Even a single weekly longer run (10-12 miles) seemed to offer some considerable benefits for me. At least in terms of keeping the legs ready. Adding a couple short runs to that helps. Could be an easy 3-4 after finishing a TR session.
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I did a long run 1.5-2hrs easy on Sun after long ride on Saturdays. During the week, I’d throw in at least one 5-10km easy run w/strides at the end. That sufficed as maintenance for me while riding 4-6d/wk.
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I’m trying the new mid volume masters plan as opposed to the low volume I usually do. Thinking of replacing one of the mid week endurance rides with an endurance run. I know that one run a week probably isn’t enough, but my only goals are to be able to sign up for a trail 10K or a half on a whim and just have a good time.
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I think it’s noteworthy how self-aware you are. Too many people live in denial, make themselves miserable, and never figure out why. But OK. It’s probably true that you’ll “never run as well as you used to” in absolute times, nor place as well as you used to in race results. So, now what?
I went through a crash course in “now what” recently. I had been reasonably quick in my youth: 1600m in 4:58, 5K in 18min or so. Not outstanding in any way, but quick enough to make the varsity on my high school team and really enjoy racing. I was also an undefeated varsity wrestler my senior year. Then I stopped all sports/activity (long story) for 30 years.
When I got off the couch recently, I was a mess. Almost 100 lbs overweight, lung capacity reduced by almost two decades of smoking, and 30 years of inactivity. After three or four YEARS of fighting to get back in shape, I’m still about 80 pounds overweight and I’m in the bottom 2% of the population in terms of speed and race results.
But I could jog 200m four years ago, and I just ran my first half. I’m improving in every way. I feel stronger. All my bloodwork is now within normal range. I could go on, but you get the point. I’m waaaaay at the back of the pack, but I’m thrilled to be where I am.
And the reason I’m telling you all this, is that I learned, by crashing headfirst into a wall of reality, that whatever I could do before is really, truly, and totally irrelevant.
What counts is work, effort, TODAY. If running is not fun, don’t do it. If running is fun but racing isn’t, don’t race. But the scale on which you measure yourself now must change: aging has a million benefits but you can no longer compare yourself every day to your best-ever results: rather, the question is about comparing yourself to your POTENTIAL today.
Are you close to the best you could have achieved today? Hallelujah. Did you work your ass off, did you earn your results, did you enjoy the PROCESS? That’s the game. You’re probably also improving compared to your age group, though that’s less important.
Life is the longest race there is. That’s the one where you want to run your best, and that requires knowing that a slower time today may be a bigger triumph than a faster time last year. So long as you don’t try to force it and stay as self-aware as you seem to be, wisdom will come and you’ll do just fine.
Peace.
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Well that’t the thing. This was supposed to be for fun. I was never intending to take it that seriously when I signed up, but somehow it ended up taking over my life for 4 months. So now I have to think. Can I manage this better, or do I need to just avoid marathons because I can’t seem to run one without it dominating my life for 4 months and my enjoyment of the process becoming totally dependent on the end result.
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You do. But you’ll find your answers, because you know that the most important thing is to ask good questions and you’re doing that. Be kind to yourself: you’re doing a lot of things right.
I hate marathons. Lots of people do. Do what you enjoy.
A lot of marathoners are more interested in their time than the race (me included), most marathoners I talk with only talk about times when they talk about races.
Some have broadened their horizons a bit with racing abroad, and come back with more experience than time splits.
A few people have found fun and challenge with trails and ultramarathons, and when they come back to road marathons it sounds like they are there more to enjoy it than to set a PB.
On the whole though, I don’t think it’s criticism to say marathoning is type 2 fun. Type 1 being where you enjoy the activity while you are doing it.
For me the half distance is a good balance between training time and getting in the way of cycling. 10 years ago I could run a full without enough training and it would be fine. Now not so much. I’m by no means fast however, 1:55ish is my half PR.
I think marathon training in particular is kind of a grind by nature, so if the return (times of otherwise) aren’t particularly inspiring to you then it’s easy for it to be more trouble than it’s worth.
I suspect I’d probably be stronger at the marathon than in the distances I’m currently focused on, but I don’t particularly enjoy the training. I do enough to finish strong, hit some ‘soft’ time goals and perform relatively well for my abilities, but I think I’d probably be selling myself short if I really wanted to test my limits. Bottom line is I just don’t want it enough- it’s investment vs. perceived payoff utltimately, and at this point in time I simply cannot be arsed.
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I have never read i post that better aligns with my own worries regarding my first marathon I’ve entered in april 24 - I have my mind set on training properly but I just know that all my enjoyment is pinned on me being able to perform well oon the day.
My plan is…
*Train really hard for 1x road marathon
*perform really well
*never run a road marathon again
*stick to trail runs, 10k, half-marathons and cycling because thats what I enjoy but talk endlessly about my awesome marathon time.
No pressure.
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Well, actually my first one was epic, in a good way. I could have stopped running them right there because I only went on to improve by 2 minutes. Makes me appreciate now how lucky I was to get it so right first try.
I think for me that running events in general are just way easier from a logistics perspective that I can only really see myself completing half-marathon distance (and up) in the future. As much as I’d love to continue with Triathlons and Duathlons, I can’t justify the costs!
Plus, as mentioned above - marathons / ultra-marathons for me are type 2 fun. Way much more so than bike racing.
Legs are (mostly) back! Closed out ‘offical’ road season with a 10k last weekend- finished 4th female overall and 2nd non- elite with a 37:47. Pretty much dead on the expected pace so I’m pretty happy with that, especially because it was one of those races where my legs were screaming at me from the beginning and it’s a fight just to cling on to the pace.
Iron thing seems to have improved enough to put the numbers out, but still feeling far from fresh and taking a bit longer to recover…respectable negative split but mainly due to a stiff headwind on the way out, and no hope of ramping things up over the final few km.)
Doing the run leg for a team sprint tri this weekend so I’ll probably use that as a 5k TT, body allowing, and potentially a few lower-priority races heading into tri season.
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Nice to see you’re feeling better! Iron supplementation?
As for triathlon relays, so much fun and much more relaxed than individual/solo.
So, my running has been going relatively well. Leg/hip is complaining less. I’ve been disciplined about my warmup and activation routine before heading out the door. Been doing my strength work at least once if not twice a week. Pre-bed time rolling and massage most days. Mileage has been consistent ~80km.
Then I decided to kick the sofa on the way out the door to run this morning. Looked down to see my little toe at a 90 degree angle. Decided to try and fix it. Managed to get it in place on the first try. While it hurt a lot, I decided to go try and run. Once the shoe was on, it still hurt, but felt better probably due to the support of the shoe. I could feel it initially when I started running, but after 10min I didn’t notice it. However, when I got home, took off the shoes, showered, and started walking barefoot 
It hurt a lot! Not only did it hurt at the toe, but it hurt upstream almost up to the ankle 
So, i scheduled an appt w/my orthopedic for this afternoon. Hopefully, I only dislocated it and didn’t fracture anything. Swelling appears minimal. No discoloration. All of which gives me hope! Even so, popped a few ibuprofen.
edit/update:
So, I broke my little toe. I’m currently buddy taping it to the adjacent toe for support. I took a few days off. It’s still sore and swollen, but I can walk around barefoot w/out taking any meds. So, I figure I can run. In shoes, I barely notice it. Amazing how much support a shoe provides. Now, if I can keep my twin 5yr olds from constantly stepping on my feet 
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Update on my running journey:
Turns out I am a lot smarter than everyone else and started running pretty fast, against all the recommendations on this forum…
After this run I am replying to, I felt super sore in my right hip. Being the genius that I am, I still ran again 4 days later, leaving me in the middle of the forest walking at 3kph to my car for the last 2km, with my dog looking at me like “c’mon man…”.
After 10 days of zero running, and struggling to get up and down stairs, I have dialed things back a lot.
I am now doing a pretty easy program, 2 runs a week, mostly at slow speed (5:30 to 6:00 km pace), with technical work afterwards. Also, I did a running analysis, figuring out what I was lacking. Stability in the right ankle being a major weakness of mine. Doing stability work for that now.
The first 2 weeks of that went well. It’s a little boring, but likely much better than running around with crutches half of the time.
So yeah, another data point to emphasize starting out slowly makes sense.
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I’m planning to cut back running to once per week while I focus on bike and swim. It’ll be a club run so it’s just a choice of pace…Tempo run or easy run?
Rookie mistake my man… So many people who are ridiculously fit bike riders think the biking fitness will translate to running quick. It does, but your legs and body will take longer and thats how they get injured.
Hope you get better soon!
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So true! And getting lucky with weather is huge!
Many of us have been there and made exactly the same mistake. Certainly I have. Don’t feel too bad… you feel great, you feel like you can do more, and you DON’T feel the strain building up to levels that cause injury. Get better, and of course you’ll also train better.
The most important thing is that the injury was minor, and you’re doing all the right things in response… so it’ll all be good in the end.
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