Competing with Your Younger Self
Here's another use for age grading. A friend, Bob, ran fairly seriously when he was in his late 20s and early 30s. His PR for a 10K was 33:46 when he was 31. A year after that, he got married, kids came along and he focused on his family and career for a while.
A couple of years ago Bob started running again when his daughter went out for her high school cross country team. She did not actually last that long, but he got the bug again and trained fairly seriously. He was surprised by how much speed he had lost. When he ran his 10K at age 52 in 41:57, he was totally discouraged.
"I didn't expect to run as fast as I could when I was in my 30s but I can't even come close to breaking 40 minutes," he said. "I'm losing to middle school kids and old bald guys—I give up!"
More: 4 Ways to Run Faster After Age 40
Bob could use some age grading to put things in perspective. Even though the AG calculator is used mostly by Master's runners, the tables cover all ages. What was Bob's AG when he did his PR at age 31? The USATF calculator says 79.89 percent. And what was the AG for his self-styled "pitiful" run at age 52? The calculator says 74.37 percent. Relative to his potential, Bob is not that far off from what he was doing when he was 31. His equivalent 31-year-old time would be 36:16.
What would it take to get back to his relative performance at age 31? The calculator produces 39:03 as the time needed for a 79.89 percent performance from a 57-year-old male. It would take some pretty serious, intelligent training—and to avoid injury—but it's feasible that Bob could take two to three minutes off his 10K time over the next few years. And, of course, as he ages, the time it takes to get a 79.89 percent performance goes up. Even as Bob slows with age, he could be kicking his 31-year-old self's butt in age grading.
That's what's so great about age grading: A masters runner can use the percentages and equivalent times they produce to provide context and goals for their hard-earned performances.
More: 5 Ways to Be an Injury-Free Runner for Life
This article originally appeared on RunnersWorld.com
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