyone here had a slow burn like this where the answer turned out to be one specific deficiency or hormone thing? I'm asking because the women's running literature on this is way thinner than the men's and I want to know what to specifically ask my doctor for. Or if I should just order my own panel since she didn't even run ferritin on a 55mpw female.

Also genuinely open to you might just be overtraining and don't know it. Will not be hurt by it.

Hey everyone!

I am wondering if there is any apps out there, that can help support self-coaching. I don’t like Runna etc, as they plan down to the session. I want to do what I want to do on any given day, not follow a recipe.

So I imagine that I could input my A and B races with goals. Then the app should take care of periodization(according to recognized experts/systems), and tell me what mileage I need to hit, minimum length long run and some rough measure of what quality session(s) I should hit.

I then imagine the app would import my sessions from Strava and give me feedback on each session. It should also keep track on where I am with my sessions vs goals, and how my race time predictions are looking vs goal etc.

Does anything like this exist?

What's everyone up to on this weekend? Racing? Long run? Movie date? Playing with Fido? Talk about that here!

As always, be safe, train smart, and have a great weekend!

Hi everyone!

Sorry if this seems like a stupid question and there is probably a simple answer but how do elite runners organize/run their training cycle’s within a year. Ex. 2024 Olympic to 2025 World Championship.

Do they just do a bunch of 3-4 months blocks of training with recovery weeks? Do they do super long 5+ Month blocks? Year round blocks?

Adderall bumps my resting heart rate up by around 10-15 bpm, and during workouts it’s even more noticeable. If I go out for a run at what would normally feel like a zone 2 effort (on a non-Adderall day), my heart rate is reading about 20 bpm higher than it would be otherwise. So my zone 2 is basically shifted up by 20 beats when I’m medicated.

Should I even bother paying attention to heart rate zones when I’m on Adderall? Or should I just run purely by effort?

Anyone dealt with this and found a good approach? I know I should talk with my doctor but also wanted some real world experience.

Curious how big of a buffer everyone plans for in their pacing when aiming for a time specific goal in race. I have an upcoming HM that I am hoping to go sub 1:45 in. In theory a 4:58 min/km pace would get me there, but we all know that not running perfect tangents, race course running long, watch not being 100% accurate, etc can all cause chip time to run over quite a bit.

In doing the big workouts leading up to the race (I usually go for a 16-18k long run with 2 x 5k at HMP), how much faster should I aim my HMP for in order to feel confident about accounting for the above mentioned factors?

Would love to hear your experiences on any time goals you’ve trained for and how much you went under the “exact pace” in your race pace training to eventually hit your goal. Or if you didn’t, what factors were the biggest contributors in causing you to roll over.

Thanks!

A place to ask questions that don't need their own thread here or just chat a bit.

We have quite a bit of info in the wiki, FAQ, and past posts. Please be sure to give those a look for info on your topic.

Link to Wiki

Link to FAQ

This weekend I'll be racing a half marathon where my original target pace would be ~3:39 min/km, which would put me around 1:17:00. However, the current forecasts predict temperatures of up to 27 degrees C, with the temp at the start line predicted to already be at around 24 C.

I'm totally not heat adapted since I've been training through winter, all outdoor running early in the morning. I have also never run a race where temperatures were above 20 C (still relatively new to running, only consistently training for ~1 year). Current mileage is around 110-120 km/w if that's relevant at all.

I'm well aware that my original goal has gone straight out the window. However, I still want to get the best possible result bearing the conditions in mind. How would those more experienced than myself in both racing and hot weather running suggest I change my race plan for Sunday? By how much should I change my starting pace to try to minimize the chances of crashing and burning? Thanks a lot in advance for your suggestions. I'm nervous for the race but looking forward to the challenge!

I heard someone phrase aging endurance sports in a way that stuck with me.

He said once you get past a certain age, the goal often isn’t getting faster anymore. It’s “slowing down more slowly.”

At first that sounded depressing butut the more I thought about it, the more honest it felt.

He was talking about how after 60 or 65, consistency becomes the whole game. Not because you’re still chasing some giant breakthrough, but because if you stop moving entirely, you usually don’t get all the way back.

What I found interesting is he wasn’t bitter about it at all. He still trains almost every day. Still races. Still spends huge days in the mountains. But the relationship to numbers changed.

Maybe this is obvious to older runners here, but I realized how much of my own motivation still assumes some future version of myself that keeps improving forever and I'm curious how people here think about this shift psychologically.

At what point did running stop being about progression and become more about continuity?

*Edit: Checked my weight this morning:82.10KG(181lbs)(6ft.1 if that's relevant info at all, also)

*Apologies if this is triggering for some*,

i know weight can be a bit of a sensitive topic.

I'm looking to sustain roughly 75-85 miles a week, but i'm a bit heavier than i would like to be at the moment.

I've been eating roughly 4000kcal a day, some days closer to 5000 not including gels during runs. I don't really know what i weigh atm, i'd guess around 85kg(187lbs).

I've been having a slight pain in one of my ankles(never hurts when running) & want to reduce the load on it so it doesn't turn into a bigger problem & i just feel better menetally & physically when i'm roughly 75Ks(165lbs).

Is there anyone who has experience with this? If so how did you manage to keep milage high & do good quality training, while in a caloric deficit?

*Again, sorry if this is a sensative topic for some. Any adive would be very much apprecaited*

M 37, I'm trying to decide if it's worth adding a 7th short day or adding doubles on my easy days. For context, I run 6 days right now, about 60-65mins on my easy days 3x a week, 65-70mins on my workout days 2x a week, and about +105mins on my long run day. I'm looking to increase my volume a little bit, but I don't know if there is any research about the level or rate of adaptation by going to 7 days vs adding in doubles, but taking a full day rest. My goal would be to start with one double of 30mins on one easy day and then slowly build up until I'm at doubles on all my easy days. I know this would be more volume over one additional day or running, but I'm not sure if there is any research that shows going 7 days in a row has some additional benefit.

I have 3 young kids, so I do like having one day off on the weekends to just hang out with them. It also allows me to schedule around any early morning soccer games they might have. On the flip side, adding in a 30min run for one day would not be too difficult to accommodate.

Looking for any literature that indicates what might be better from a training perspective to help make a decision on this.

Hi guys! I've been a lurker for a while. Learned a few things. Great sub! :-)

A few minutes ago I commented on a YouTube Video that was discussing the recent breaking of the 2 hour barrier in London and thought I'd get a livelier discussion on this sub.

Ever since London I couldn't stop thinking about how the record times have progressed given the advances we've had in nutrition, recovery and shoe technology.

The best example for me is Abebe Bikila, who ran 2:15:16.2 in Rome in 1960, in extreme heat, without shoes. That's right — BAREFOOT! The other runners weren't barefoot, but they wore the old racing flats that had virtually no midsole. When you consider everything that has since been measured and optimized — nutrition, recovery, top athletes like Sawe getting their shoes custom-fitted by engineers in labs — the Pro Evo 3 has an energy return of nearly 80% and weighs under 100 grams in a size 9. Keeping all of that in mind, I find an improvement of just over 15 minutes in 66 years far less impressive than the time viewed separately might suggest.

What do you think? Did runners in the 60s just have better pharmacists? ;-) Did they have greater willpower? Do you find a ~ 15 minutes improvement over 66 years — given all the knowledge and developments since then — impressive? Is the ceiling close?

Cheers!

Race Information

• Name: NE PA 5k
• Date: May 16, 2026
• Distance: 5K
• Location: North-Eastern PA
• Time: 16:30

Goals

Splits

Background

31yo Male, 6'1", ~175lbs. Former XC/Track runner in HS, ran on and off through college and some adult life before getting more serious about my running over the last ~3 years or so. Broke my ankle about a year and a half ago, though thankfully I had a fast recovery. Recent past performances:

1mi - 5:02 before ankle break, 5:16 last winter

5k - 17:25 before ankle break, 18:28 spring after

10k - 36:4X end of last summer

Half - 1:19:38, before ankle break

Full - 2:51:18, last fall

Training

The training started in part basically as soon as I got done with my marathon last fall. Five weeks of recovery as dictated by Pfitz, then I made a modified version of his base building program to work on increasing my mileage over the winter converting from a 10 week program to a 15 week program with a slower ramp rate but higher ceiling. The goal was to get weekly mileage up into the mid-60s before starting the Pfitz 12/70 5k plan.

I executed pretty well overall on this plan, probably about 85% after some holiday and pet emergency struggles, and some minor injury towards the end of the plan. For the most part the body felt fine with the training, at some point it was much more psychological with the darkness and cold.

I hit a really strong 61mi week and was feeling great going into the last few weeks of my base building before switching to 5k mode, but out of nowhere on a moderate run that I was otherwise feeling great on, I felt something sharp in my left calf and it was enough to stop me mid-run. It was a mild strain of some variety but it kept me from running for about a week. Just as that cleared up I went on a ski trip and got whacked hard by a ski-lift, giving me a deep bruise in the left glute which also really limited my running for another 2 weeks or so. Then, finally as I was mostly over that, I made the wise decision to skip a run during freezing rain that had iced the sidewalks and roads and decided to just go get groceries instead. Que me taking a hard fall anyways as I walked across a cross walk, which stiffened my neck pretty good for a few days. I was so frustrated at the continual series of injury misfortune I almost wanted to cry. Thankfully running seemed to help loosen the neck issue.

At this point though my mileage had fallen way down at the transition point to the Pfitz 12/70 plan, so I had to modify the first three weeks of that plan to give a better ramp to the appropriate mileage/intensity. Thankfully once I got back to speed there I had no more run-ins with injury, only some little niggles that would pop up here or there from the training load but otherwise fade away quickly. Execution from week 4 on was 100% as planned. Average weekly mileage ended up being 55.8mpw, (60.5mpw discounting the first 3 weeks). Peak mileage week at 70.5mi.

Going from 5, to 6, to 7 days per week running was definitely a bit of a shift for me. Thankfully it actually seemed easier doing 60-70mi over 7 days vs 50-60mi over 6 days in the dark/cold. The recovery runs, especially the 2-a-days, felt really brutal actually. Slow slogs on trashed legs, but they seemed to do their job well because on the actual quality days my legs performed well. In addition to the running, I was also pretty consistently getting 1-3 lifting sessions in following Tactical Barbell training philosophy, focusing on the main compound lifts (squat, deadlift, pullups, bench press) and some accessories. I also started getting in about a 1hr pool session most weeks, mostly keeping it easy and just focusing on form/skills, as I wanted to build some extra comfortability in anticipation of getting my SCUBA certification this coming June. Sleep and nutrition were definitely weak points over the course of the training in general.

As the mileage approached peak, the legs were feeling properly dumpstered. Luckily any amount of extra recovery or tapering seemed to allow them to freshen up quickly. The tune-up races went well. I did both as 5ks, and they were on much harder courses than my actual target race (Both tune-ups had some brutal uphill in the last mile). The first tune-up was a 2nd place finish at 17:32, which I could have done better but I saved too much not knowing the exact hill situation at the end. The next tune-up was a 17:13 and 1st place finish. Pretty much as soon as I got into the 2 week taper my legs were feeling ready to rock and it was hard to keep my pace dialed back on runs. Pre-race nerves really lowered my appetite in the two tapering weeks, so I think I under-ate overall and the body weight dropped a little bit.

Pre-race

Nothing special for dinner the night before. I could have also done a better job of getting sleep on the two nights before, but I had other things going on that were worth staying up a bit for. Wake-up time was 6am with the race at 9:30am. Had a few packs of fruit snacks and some water. My normal pre-race is a bagel with peanut butter and honey + orange juice but the week was too busy for groceries. I drove out to the race and did my standard warm-up: 2mi easy-moderate followed by dynamic stretches and form drills. 10min before race start I shed my warm-ups and did a few strides before heading to the line. My cousin helps organize the race so he gave me the scoop on the college-aged kid that won the 10K, and that he was going to run the 5k as well (And felt very cocky in his chances of winning).

Race

Weather was a sunny/warm 60F, not very humid, and with a slight breeze. I noticed a familiar runner that I've raced against before several times, and felt reassured that at least the cocky college student wasn't going to win. The gun went off and I started a little hot but caught myself and dialed it back within the first 400m. As the familiar runner passed me I asked if his goal was <16 today (It was), then wished him luck while I focused in on my own race. The first mile came through at 5:18, which was kinda at the top end of what I was going to allow myself, yet my legs were feeling so fresh that I still felt like I was holding back. I felt like I could have easily sent a sub-5mi that morning if I didn't have to worry about running 2 more after.

Mile 2 was 5:17, I just held on and stayed controlled on my pace. The legs were still feeling pretty good but I didn't feel like I was burning out, and somewhere within this mile I felt extremely confident that my <17:00 goal was locked in, and now the question was just how much further under could I get.

Mile 3 was 5:13. I knew this course well, and that it was essentially entirely flat so there were no killer hills to save for in the final act. The only downside was that I had no competition to push off of. First place was 30s in front of me, and college kid was nowhere to be seen (About 1min behind). I feel like if I had someone to race against in the last mile I could have definitely pushed the time down even more. The official time ended up being 16:30, though the course is slightly long at 3.16mi and my watch caught 16:17 as the strict 5k split.

Post-race

I was quite over-joyed with the race outcome. Truly crushed my goal with a huge lifetime PR during a well executed race on a nice day. I went and congratulated first place and chatted with him for a bit. He is 10 years older than me, and there's nothing I like more than being beaten by people older than me like that, as it just proves that you can stay fast for a long time if you keep putting the work in. I also chatted a bit with 2nd place, who was beating themselves up a bit, but I reassured them that he still ran an excellent time that definitely indicates his Boston marathon qualifying goal for a marathon later this year is well within reach. After my post-race conversations I went on a nice easy 4mi recovery trail run along the river (That I probably ran too hard, but the adrenaline and post race high could not be stopped). The strong race performance really shifted some of my own goals for the marathon I'll be doing in the fall. Whereas before I was thinking ~2:45, now I'm thinking <2:40 might be the more appropriate goal, especially knowing myself in that my longer race performances trend proportionately better than my shorter races. My plan for this summer is the 18/85 from Pfitz, in addition to really focusing on not injuring myself, as I feel that is truly the only thing that would prevent a solid marathon performance and Boston qualification this Fall.

Made with a new race report generator created by u/herumph.

A place to ask questions that don't need their own thread here or just chat a bit.

We have quite a bit of info in the wiki, FAQ, and past posts. Please be sure to give those a look for info on your topic.

Link to Wiki

Link to FAQ

Two weeks ago I ran a marathon in 3:19. I had done a full Daniels 2Q training plan consistently hitting 65-70 mpw for many weeks leading up to the taper. I did a mild negative split in the marathon, and I felt my execution was good in both training and the race. I might be able to go a little faster than 3:19 in better conditions, but I feel that 3:19 was near the limit of my realistic abilities given my fitness. This marathon time corresponds to as VDot of between 47 and 48.

Yesterday for the heck of it I did a parkrun 5k in just over 19 minutes. I did no special training or prep for a 5k, and this was the first run above E pace since the marathon. This 5k time corresponds to a VDot of 52-53.

My 5k VDot suggests a marathon equivalent time around 3:03, which seems well beyond my reach.

Is this sort of discrepancy across distances typical? I just got back into competitive running about 7 months ago after over 17 years of no competitive running, so perhaps I just need more years of consistent running to have VDot be more consistent across distances?

If it matters, I am 60yo, male.