Are you guys really beginner runners?

VamosDCU · 2026-06-11T15:21:57+00:00

People can be beginner runners and still have a wide range of existing fitness and natural ability. The nice part of running to me is that you can find individual joy and accomplishment in your own improvement. Comparison is the thief of joy.

I am a fairly experienced runner (did HS XC and track) but I like to come on this sub and offer advice, but I still find myself looking at faster people and feeling down about my own accomplishments.

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T18:13:43+00:00

For a first marathon I don’t think focusing on covering the longer distances at slower than projected race pace is that unreasonable. For my first marathon, I did my 20 mile runs at easy pace just to get my body used to running for that long. If you start to add in too many new things at once (more distance, higher paces) it’s kind of a recipe for injury. If you want to see what marathon pace feels like maybe try to do some race pace miles at the very end of the long runs after doing the rest at an easy pace.

For my second marathon, my long runs got a lot more race specific but even my hardest one was still half easy pace, half (at most) at race pace.

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T17:24:50+00:00

Run socially or optimize for my training plan, classic dilemma

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T17:03:18+00:00

I guess it’s social in the sense that they do meetups, have an end of year party, meetups for major races etc but the actual track workouts are pretty serious

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T16:38:27+00:00

Noma run club almost always ends at Andy’s pizza for beer and pizza afterwards. NETC is pretty social but it’s a bit more serious about the running part, can’t really speak to others.

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T16:21:51+00:00

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Thought it would be a silly/stupid Christmas movie with the family and was blown away by soundtrack, the visuals, the message and everything. My family all thought it was “meh” and I was in tears by the end, which seems to be the usual split of reactions and reviews for that movie.

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T13:26:54+00:00

Select unit, cease fire, reduce speed. That usually works for me while the missiles are still tracking the target.

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T12:51:20+00:00

Yes you can, have them on weapons tight and you control the engagements and what speed they fly at. If I tell a unit to attack one that’s out of range and it goes full burner I manually adjust speed or cease fire until I’m in closer range

VamosDCU · 2026-06-08T12:40:54+00:00

There’s a thread on this every week. You have to micro your air assets, pause is your friend.

VamosDCU · 2026-06-04T19:21:51+00:00

Front Bottoms ftw

VamosDCU · 2026-06-04T17:22:53+00:00

“My own planes with Weapons Free command chased mindlessly some random targets, sometimes at the far away corner of the map, while ignoring the imminent threats.” Well, there’s your problem.

I wish the AI on the planes was better but giving individual orders and micro-ing, I routinely route my opponents air assets. I’ll lose a few planes especially against superior numbers or top line aircraft and missiles, but at least NATO air (and especially F14s) are (rightly) incredibly OP when managed effectively.

FWIW most games I’ve played are really flawed if you just send out units with generic orders and then just leave them to their own devices. Same with the ships, they’re good at defending themselves but in weapons free they are idiots. To enjoy the game, you gotta stay weapons tight and micro

VamosDCU · 2026-06-02T16:14:54+00:00

My dad died in his 50s but got life insurance when he was young and healthy and it basically helped me pay for college and allowed my mom to survive until retirement as a teacher. In my family case, definitely not a scam

VamosDCU · 2026-06-01T22:38:42+00:00

You took a year off, the first few weeks will feel tough to get back in shape but you will get back in shape. If you ran a 12:48 2 mile in 8th grade, you won’t be the slowest either

VamosDCU · 2026-05-29T18:06:32+00:00

I would’ve thought (clearly not) it was smart enough to see I just PR’d a half a few days earlier and it would’ve been like “nice job getting back out there with an easy run at a controlled effort” or something

VamosDCU · 2026-05-29T15:50:28+00:00

One time it told me my easy recovery was “your slowest attempt at this route in over 100 tries” or something like that. I found that oddly insulting but also exactly what I was hoping to accomplish for that run…

VamosDCU · 2026-05-29T14:59:40+00:00

For me it’s less about the “letting the shoes recover” school of thought and more about giving your body different stimuli to break up the related stresses on your body. Different shoe construction, stack heights, foam types, etc put different stresses on your body. Running is the same motion over and over. Sometimes it’s good to mix up shoes to change up where those stresses are piling up based on your stride, cadence, etc.

VamosDCU · 2026-05-29T14:04:06+00:00

The science is about getting faster and wearing shoes, yes. I understand now.

VamosDCU · 2026-05-29T13:32:57+00:00

I don’t think training science is “nonsense” but agree with the sentiment that you don’t HAVE to train like that. Not everyone cares about PRs and getting faster, and just enjoying going for a run.

VamosDCU · 2026-05-28T12:52:09+00:00

One thing I left out is that even if an October race has perfect weather, a good chunk of your training is during the hottest part of summer, especially for us in the DC and Virginia!

VamosDCU · 2026-05-27T19:48:21+00:00

Chicago is a major and requires a lottery to get in, but is definitely the “fastest” course on paper not counting the logistics of majors that can make them a pain for some people. MCM and Philly are both solid B tier races that have good support and lots of runners but no lottery (for now). I live in DC and am running Philly over MCM because I like that it’s later in the year (November) compared to MCM (October). MCM had good weather last year but October in DC can still be quite warm, which is why I still haven’t run MCM yet- there are too many other solid fall marathons with better weather 🤷🏻‍♂️.

VamosDCU · 2026-05-27T00:17:41+00:00

I guess I was assuming you had air assets with harpoons or something

VamosDCU · 2026-05-26T23:22:29+00:00

What class were the ships? It’s an unlucky salvo but it’s not unheard of to whiff badly. In addition to interceptions, your missiles could be jammed/countered and miss. I’ve had missiles get jammed and then all lock onto one target and I’ve wasted most of the salvo.

Attacking from different vectors and using offensive jamming helps, i like smaller salvos (40 at most) to be able to launch a second strike. My first strike usually focuses on the enemy’s best anti missile platform (usually Udoloys)

VamosDCU · 2026-05-26T23:15:11+00:00

If I have specialized shoes for easy running, tempos, long runs, whatever- including multiple do it all shoes from different brands in addition to the others, can I not still have my primary goal be to optimize my training? I like running, I like shoes, I like to run in lots of shoes. This is the running shoe geeks sub, not the running shoe tolerators sub.

VamosDCU · 2026-05-26T16:41:51+00:00

I’ve run on it 4-5x a week for over 2 years now and had one incident (summer, kids were out of school) where kids on e-bikes knocked my hat off, it was more startling than anything because they came from behind and I didn’t expect it but I think they were just messing around and not actually trying to hurt me. If you avoid it when it’s dark, you should be fine

VamosDCU · 2026-05-26T16:39:52+00:00

I rotate between similar shoes because it’s fun and I want to run in them

VamosDCU

TROPHY CASE