What does it look like?

So since starting this blog I have had a few requests to show what its like to train in a true Lydiard style.

I find it a bit strange to do a blog like this as all the training I am doing is already documented in all of the Lydiard books. Barry has always said that it is not Barry's training philosophy its Arthur's philosophy and hes just passing it down. So with that said here's what my training has looked like since starting true marathon training.

Generally the aim has been on building base and therefore aerobic capacity. This has meant a lot of miles and a lot of quality work. This has meant that the general look of my week has been the same week in week out.

Monday AM: 60 Min Easy Jog ~ 4:30-5min/Km
Monday PM: 15min Warm up / 60min @ tempo pace (Hilly Course)  / 10min warm down

Tuesday AM: 60min Easy Jog ~ 4:30-5min/Km
Tuesday PM: 1:30 - 1:45 easy run over hills

Wednesday AM: 60 Min Easy Jog ~ 4:30-5min/Km
Wednesday PM: 75min Hilly Fartlek.

Thursday AM: 60 Min Easy Jog ~ 4:30-5min/Km
Thursday PM: 2hrs Moderate run

Friday AM: 60 Min Easy Jog ~ 4:30-5min/Km
Friday PM: 15min Warm up / 60min @ tempo pace (Flat) / 10min warm down

Saturday AM: 1:30 Easy pace
Saturday PM: 60 Min Easy Jog ~ 4:30-5min/Km

Sunday AM: 2:30 Moderate effort
Sunday PM: REST

So this is what my weeks have looked like for the 6 weeks leading up to the Legend.
Obviously this is a large amount of running however it also contained a lot of quality with the 3 workout days a week. One of the keys to a conditioning like this is to never go into an anaerobic state as it begins to destroy the aerobic base which you are trying to create. Even during the Workout days it was important to stay completely in control of your effort and never really go into the well.  One of the Keys to a great conditioning block is the amount of time spent on your feet and the cumulative effect of weeks of high mileage running. During the first 6 weeks of my conditioning I averaged 221kms a week. This is so clear as you can see the pace of my tempo runs come down as I got progressively fitter. The first tempo of the conditioning was 60min at a pace of 3:34/km, whereas my most recent tempo was at 3:25/km. A HUGE difference!

During this time I unfortunately haven't had the luxury of avoiding  racing during this period as there were 2 championships that i needed to navigate on the way. The First that I came up against was the Auckland Championships. While this did hold some importance as any chamiopnship does, It was obviously not the most important as my aim was simply to make the team for nationals which meant a top 6 finish would likely be enough. However racing with the goal of only finishing a certain place is a dangerous idea. So of course I knew that I must run for the best place i could.

One of the secrets to Lydiard training is the ability to race at any time and race well. This comes simply from being so strong after having weeks of conditioning in your legs. People often talk about racing through, this is what I have been doing in the build up to the Legend. A race like the Auckland champs clearly evidences how strong Lydiard conditioning makes you. In the week leading up to the championships I followed the above schedule with the exception of Friday and Saturday. On Friday I swapped my tempo for 60min Easy + 5x200m strides and a 30min easy Jog on Saturday. This meant that prior to the race even beginning I had run 202km!

For most athletes this sort of mileage would leave them exhausted and certainly not able to race, but a Lydiard trained athlete has the strength to be able to produce a solid race. The one kicker to this is that your speed is dulled slightly after such a big week. So to counter this I needed to change my racing strategy slightly. Jono and I came up with a strategy where we could work together to get the best possible result for the both of us. We decided that we would sit in and just go with whatever the pace was. It turned out to be quite slow which worked in our favor. WE knew that to make the most of our strength it was important to try and make it a long stretch of high speed. With 4.5km to go, on an uphill section we put the hammer down and together manged to break away from the rest of the pack. This was the perfect strategy as we finished up going 1-2. The speed at which the second half of the race was run was highlighted by the 45 second negative split.

The week of nationals and the Legend followed much the same strategy with both races coming off huge mileage weeks.

With this sort of blog I do feel an obligation to have a disclaimer. While anyone can do Lydiard training it is important to not think that anyone can do this without proper training. I have only been able to build up to putting in this sort of mileage over the last 3 years. It is not like one day I woke up and decided to run this sort of mileage. Conditioning is not just about building an aerobic base but also building up your muscles, ligaments, tendons and bones to be able to hand such a heavy load without breaking down.

The year so far...

So now everyone has a decent idea about my background it's time for a review of the year so I can start writing some meaningful posts!

What a year it has been!
I'll start from the beginning, generally the best blade to start!

Janurary
This month started off pretty tamely, with no big races too early in the year I could focus on putting in solid training! I did the Tauranga twilight meet again and had a decent run, considering the antics that went on the night before, any run is decent.
My first major race of the season came in the form of the NZ 10,000m champs. I ran a good race but wasn't quite as strong as I would have liked. I finished up 8th in 31:18:58, a huge PB.  This pretty much rounded up January and gave me a solid platform to build the remainder of my season.

February 
Coming off a solid 10,000m the next major race on the schedule was the Auckland 3000m champs. After skipping all the classic races this year I really hoped it had paid off and left me in great form to smash a fast 3k. Turns out this is exactly what happened as I had a huge breakthrough by ballsing up and deciding to just follow the early pace no matter what, not something I would normally advise! On this occasion though it turned out great as I hung on for 3rd behind Alex and Jono in a huge 12sec PB of 8:34:24. This pretty much completed my February with only a few small club races left.

March
The start of March signals the start of the most serious month for track. For me this started with the Auckland Championships. At this event i decided to run the 1500m where I had an awesome race. I was sitting in 4th position with 300m to go and kicked hard but still couldn't beat the true speed merchants and finished 4th in 4:00.35 my fastest 1500 of the season. Just over a week later came the Auckland 5000m championships. While I didn't achieve the podium finish that I had hoped or, I did achieve a different goal, one that I had been chasing for a few years, sub 15. I finally managed to break 15 min for the 5k with a 14:54.48 clocking. Just 2 weeks later came the New Zealand Track and Field Champs in Wellington. For the first time i planned to attempt a double up at Nationals with the 5000m and 1500m. Unfortunately my legs did not have it over the second half of the 5k after going through 2k on approximately 14:40 pace as I faded to 15:14.99. Also unfortunate was that my legs were not happy with me doubling up. I ran a decent race but made a tactical error and got stuck in the wrong group and missed the split in windy conditions and finished up just outside of qualifying for the final, not that I was too disappointed as I was stuffed!

New Zealand 5000m champs

April
Following Nationals I took 5 days off to try and give my body a bit of a rest before jumping into XC. After this rest I was straight into heavy training with some of my biggest ever weeks mileage wise. I ran 3 weeks of 233, 241 and 208 kilometers. We also had a training camp in National park which included some truly brutal runs with insane elevation changes.

Elevation of one of our runs, 1816m of climbing!

May
Time for some XC! Started off with a bit of a rust buster at the HEB XC where i finished up in 5th place in what was a good way to start the season. Following this I went down to Huntly where I raced the 10k. When I say race, I mean attempted to race. I had one of the most shocking 10ks of my life and struggled home in 4th place. I managed to get through though and decided to take it as a bad race and move on. Luckily I did because the week after I was 3rd at the Pakuranga XC. I ran a perfect race where I just grinded away until those following me dropped off.

June
Unfortunately Pakuranga would be my last good race for the XC season as it was pretty much all downhill from here. Right at the start of June I had the Christchurch half Marathon where I was hoping to crack a really good run. Unfortunately this did not eventuate and i struggled home in 1:10:15 about 2 min slower than what I wanted. part of the reason for this was I came down with an Awful sickness just after the finish and almost didnt make the prizegiving I was feeling so bad! After Christchurch came the Teams XC where I finished 6th in another bad race. I was also having Wisdom tooth issues over this month which may have explained why i raced so poorly!

July 
The start of July always means North Island XC champs. Oh what a race, and not in a good way. Probably my worst race of the season and thats saying something. that being said, this was when my Wisdom teeth were at maximum pain levels. After this was a few good weeks of training before the Auckland XC champs. Another shocker as I finished 8th and missed out on the Auckland team for the first time in a few years. This race turned out to be a blessing as because I missed out on Nationals I set a new goal, the Auckland Marathon! This was both scary and exciting as I wanted to see what I could do.

August
Thankfully August bought about the start of my good racing. I began conditioning and started running the big mileage with a number of weeks in the 220km range. The week of Auckland Road Champs saw me run 200km before the race had even started! thankfully this didnt affect me at all as i had one of the races of my life. Jono and I ran to a very specific plan and it most certainly paid off as we went 1-2 in a decent field. We decided that our best chance was to attack from a long way out so we crushed the last 4km and got a lead which we held on to.

September
And that brings us to the current month! and what a month its been already! it all started with the NZ Road champs in Tauranga. I thought that the Auckland Champs was a good race, this was significantly better. I managed to run a very evenly split race on a good course in a strong field to finish 7th, my best nationals result to date! I was very happy with this race, Mainly because of how deep I was able to go, I took myself to the absolute limit for the first time and came away with an amazing result. managed to claim a few scalps as well which is always nice.  Oh! and a road PB 31:34. Just one week later I ran my first marathon, the Lydiard Legend. I thought this was the perfect race for me as the start is only a few Km from my house and its over a course which I run parts of on a regular basis. It is also a race where people aren't expected to run particularly fast... so not as much pressure. The final reason I chose to do this one was it is considered the hardest road marathon and everything else should seem easy after this! And what a race I ended up having! I finished my debut marathon with the 3rd fastest time in history on the Legend course with 2:29;23! this time converts to around 2:23 on a flat course. Which is of course a great debut for anyone, let alone a 21 year old. The race still hasn't completely sunk in. I cant really believe that I just ran the 8th fastest time in the country on the hardest course. The thing I am most happy about is with how much ease I ran it with. I never feel like I went above about 80% effort so still have a lot more in me.

Leading the Group

Never hurt so bad.

Profile of the Legend, 816m of climbing!

So that is the year so far!

From here the only goals which I have set in stone are the NZ Road Relays in Christchurch where ACA has an absolutely awesome team which we hope to have in the medals and of course the major goal the Auckland Marathon. The aim for the Auckland Marathon will have to be reassessed as i was only planning to run 2:26, this may need to be looked at after Saturday!

Hopefully it will all go well and I can continue to keep this hot racing streak alive!

Let me know what you think of my writing! this is my first blog so would love to know what you think so I can get better at it!

Cheers

So, this Is blogging!

So this is a bit different.

I've decided that im going to start blogging about what its like to train like a maniac!

Basically, long story short, Im a distance runner from New Zealand. My goal is to become the best marathon runner that New Zealand has EVER produced. Bit of a lofty goal I know but hey, Aim high right?

So now time for a bit of background on me.
My journey through running had a bit of a false start, Twice! I first started runnign when my parents signed me up as a Tiny Tot at Roskill South Athletics Club. I continued with this, racing between 40-100m for about 2 years, then when I was 4 years old I broke my arm pretty badly, missed the start of the season and that was that. Then when I was 9, my younger brother Keegan decided to give athletics a go, Mum forced me to come along and try it out too. I was VERY reluctant, I remember having a screaming match with my mum about how I didn't want to go, needless to say, she won. By the end of that first Tuesday night Club meeting i was hooked. However I wasn't sorted yet. After about 4 years of training on and off with ACAs junior training I called it quits. This time it was because of the pressure. As much as they hate to hear it most of the issue was with my parents, they put way to much pressure on me to train and as a 13 year old I couldn't handle it. I "quit" the sport, that only lasted about 12 months, pretty soon I was back at it training with the group again and pretty soon moved up to being coached by my current coach, Barry Magee. And the rest as they say is history.

Being coached by Barry is . . . Interesting. Barry is one of Arthur Lydiards original "boys", He won a bronze medal in the Marathon at the Rome Olympics, a few days after Murray Halberg and Peter Snell won golds. Barry was one of the forgotten athletes because he 'only' won bronze but it was still a mammoth achievement and one that confirmed Lydiard as the greatest coach of the time and still one of the greatest ever. What this means for me is, quite simply, Im coached in the Lydiard way.

Lydaird training is not for the faint of heart, or body. It takes a special kind of person to complete this training and not break down, physically and mentally. Lydiard was the original guy who suggested you needed to run 100 miles a week in order to maximize your potential. many people believe that this just means Long Slow Distance. This simply isn't the case, during Lydiard training, you run fast, a lot. what people also forget is that 100 miles is just for the main training of the day, all Lydiard athletes run twice a day with an easier jog in the morning and the main training at night. What does all this result in, about 220-240km a week during conditioning, track, XC and road all start with the same conditioning program.

All of this training however wouldnt be possible without the awesome training group I have, We have dubbed ourselves "Barrys Boys". Jono and Asher make all this training so much easier. Of course I also have the awesome support of Reliv. Reliv is an awesome company who provides me with all that I need to stay healthy, fit and able to train at such a high level.

So I guess that's me, first blog post over and done with!