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Originally posted by JimR:

Don't worry about speed too much over winter. Keep a good volume going. Once the weather starts to break and race season approaches, then you can introduce your speed back in. Nothing wrong with mile repeats. You may want to look at introducing a solid tempo or progression run in your plan at that time as well.

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As well as maintaining a good percentage of my miles, as JimR suggests, I like to keep some shorter tempo runs in over the winter, just to keep the motor running. I have found that this keeps me stimulated and makes the transition to speedwork prior to racing season a little smoother.

I start my speedwork each season by slowly increasing my tempo run duration then ease into some 400s, then 800s then mile repeats. For the 5k, I'll focus more on the 400s, building pace and number of intervals (upto 10).

Note that for my first sub 20 5k, the majority of my runs were 20 min tempos and 30 progressions. Adding consistant 400s, and some longer tempos I dropped to the low 19s. Adding more miles, I dropped below 19.

[http://This message has been edited by RunAsics (edited Oct-30-2007).|http://This message has been edited by RunAsics (edited Oct-30-2007).]

After 2 weeks vacation from running in which I ran a total of 16.5 miles run I am now beginning my 2008 training regime.

I ran 20 miles last week and my goal is 22 miles this week.

Last night being the 1st of the month I decided to log a 5k on my neighborhood roads. I went out at what I felt was 10k race pace so that I wouldn't be running this like a race.

My splits were 6:56, 7:00 and 6:47.
A final tenth of 0:35 gave me a 5k time of 21:17.

My muscles are sore today but it seems like I ran it pretty controlled. I was happy about my middle half miles which clocked in very consistently at:

3:29
3:31
3:32
3:31

The 1st half mile was 3:24 and the last 3:16. So as Jasons Driving Force says you can really make up a ton of time in that last quarter mile. I estimate in the last 0.15 mile I made up about 16 seconds from what my average pace was for the 1st 2.9 miles of the run.

Every month I hope to test my 5k speed like this. I don't want to do a whole lot of fast miles just get my miles up again to around 35 by New Years and see if I can increase it to the 50s by Spring.

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Originally posted by MichiganFlyer:

The 1st half mile was 3:24 and the last 3:16. So as Jasons Driving Force says you can really make up a ton of time in that last quarter mile. I estimate in the last 0.15 mile I made up about 16 seconds from what my average pace was for the 1st 2.9 miles of the run.

Every month I hope to test my 5k speed like this. I don't want to do a whole lot of fast miles just get my miles up again to around 35 by New Years and see if I can increase it to the 50s by Spring.

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Keep at it Michigan! You are going to do it, I have faith in you!

I have my biggest race weekend coming up tomorrow! I have my goal 5k race on Saturday and a goal half marathon on Sunday. I know two races in two days is suicide but I like to live dangerously. To top it off I have had a cold and a very bad cough all week.

The 5K should be interesting. It finishes down a moderately steep hill for the entire last mile. I am going to try and blow that last mile out. This might be my first negative split 5K ever.

I am just going to try not to die in half marathon. Good luck to everyone racing this weekend.


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Originally posted by joev9:

Michigan, what are you hoping to gain from these 5K non-race efforts? Are you just hoping to pop off a sub 20, or do you have a good training reason?

Not trying to be critical, but I think you would be better served by a solid training program with a good mix of tempo runs, intervals, and weekly long runs and saving the 5K race efforts for actual races. I have been reading Daniels book and he is a big proponent of only training as fast and as long as you need to train to get the desired effect from a particular workout (lactate removal for tempo and VO2max from intervals). He goes into great detail about why you should stick to your target paces for a particular workout even if you are feeling great. Your 5K runs are too fast for tempo and probably beat you up much more than a solid interval workout.

Besides, I know that for myself, there is no way I can match my race pace from an actual race in a solo time trial. I need the adreneline of the race and the other runners to push me to my best times. You might be sabotaging your actual races with these periodic 5K time trials.

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Thanks for the advice.

I am just seeing where I am at for the time being. I don't have any races lined up probably until February. I called this my 6 mile race pace effort. I suppose it was a tempo paced run. I think tempo pace is 7:00 per mile for 4 miles for me. Basically I am running most of my training at around 8:10 per mile pace which may be a little fast but I am only running 20 miles per week right now so I suppose when my miles go higher the training pace will slow.

I have run 5 five-ks in the last month in my neighborhood alone...21:19, 22:09, 22:33, 22:27 and 21:17. I cannot say there was anything hard about them. They were all in my comfort zone and keep me confident knowing I can still run a mid 20's five-k if need be.

I am having fun right now. I am keeping the paces easy and the mileage fairly low so far. There have been alot of times when I dreaded getting out and running but currently I am doing what I like and its working so I hope this continues.

I don't want to try and break 5k for a few months maybe not April. The pressure is off and I like that. I can get better but I have time. Last year I tried several different training programs (probably didnt follow them as well as I should...not enough long runs or intervals) but I ran a 5k in 20:22 in May...and only improved 5 seconds to 20:17 in July and from July-October I could not best that time. So this winter I am looking at getting in a little more base miles. Last year I was around 35 as a peak....I did get to 40 per week for a month and put forth 4 good races under 20:30. This year I am going to try for 50 miles per week and hope to bring all my 5k races to sub 20 next year.

I do agree its much harder to run 5ks by yourself like you do in races. I have run sub 20:30 by myself three or four times though which is about the same as my 5k race time so it is posisble. The reason for this is I get used to my neighborhood course and know what to expect.

Adkblues, nice race yesterday.  That's quite an accomplishment, knocking over a minute off your previous PR in only two months.  I agree with you that it would be a good idea to up your mileage a bit.  When you do, you'll be knocking on the door of a sub-20 in no time.  Good luck!

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Originally posted by adkblues:

Thanks XCguy. I'm pretty happy with the race, though its still humbling to run 21:00 when I used to be able to easily run under 18 minutes.

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I ran a small 5K race this weekend only two weeks after setting my PR of 18:27. I only barely broke 21:00 with a 20:54. Adding 2:27 onto your 5k time in 2 weeks is definitely humbling! Now the race was extremely windy(There was a hurricane offshore at the time), I had the double stroller with me, the course was anything but the advertised “Flat and Fast”, and I was recovering from a really bad cold.

You win some you loose some but you come back to race again another day. My next goal is to break 40:00 for the 10K with the stroller. I will get that chance on Sunday as long as the weather holds up.


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