(Men) 10 Round Numbers- how many of these can you run in 2012?

pconn062 · 21-04-2012 10:39PM

Kurt Godel wrote: »

Great, I look forward to reading about your training, and your targets. As it stands, pages of tables being updated is about as interesting as an evening of someone else's baby photographs.

I'm only pulling your leg dude, you just came across as a bit of a disapproving teacher with your first comment! Well both the updates I uploaded into the table were achieved in the middle of my half marathon training that I'm currently coming to then end of, with the half marathon itself on the 9th of May. The 10k today was to see what sort of shape I'm in with that upcoming race in mind.

Kurt Godel · 21-04-2012 10:46PM

pconn062 wrote: »

I'm only pulling your leg dude, you just came across as a bit of a disapproving teacher with your first comment! Well both the updates I uploaded into the table were achieved in the middle of my half marathon training that I'm currently coming to then end of, with the half marathon itself on the 9th of May. The 10k today was to see what sort of shape I'm in with that upcoming race in mind.

Cheers, its always more interesting to get the story behind the figures! So I guess you're leading up to, what, a sub 1:25 half? Interesting that so many here see a 5k or 10k as steps in a path to a half, and ultimately a marathon; rather than A goals in themselves.

(Disapproving teacher is my default state, as my wife, kids, and friends, would tell you.

)

pconn062 · 21-04-2012 11:14PM

Kurt Godel wrote: »

Cheers, its always more interesting to get the story behind the figures! So I guess you're leading up to, what, a sub 1:25 half? Interesting that so many here see a 5k or 10k as steps in a path to a half, and ultimately a marathon; rather than A goals in themselves.

(Disapproving teacher is my default state, as my wife, kids, and friends, would tell you. )

The target is sub 1:30 and then anything after that will be played by ear on the day!

In regards to your other point about focusing on shorter distances, before I began this training cycle I spent 4-5 months focusing on shorter distances only, namely 5k, 4 mile, 5 mile and 10k. I also ran a full cross country season to build speed and strength. I found over that time that I get my best results over shorter distances (although none of my times are particularly noteworthy) so after this half marathon I will focus on short distances again for the summer, 3-10k, before building up for another 1/2 in September. No marathons for me this year!
My long term goals are all focused on shorter distances, mainly 16:XX 5k and 35-36 minutes for 10k, I just enjoy racing longer distances like that 1/2 now and again.

Pisco Sour · 22-04-2012 02:11AM

Agree with KG. More talk about goals, training, the races themselves etc would add to this thread greatly.

Regarding myself, the track season down here has finished now, and I'm on a bit of a break before launching pre-season training for the new season starting late September/ early October. The plan is to ease into a routine which will comprise 5 days a week: 2 in the gym working mainly on lower body, with some upper body work, 1 day hill reps, 1 day tempo endurance session with slower speed and short recovery, and 1 day "long run" of about 3 Km. Speed and track work won't start til around August.

The tables in general don't really suit me, and without 100 and 200 targets on it, the 400 and 800 are the only ones I can realistically chalk off, which I already have. I'd like to get the 400 down to 55 by the end of the year if I can, and the 800 below 2:20. I don't train for the 800 so any improvements in that will come solely off the back of improvements in my 400. My 800 time is grossly out of sync with my 400, but I can live with that.

Aim for anything else and it would be counterproductive to my 400 goals. I have a 5:48 mile from a couple of years ago off no training, and ran the 1500m equivalent of a 5:56 mile at the end of a decathlon this season. I'm a fair distance off that sub 5 mile.

The rest of the distances above my times get worse and worse. I did a 10k last year (my last road race before giving up on them) in 45:24. I'm way off these targets in these events, and I didn't love the training involved to try get much better. My 5k time (21:02) would be the closest, but excluding the 800, that is by far the softest standard here.

It would be fair going for somebody to knock off all 10 of these targets in one year. To have the endurance to go under 3 hours, and have the speed to go sub 60 seconds would be impressive. Very interested to see how people get on at the shorter distances. Plenty of races in the graded meets available so no excuse.

RayCun · 22-04-2012 07:00AM

Training is fairly simple -
Run 7 days a week
1 club training session, usually intervals between 800m and a mile, often hill-based
Either a longish (20-25k) run or a race once a week
One recovery run, about 6k, usually the day after the above
4 easy runs, between about 9k and 16k, on the other days
I've been neglecting strides, so want to make sure I include them at the end of one of my easy runs from now on.
I was doing two club sessions a week, but it was probably too much given my racing schedule. I'm coaching one of those evenings instead now.

Targets -
No goal races this year
I want to keep the training above solid through the year, and build up my weekly distance (currently 70-80k a week, want to be more like 90k a week by the end of the year). That'll probably mean adding regular double days at some point.
I'll do the 800m in June, and the half marathon if I race one this year. I'll have a couple of miles over the summer but will be running more like 5.30, a 3k in August (11.xx), and 5 miles I want to get down to 30.xx but I don't think 29 is on the cards this year. The other distances I won't be racing this year.

n-dawg · 22-04-2012 10:07PM

I've enjoyed reading other people goals and aims. So I figured I'd post mine too.

Year started with a focus on XC and thanks to lots of miles in October (DCM), November and December I had some great results (61st at Scottish National XC, almost 30 places better then last year)

After that I promised the GF that I would run a marathon with her. So February and March was more long miles, however I did manage a 57:xx 10 mile and 1:16:xx half in the process of training.

Now the focus is back to what I really enjoy, 3k-10k, for this I do about 80km a week, including 2 squad sessions with a development squad for the Scottish commonwealth games team (I run with the girls but I'm completely happy with this

). These involve long reps one day (800m-1600m) and short reps the other (200m-600m) normally totalling about 8k for the session excluding warm up/down. And another tough session of about 20km at "threshold" pace I suppose (80min ish). My other runs are just easy runs of 5-10km normally with the girlfriend. I also do quite a few hill races.

My goals for this session were to repeat a sub 16 5k and run sub 9 for 3k. I think I'm probably close to form that could achieve both. And I want to win a few hill races...

For the "10 round number" I figured most were OK, 3k and 10 miles are tough targets and a 3 hr marathon requires good training. 400 is a bit of unknown but normally I rep about 63 for 400m so maybe I can do it. 800m is soft... should be 2 min

Krusty_Clown · 22-04-2012 10:41PM

I could take my 5k split from the Boston marathon on Monday (any of the first three 5k splits), but still too annoyed with the race to re-use the splits (and they're slightly down-hill). Will try and train for and run a proper 5k over the next few months.

Marathon goal should have been ticked off, but will have to wait until later in the year (unless I weaken and give in to my brain, which demands instant gratification). 10k and marathon should be straight-forward. 800m in 3 minutes would be easy, but difficult to find a matching race (may just have to do it ad-hoc on the track with a witness/adjudicator!). 3k in 10 minutes. Hmm... As part of my marathon training, I've been doing 3 x 1600m intervals at that same pace, so I'm thinking that it might be achievable with a bit of digging in. The sub 60 400m is the one I'd imagine I'd have to dedicate training to, so may be the least achievable from both a logistics and ability perspective.

Pisco Sour · 23-04-2012 11:43AM

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

I could take my 5k split from the Boston marathon on Monday (any of the first three 5k splits), but still too annoyed with the race to re-use the splits (and they're slightly down-hill). Will try and train for and run a proper 5k over the next few months.

Marathon goal should have been ticked off, but will have to wait until later in the year (unless I weaken and give in to my brain, which demands instant gratification).

Think you are being a bit harsh on yourself. You prepared as best you could. You didn't run a bad race. Just one of those unfortunate things. We can't control the weather unfortunately, as much of a cliche as that sounds.

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

The sub 60 400m is the one I'd imagine I'd have to dedicate training to, so may be the least achievable from both a logistics and ability perspective.

Would be interesting to see you try this. I think half the graded meets have a 400m on the programme. Very hard to predict how you would do given your lack of experience of running short and fast, but you'd have nothing to lose. It looks like it will be the last one for you to tick off the list so you may as well try it.

Timmaay · 23-04-2012 12:41PM

Name|400m<60 secs|800m<3min|1 mile<5 min|3k<10min|5k<20min|5mile<30min|10k<40m|10miles<1hr|Half Marathon<90mins|Marathon<3hrs

04072511|58.68|2:27.6||||||||
drquirky|||||17:39|29:57|35.42|||
krusty_clown|||4:57|||27:44||58:37|1:20:30|
RayCun|||||19:22||39.23|||
pconn062|||||18.40||39.17|||
robinph|||||17:48|29:05|||1:23:16|
Brianderunner|||||||||1:29:35|
n-dawg||||9:35|19:12|||57:22|1:16:33|2:54:03
woddle|||||19:52|||||
Timmaay|||4:47||16:37||35.14|||

I'll throw myself in the mix for this also. Unlike most other years, I've done very few races in the past few months, I'm finally getting some sense and targeting big races, instead of do everything, and then with work and all that its hard to get out as much as I like. Middle distance is what is firmly on the radar for me this summer, between 800 and 5k. I have my 1st 800 coming up this Wed at the graded, I'm not too sure where I stand at the minute, but sub2 is certainly the target this summer!

Training wise, I have focused more so on 3k sessions for the past few months, with the odd few 1500m sessions thrown in to keep the speed up. With time constraints due to work etc, I usually only get out 4 or max 5 times a week, but I believe in quality not quantity anyway. I still get in an hour or 70mins run either Sunday or Monday, session Tue and Fri, however with the track in full swing I might change this to sessions on Tue/Thur and Sat if I'm not racing that week. I generally don't have a set plan for the month ahead in terms of all my training, but am lucky enough to have 2/3 different training groups that I jump in and out of, so chop and change my sessions and tailor them around what training they are doing!

I know that that is something that many coaches wouldn't agree with, however I do have an overall plan, and ultimately do athletics for the fun of it, where's the fun in slogging away on your own trying to do a session of 10x400s etc ha!

I should hit 7 of the 10times this year, 400m-10k, I have zero interest in anything above that, until I'm in my 40s and lost all speed in my legs :P. The 400 is the only tricky race, where can I find an 800 with an official 400 split, because I don't really plan on doing a straight 400!

Krusty_Clown · 23-04-2012 01:30PM

Timmaay wrote: »

I should hit 7 of the 10times this year, 400m-10k, I have zero interest in anything above that, until I'm in my 40s and lost all speed in my legs :P. The 400 is the only tricky race, where can I find an 800 with an official 400 split, because I don't really plan on doing a straight 400!

Really impressive times. Are you doing the fit4life 3k on Thursday or will you be too busy manning the desk? Sadly, it's just too soon after Boston, but might consider running it easy as a mini-session.

Maybe this would be a good thread to post-up any upcoming 400m, 800m, mile and 3k races to bring them to posters attention? Would also be interesting to hear of any typical 400m training-type sessions.

Pisco Sour · 23-04-2012 02:14PM

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Would also be interesting to hear of any typical 400m training-type sessions.

Speed endurance would be a big thing for people starting off. Everybody can naturally sprint flat out for 100m (albeit at different speeds) but over 400m the speed endurance is needed so that you dont run out of steam in the last 100m.

Examples of sessions I did a lot last year:

3x300m at 90-95% effort with 4 minutes rest/walk back rest between each rep

4x200m at 90-95% effort with 3 minutes rest

Pyramid session: 100-200-300-200-100 with 3 minutes between each

Hill sprints are huge aswell. Something like 5x100m on a hill of a 30 degree slope with 2 minutes between each rep

This type of work will improve your sprint endurance (a hell of a lot different to distance runners endurance) allowing you to run closer to 100% for the full 400m (not possible to run the full 400m at 100%).

Timmaay · 23-04-2012 07:28PM

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Really impressive times. Are you doing the fit4life 3k on Thursday or will you be too busy manning the desk? Sadly, it's just too soon after Boston, but might consider running it easy as a mini-session.

Maybe this would be a good thread to post-up any upcoming 400m, 800m, mile and 3k races to bring them to posters attention? Would also be interesting to hear of any typical 400m training-type sessions.

As I said the graded 800 on Wednesday in Santry is the target, but the weather is very hit a miss, so if its bad Wed I'll bail and do the fit4life instead.

And yep, definitely worth posting up any of the upcoming middle distance stuff, there are quite a few low key middle distance races out there, which tend not to be advertised well as the general public aren't as interested in them over 5k/10k etc, which is a shame!

robinph · 24-04-2012 08:13AM

Annoyed that I don't get to tick off the sub 3hrs for this year, I thought that was a dead cert for Sunday. The gods of making ones legs hurt were just conspiring against me.

Krusty_Clown · 26-04-2012 08:16PM

Name|400m<60 secs|800m<3min|1 mile<5 min|3k<10min|5k<20min|5mile<30min|10k<40m|10miles<1hr|Half Marathon<90mins|Marathon<3hrs

04072511|58.68|2:27.6||||||||
drquirky|||||17:39|29:57|35.42|||
krusty_clown|||4:57|9:55||27:44||58:37|1:20:30|
RayCun|||||19:22||39.23|||
pconn062|||||18.40||39.17|||
robinph|||||17:48|29:05|||1:23:16|
Brianderunner|||||||||1:29:35|
n-dawg||||9:35|19:12|||57:22|1:16:33|2:54:03
woddle|||||19:52|||||
Timmaay|||4:47||16:37||35.14|||

Bit of a surprise that one. Knew I'd be close enough to 10 minutes, having done a lot of intervals over my recent marathon training period at close to that pace, but thought hitting sub-10 would take a couple of attempts. It didn't hurt that I got my pace numbers mixed up and was chasing 5:10/mile for most of the course, rather than 5:19/mile. Half-way there now!

Brianderunner · 26-04-2012 08:28PM

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Name|400m<60 secs|800m<3min|1 mile<5 min|3k<10min|5k<20min|5mile<30min|10k<40m|10miles<1hr|Half Marathon<90mins|Marathon<3hrs

04072511|58.68|2:27.6||||||||
drquirky|||||17:39|29:57|35.42|||
krusty_clown|||4:57|9:55||27:44||58:37|1:20:30|
RayCun|||||19:22||39.23|||
pconn062|||||18.40||39.17|||
robinph|||||17:48|29:05|||1:23:16|
Brianderunner|||||||||1:29:35|
n-dawg||||9:35|19:12|||57:22|1:16:33|2:54:03
woddle|||||19:52|||||
Timmaay|||4:47||16:37||35.14|||

Bit of a surprise that one. Knew I'd be close enough to 10 minutes, having done a lot of intervals over my recent marathon training period at close to that pace, but thought hitting sub-10 would take a couple of attempts. It didn't hurt that I got my pace numbers mixed up and was chasing 5:10/mile for most of the course, rather than 5:19/mile. Half-way there now!

Fair play Krusty, nice way to bounce back from Boston. Any plans for a 400m this summer or you just gonna leave that one?

Krusty_Clown · 26-04-2012 08:54PM

Brianderunner wrote: »

Fair play Krusty, nice way to bounce back from Boston. Any plans for a 400m this summer or you just gonna leave that one?

Well, I see a 5k and 10k coming up over the next month or so. That'll give me the entire summer to mess around with stuff like aiming for a few shorter distances. Need to pick a few target races though.

HelenAnne · 27-04-2012 01:52PM

Are the 10 round numbers for men or women or are they unisex?

Pisco Sour · 27-04-2012 01:59PM

HelenAnne wrote: »

Are the 10 round numbers for men or women or are they unisex?

Open to all.

RayCun · 27-04-2012 02:27PM

HelenAnne wrote: »

Are the 10 round numbers for men or women or are they unisex?

They were put together as times that a club runner should be able to do... or aspire to... or an average runner would be able to hit them... or possibly they are lifetime targets

They're round anyway.

But the assumption when they were collected, whether they're average or aspirational, was that they were average or aspirational for men. There are women on boards who have run some or all of those times, but they are finishing far higher up in the field than men running those times.

So there's definitely room for a female equivalent thread, if that's what you're wondering.

Pisco Sour · 27-04-2012 02:39PM

RayCun wrote: »

They were put together as times that a club runner should be able to do... or aspire to... or an average runner would be able to hit them... or possibly they are lifetime targets
They're round anyway.

But the assumption when they were collected, whether they're average or aspirational, was that they were average or aspirational for men. There are women on boards who have run some or all of those times, but they are finishing far higher up in the field than men running those times.

So there's definitely room for a female equivalent thread, if that's what you're wondering.

The 800m and 5k times are too soft for women, not to mention men. These times wouldn't need to change if a women's tables was set up.

RayCun · 27-04-2012 02:44PM

04072511 wrote: »

The 800m and 5k times are too soft for women, not to mention men. These times wouldn't need to change if a women's tables was set up.

'Too soft' is another argument, but I agree that those times don't need to be changed for a women's table. Rather than adding 10% to each time, pick ten round numbers that are on the whole at the right level. For example

400m - 70 seconds
800m - 3 minutes
Mile - 6 minutes
3k - 12 minutes
5k - 20 minutes
5 miles - 35 minutes
10k - 40 minutes
10 miles - 70 minutes
Half - 100 minutes
Marathon - 3.20 (200 minutes)

Pisco Sour · 27-04-2012 02:45PM

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Name|400m<60 secs|800m<3min|1 mile<5 min|3k<10min|5k<20min|5mile<30min|10k<40m|10miles<1hr|Half Marathon<90mins|Marathon<3hrs

04072511|58.68|2:27.6||||||||
drquirky|||||17:39|29:57|35.42|||
krusty_clown|||4:57|9:55||27:44||58:37|1:20:30|
RayCun|||||19:22||39.23|||
pconn062|||||18.40||39.17|||
robinph|||||17:48|29:05|||1:23:16|
Brianderunner|||||||||1:29:35|
n-dawg||||9:35|19:12|||57:22|1:16:33|2:54:03
woddle|||||19:52|||||
Timmaay|||4:47||16:37||35.14|||

Bit of a surprise that one. Knew I'd be close enough to 10 minutes, having done a lot of intervals over my recent marathon training period at close to that pace, but thought hitting sub-10 would take a couple of attempts. It didn't hurt that I got my pace numbers mixed up and was chasing 5:10/mile for most of the course, rather than 5:19/mile. Half-way there now!

Good job Krusty. You seem to be in very good form. The 400m will be an interesting one. Very much an unknown and hard to know what you can do over it. You're 800m time will tell us more, which will be when?

robinph · 27-04-2012 03:10PM

RayCun wrote: »

They were put together as times that a club runner should be able to do... or aspire to... or an average runner would be able to hit them... or possibly they are lifetime targets
They're round anyway.

But the assumption when they were collected, whether they're average or aspirational, was that they were average or aspirational for men. There are women on boards who have run some or all of those times, but they are finishing far higher up in the field than men running those times.

So there's definitely room for a female equivalent thread, if that's what you're wondering.

The only definition that can be 100% agreed on is that they are round. To use the term "average" at any point would require some relearning of some basic maths skills I think.

My 3:08 marathon from last weekend puts me in the top 5% of all UK based marathoners so far this year. That is a long way off any definition of average in any mathematical sense.

They are ROUND numbers, that is all.

Pisco Sour · 27-04-2012 03:29PM

robinph wrote: »

The only definition that can be 100% agreed on is that they are round. To use the term "average" at any point would require some relearning of some basic maths skills I think.

My 3:08 marathon from last weekend puts me in the top 5% of all UK based marathoners so far this year. That is a long way off any definition of average in any mathematical sense.

They are ROUND numbers, that is all.

Agree with you. However it must be noted that the average in the marathon (and other long distance road races) is much lower than the average in say the Mile, 3K or 400m, due to numerous walkers, grannies, people dressed as bananas, punters running backwards etc etc skewing the average.

Timmaay · 27-04-2012 03:33PM

Name|400m<60 secs|800m<3min|1 mile<5 min|3k<10min|5k<20min|5mile<30min|10k<40m|10miles<1hr|Half Marathon<90mins|Marathon<3hrs

04072511|58.68|2:27.6||||||||
drquirky|||||17:39|29:57|35.42|||
krusty_clown|||4:57|9:55||27:44||58:37|1:20:30|
RayCun|||||19:22||39.23|||
pconn062|||||18.40||39.17|||
robinph|||||17:48|29:05|||1:23:16|
Brianderunner|||||||||1:29:35|
n-dawg||||9:35|19:12|||57:22|1:16:33|2:54:03
woddle|||||19:52|||||
Timmaay||2:06|4:47|9:45|16:37||35:14|||

Two more ticked of in less then 24hrs of eachother :P. But I can't say I'm impressed with either the 800 or 3k times though, I'm not at all where I should be at the minute, and also need to stop daydreaming during races and keep pushing!!! I did a 9:50 3k split during that 16:37 5k, and only shaved 5sec off it lastnight

Krusty_Clown · 27-04-2012 03:40PM

04072511 wrote: »

Good job Krusty. You seem to be in very good form. The 400m will be an interesting one. Very much an unknown and hard to know what you can do over it. You're 800m time will tell us more, which will be when?

Sure I could do a brisk run around the track and complete the 800m in three minutes. Right now, I don't have immediate plans to do a 400 or 800m, as I would be better off targeting 5k and 10k on the back of the marathon training period (which won't add much to either the 400 or 800m goals).

Any plans for you to tick off any of the other events? The idea is to get one out of their comfort zone and try something different. Without this thread, I'd never have tried a mile or a 3k run.

robinph · 27-04-2012 03:53PM

04072511 wrote: »

Agree with you. However it must be noted that the average in the marathon (and other long distance road races) is much lower than the average in say the Mile, 3K or 400m, due to numerous walkers, grannies, people dressed as bananas, punters running backwards etc etc skewing the average.

True, but even looking at my 5km times where you don't get people dressed as bananas walking around at the back, my ranking level is about the same out of all competitors. I've not dug around enough to find exactly what ranking someone with a 20 minute 5km time gets, but it will be way above average.

menoscemo · 27-04-2012 03:54PM

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Sure I could do a brisk run around the track and complete the 800m in three minutes. Right now, I don't have immediate plans to do a 400 or 800m, as I would be better off targeting 5k and 10k on the back of the marathon training period (which won't add much to either the 400 or 800m goals).

Any plans for you to tick off any of the other events? The idea is to get one out of their comfort zone and try something different. Without this thread, I'd never have tried a mile or a 3k run.

Keep an eye on the graded meets calendar Krusty.
The meet on the 23rd may has a 400m, 1 mile and 3000m.
On the 6th june there is a 400m and 800m, on the 4th July there is a 400m and 10k etc etc.

There are a good few chances for you to knock off a few targets in one go. With your mile time I honestly can't see how you wouldn't get a sub 60 400m but you'll never know unless you give it a bash.

Pisco Sour · 27-04-2012 03:56PM

Krusty_Clown wrote: »

Sure I could do a brisk run around the track and complete the 800m in three minutes. Right now, I don't have immediate plans to do a 400 or 800m, as I would be better off targeting 5k and 10k on the back of the marathon training period (which won't add much to either the 400 or 800m goals).

Any plans for you to tick off any of the other events? The idea is to get one out of their comfort zone and try something different. Without this thread, I'd never have tried a mile or a 3k run.

Yeh a fair point. I have tried the majority of the above events in the past (except 5m and 10m) and my times are not impressive at all. I'm starting pre-season training within the next month with the hope of going 55 before the end of the year. To get under any of the targets above 800m would require a completely different approach to my training, which would be counterproductive to my targets. However, the 5Km target is soft here, and during the winter phase of my training I will have one weekend long run (about 3km LOL

!!), so I guess there's no reason why I can't try a 5km race as one of these runs if it fits into the schedule. My PB is 21.02 from late 2009.

Pisco Sour · 27-04-2012 04:00PM

menoscemo wrote: »

There are a good few chances for you to knock off a few targets in one go. With your mile time I honestly can't see how you wouldn't get a sub 60 400m but you'll never know unless you give it a bash.

Not so much the mile time, but more the 70 second closing lap (albeit hand timed and off a flying start) which is a better indicator. That is impressive finishing speed. No doubt about it. However one of the girls at my club who is in her mid 20s is a 4:54 miler, 2:13 800m runner, and is 59 for 400m. A lad at my club who is probably a small bit older than Krusty is around 4:38 for 1500m (so probably about 4:59ish for the mile), yet is just 2:19 for 800m, and 64 for 400m. It really is a hard one to call. Could be touch and go, but would be great to see* you give it a shot.

By "see" I mean read your log of course!

EDIT: Pretty interesting thread here:

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=4540850

There's no doubt that a sub 5 mile is a stronger performance than a sub 60 400m but some interesting comments on there. It really depends on the person with regard which target comes easier.

(Men) 10 Round Numbers- how many of these can you run in 2012?

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