Testing and Improving the Maffetone Method for Walking

[Skip]

Gershon,

You have a knack of setting off the "bullshit meter" in my head. For example, last week you said your goal was:

My long term goal is to be able to average 24 miles a day for a year. Speed is not a major factor, but avoiding injuries and over training is. That's what attracted me to Maffetone.

Now you say your goal is:

I'm setting my goal as five 15-mile runs a week at an eight-minute pace. Eight minutes used to be a relaxed pace for me, and I see no reason I can't get there as it's mostly mechanical efficiency to that point.

There are numerous other remarks that set off the bs meter, but I'm not going to list them all because there are so many.

From now on, I'm not going to reply or respond to your statements that set my bs meter off because this is not productive for me or for you. Good luck to you and all your goals and I hope you can achieve whatever you set out to do.

[Gershon]

Skip,

Enjoy your life. I don't think it is productive for you to visit this thread anymore. Surely you have something better to do than wallow in what you think is bullshit.

Best of luck to you,

Gershon

[Gershon]

The Beginnings of the Plan



The plan is simple. There are 555 points on this curve. I'll be starting at 6.1 miles and increasing my distance by a tenth of a mile about every 11 days. During those 11 days, I'll be improving my speed gradually. At each distance, I have what I'm calling a progression pace. If I'm not maintaining that pace, I'll hold at that point until I do increase my pace. Even if the progression pace turns out to be easy, I'll still do the number of days in the plan at that distance minus the two off days a week. In order to progress to the next distance, my heart rate will also have to be in the Aerobic Training Range.

I'll do slow tempo training after three days of running. This will be about 1 minute runs at a pace a bit faster than what I've been doing. I'll do the number of reps I feel like doing on those days.

(Note: The chart ends at 13 miles. I ran into a problem with dividing time in the spreadsheet that I'll fix soon.)

Today, I am slowing my time from what I've been doing so I can set the metronome at the slowest stride rate during my recent runs. The stride rate up hills was only a couple steps per minute slower than it was down hills. By using the slowest stride rate, everything but the hills should be restful. I'll increase the stride rate in future only when I need to to meet my target pace. I'll create a click track on the audio books so the stride rate can be increased in small fractions of a step per minute.

The first 100 days or so should be straightforward as I'm only planning to run at a pace I've already sustained. The only thing I'll be doing is gradually increasing the distance to 6.7 miles.

The most important constraint is avoiding even minor injuries or over training symptoms. There may be times I regress which will extend my timeline. If the training is going well, I may skip ahead a point or two. I'll have to make these decisions along the way.

[Gershon]

Day 1

This is the first day of working The Plan. Last night, I decided on a stride rate to maintain for the whole run and set that on the metronome since it was a whole number. According to the Fitbit Zip, the most I was off in any five-minute period was one step. This was the first time I've used the metronome for running the whole distance, and I was pleased with the way it worked. It was slightly strenuous up the two bigger hills and a relaxed pace the rest of the distance. As expected, my time was a little faster than The Plan's target for today.

I set the Fitbit Surge to vibrate every three minutes and give me the pace for the previous three minutes. I'll do this until I get bored of looking so often. Then I'll set it for every half-mile.



This is a highly magnified area of the northwest corner of the chart in the previous post showing about the first 66 days. It's a scatter gram, so the daily runs may not progress steadily from left to right if I run a little less or a little farther than the planned distance. My time was better than the target and will be good for about the next 30 days. However, my plan is to increase my stride rate a few hundredths of a beat a day so I stay ahead of the times on The Plan. I'll use a click track on the audio book to do that. I'm listening to The Garden of Rama by Arthur C. Clarke.

[Gershon]

11/7/15

Stride Rate

Yesterday, I estimated I'll need to run at a stride rate of about 160 steps per minute to achieve my goal. Elite runners run at a stride rate of 180 or more. I read recreational runners use a stride rate of 150 to 170 steps per minute. I decided to increase my stride rate a tiny amount each day so I reach my goal on the target date. I use a click track to keep my stride rate constant throughout the run. Increasing my stride rate will be the mechanism for improving speed. Stride length will naturally increase as the stride rate increases.

Physiological changes

I've noticed a great improvement in the bounciness of my leg and foot muscles. I can feel it the most when going down stairs. It's similar to adding pressure to air shocks. These are happening quickly, and I can feel the difference from one day to the next. I suspect the changes are both neurological and muscular.

Today's Run



My heart rate settled at 127 bpm for a while. I let it stay there as I wanted to maintain my stride rate. Besides, I've found chasing my heart rate doesn't work well. Then mysteriously, at about 3.85 miles, it peaked briefly at 134 bpm, and then dropped to 104 bpm. This was on what I call "THE HILL," which is the uphill stretch that sets the limit for my stride rate. It stayed between 91 and 104 bpm for mile five which is relatively level. This was my fastest mile split of the run. The sixth mile was my second fastest split. It's downhill, so that one makes sense.

The Vision

I've changed the name of the plan to "The Vision" as the word represents a firmer belief it will happen and a firmer commitment to making it happen.



I made some minor changes to the equation of the line so there is faster progress in the beginning. At some point, reality may show the vision is impossible, but this shouldn't be for quite some time.

[Gershon]

11/8/15

Today's Run

The cold sneaks up here and I didn't check the temperature before I went out. It was 27 degrees, which is about 7 degrees colder than it was the past few days. I could have used a hat and long johns. I felt like my legs never warmed up.

Heart Rate



I should add some more distance to my warm up walk on the cold days.

Herbie

I do have a small amount of pain on my left heel, but it's not enough to warrant a day off yet. I often get it when I wear running shoes too much during the day. I'll make a decision about tomorrow's run in the morning.

Speed Work

I've decided not to do any speed work until I have trouble maintaining my stride rate.

The Vision

[Gershon]

11/9/15

Today's Run
I decided not to run today for two reasons. First, part of the plan is to only run five days a week. Second, the bottoms of my heels are a little sore. It feels like dried callouses. The weather is forecast to be bad tomorrow, so I may get a run later today so I don't miss two days in a row.

A word about visions

I think I made it clear in my posts that I might reach my goal which seems out of reach. It's intentionally at the limit of what I think is possible. A vision provides a framework for thinking and acting. Every thought and action should lead me a step closer (pun intended) to my vision. Ideally, it will be out of reach. As Joan Benoit-Samuelson says, There is no finish line. Along the way, I'll be making adjustments when reality shows the vision is not possible in the time frame I set.

Training concerns



I added my heart rate to each data point. Green is in my aerobic training zone. Yellow is up to 10 beats above. Red will be more than 10 beats above.

The question arises, When am I not following the Maffetone Method?

Clearly at the present time, I'm not following even a loose interpretation of the Maffetone Method. Why not? The critical factor now is my running gait. In the book The Critical Chain by Eliyahu Goldratt, he points out that if a chain won't lift a load, only the weakest link needs to be strengthened. As long as my heart rate stays in the yellow zone, I'll consider my running gait to be the weakest link. My aerobic capacity, as defined by Maffetone, is good enough.

Taking the example of Herbie being the slowest scout in a group of scouts hiking, focusing on something besides my gait would be like asking all the scouts in the group except for Herbie to get more hiking practice. However, I will try to keep my heart rate from averaging more than my aerobic training zone plus 10 beats.

Splits



I made a chart showing my splits for six miles. I won't add the seventh mile until I'm running a full seventh mile. This gives some information on which miles to focus on improving. The obvious choice is the first mile, but going too fast in the first mile will affect the later miles. The last mile is mostly downhill, so that should be the easiest to improve. I'll see what happens next run.

[Gershon]

Today's Run

When it warmed up, I decided to go for a run since the weather may be too bad tomorrow morning to run. I felt good the entire run. I pushed the pace a little by increasing my stride length when possible while maintaining a constant stride rate.

Heart Rate



Splits



Today was my fastest run for the six miles. I had negative splits for every mile but the last one. I had a PR for each mile. Without the constraint to maintain a constant stride rate, I could have run faster.


The Vision



Today was a bit of a breakthrough aided by running in a warmer temperature. I'll probably regress when it's colder.

[petero]

I've read that temperature can affect heart rate quite a bit, so it'll be interesting to see what happens when the weather cools.

[Gershon]

I've read that temperature can affect heart rate quite a bit, so it'll be interesting to see what happens when the weather cools.

Tomorrow will be the big test. It is supposed to be cold with high winds. I'll have to bundle up.

[Gershon]

11/10/15

Today's Run

Today, I maintained the stride rate I set on the metronome and didn't worry about my pace. It's not possible to set a PR every day, and trying to do so would lead to fatigue or injuries.

Temperature was about 32.

Heart Rate



Splits



Today's run is connected with a line. This was my second fastest day.

The Vision



I adjusted the vision curve downward a bit to reflect actual performance. This affects all points in the future. Understand, the Vision Curve does not represent goals. The daily goal is increasing stride rate and distance by a tiny amount. The Vision Curve represents expectations based on increasing stride rate and distance each day. At some point, it may be adjusted upward if I reach a plateau.

I added a logarithmic trend line to the Reality Line. The reason I used a logarithmic trend line is I expect a fast pace improvement in the early stages and a slow pace improvement in the late stages. Along the way, I may change the formula of the trend line to reflect reality.

Days Off

The runs are easy enough now that I don't feel the need to take any days off. I don't feel at all fatigued after the runs. Each unnecessary day off would delay achieving my vision by a day as I'll only increase the stride rate and distance on days I run.

[Gershon]

Today's Run

The conditions for running were challenging. The wind were 15 mph gusting to 30 mph. Most of the regular route is in the open, so I felt the full force of the winds. It rained between about 2 miles and 4.5 miles. I did adjust the route when it started raining so about the last 2 miles were in a housing area. I also wanted to be closer to home in case it started to rain harder. It was one of those runs I'm glad I did after it was over.

Heart Rate



My heart rate was high today, which I attribute to the high winds.

Splits



Since I changed the route, the splits are not comparable.

The Vision


Starting New Thread

This will be my last post in this thread except to reply to posts from others. One reason is I'm only loosely following the Maffetone method. I don't want to keep Maffetone in the title as it would be misleading. Another reason is I've developed another method I'm calling The Continuous non-destructive adaptation model (Gershon's Model) which will have broader application for a lifetime of activity.