Back on the Track; Back on the Roads

From: Mark Raybuck [mailto:mraybuck@roadrunner.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 26, 2007 2:58 PM
To: Eric Kaplan
Subject: RE: Back on the Track; Back on the Roads

Interesting thought on the intervals........what is the real goal of intervals, and how long should the rest period be? I have heard various terms.....speed workout, interval training, speed "form" training, etc.
Learning to run fast is supposedly speed "form" training. This is where you would take longer rests, so you can get used to running faster than race pace. Interval training, with shorter rests, is different, but I'm not sure what the fine differences are.
I kind of like the 2-minute rests. I thought we used to rest for the same amount of time as the actual run....in other words, if we were doing 70-second quarters, we rested 70 seconds. In your reference below to the XC team workout, if we rested while the other group ran, that means our rest intervals were the same as the running intervals (except for minor differences in speed between the two groups).
You stated that I was running 2-minute quarters with 2-minute rests. I was actually running slightly less than 1.5 minute quarters (87 seconds or so) with 2-minute rests.


-----Original Message-----
From: Eric Kaplan [mailto:ekaplan@fte.com]
Sent: Thursday, June 21, 2007 11:30 PM
To: mraybuck@adelphia.net
Subject: RE: Back on the Track; Back on the Roads
Mark,
I did a 20 minute slow run this morning in Tokyo. It felt okay. I hope to do the second half of my double workout (see previous email) tonight and will shoot for about the same.
See below for more exciting running ideas...
Eric
-----Original Message-----
From: mraybuck@adelphia.net [mailto:mraybuck@adelphia.net]
Sent: Wednesday, June 20, 2007 9:44 AM
To: Eric Kaplan
Subject: Back on the Track
Eric:
I finally got back on the track last night, after a few weeks of puttering on the roads. I have to agree with you that running slowly on the roads just trains you for running slowly.
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So do you believe the story about the guy who claims to be running decent miles using only LSD for training?
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Since the point of these workouts is speed, more than strength or endurance, I'd like to see you taking a longer rest between intervals and running faster. Consider this, the toughest workouts I remember from college were when the XC would be split into two groups and we run quarters. As one group finished, the other would start. We did this for 10 quarters, took a bit more of a rest, and did 10 more.
Now you are running two-minute quarters with a two-minutes rest in between. Instead of two minutes, next time please try a really, really slow one lap jog between intervals and see how fast you run the intervals.
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Congratulations! Doggone it, does this mean you are getting old?
Interesting that Truce doesn't have a married daughter, or even a child (that we are are aware of). Maybe that is how he stays so young.
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I think one hard one-mile time trial each two weeks would be better.
That would still give plenty of attempts during decent weather. I think running one race/week would be too much wear and tear. In the off weeks, I'd recommend a shorter distance run hard. Run a hard 1/2 or a hard 1/4. Recovery time will be a lot less and you will still get many of the benefits of racing.
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