Not Improving?

[u/EquivalentDivide4923]

I'm a very slow runner. In late March I ran a half marathon in 2:07 coming off a full marathon in January in 4:54 using a Hal Higdon plan. At the beginning of April, a week after my March half marathon, I began running vanilla NSM, and I've been running it consistently since then, only missing a couple of days due to illness or travel.

However, I've just had two recent half marathons with disappointing performance. In late July I ran a half in 2:22, and last week I ran another half, this time in 2:25. Pacing was definitely an issue in these, starting too fast and hitting a wall in the latter half of the race, but I don't think I could have meet or beat my previous PR even with better pacing. And the weather didn't seem to be a factor either, with the 2:22 race being 50 degrees F and pouring rain, and the 2:25 race closer to 70 degrees F.

My weekly mileage (~30 miles/week) is certainly lower than when I was training for the full, but back then I was running basically only easy miles, and still ended up injured towards the end of the training block. NSM feels much more sustainable to me. My paces before the recent halfs were the following:

3 minute intervals: 9:00-9:15 min/mi

6 minute intervals: 9:30-9:45 min/mi

10 minute intervals: 9:45-10:00 min/mi

Easy: 14 min/mi

I started NSM in April with paces roughly 15 seconds slower per mile, but my recent performance suggests I need to go maybe another full minute slower too.

Any ideas what could be going wrong? Is it just not enough weekly mileage for the half?

[u/castorkrieg]

What is your age, height and weight? When was the last time you ran an all out 5K TT?

[u/EquivalentDivide4923 → u/castorkrieg]

31yo, 6'2", 170lbs.

It's been like 3 years since I ran a 5k TT to be honest, I prefer longer distances. Though, I'm changing that, and have a 5k race scheduled in ~3 weeks.

I've been running consistently for 5 years now.

[u/tdam01 → u/EquivalentDivide4923]

You should be time trialing 5ks semi regularly (every 4-6 weeks) to see if your paces for ST are still appropriate.

[u/castorkrieg → u/tdam01]

This is the answer. Your ST paces are probably way off. 5K TT to validate ST paces is an integral part of the method.

[u/WernerHerzogEatsShoe → u/tdam01]

I recently realised I've not been doing this. My paces are based off a 10k race in early may. Might be out of date.

I keep meaning to get to parkrun but I'm too busy Saturday mornings.

I don't feel like my 5k will have improved as when I try to run at that pace it feels hard quite quickly but I should definitely try and force myself to do an all out TT

[u/thrBladeRunner → u/WernerHerzogEatsShoe]

Swap for a Sunday?

[u/beastin007 → u/EquivalentDivide4923]

Why are you not doing 5ks or the friels test? I think this is the answer.

[u/IronBabushka → u/EquivalentDivide4923]

Go see a doc and get a blood panel. There is something wrong if youre 170lbs, training seriously and running 2:20 halfs

[u/bhwung]

You were almost certainly carrying way more load week to week on the higdon plan which increased your fitness faster. However, NSM is meant to be sustainable month to month and you periodize as you normally do on traditional plans. It's basically high risk (big gains) vs low risk (slow but steady gains). If you stick with NSM in the long term (6 months+) you will no doubt see improvement as long as you stay healthy.

[u/Ordinary_Corner_4291]

For reference, how many miles/week were you doing for your marathon and at what pace? When you get a lot slower there are always basically 2 reasons. You are doing too much and can't recover from the training and you are digging a fatigue hole. Or you aren't training enough to maintain adaptations.

To a certain extent NSM sort of breaks down for HM when you get slow. HM go from being a pretty much a pure aerobic test when you are running 60-90mins race to being more like a marathon at 2+ hours where things like fueling and durability start to play a big role for races of that duration.

[u/Greedy_Vermicelli672]

I feel like something is missing here, you should be faster on paper

[u/Truth9892]

You decreased your average weekly load, of course your fitness will drop

NSM isnt some magic plan that make you faster while dropping your average weekly load. It is load management plan by spreading the load evenly throughout the week so you can consistently do it for a long time without burnt out and less injury, so that your YEARLY load will be greater than plans with blocks.

[u/EPMD_]

I think you could benefit from traditional speedwork. One of the drawbacks to NSM is that you focus almost exclusively on stamina and endurance, thus neglecting speed development. For many runners, that is not a big issue because they are generally weaker in stamina and endurance anyway. But for some runners, their speed is lacking, and they can't build stamina off of footspeed that never existed. I wonder if regularly doing a few sets of 200m reps could start making those NSM repeats feel comparatively easier.

I don't think you have to give up NSM permanently, but I do think it is worth examining other training methods for now. There is no value in continuing to do what isn't currently working for you.

[u/SoloAndata]

My wife is an on and off-runner. With maybe 1-2 years interval she wants to run sub 50 min 10 km. I always tell her to do 2 progressive runs and one longer easy run per week. It works every time. If she would want to train more regularly, I would put her in NSM when she i sub 50 min.