I want to be good, time to increase mileage!?

Keep doing what your doing!

What does a week look like for you now? do you do am and pm runs or just 10 milers and how many workouts do you do a week?

70 miles is high mileage. And only 15:45? keep your mileage up and reap the benefits. You should be able to go 14:30

with this kind of mileage. Good luck!

@Ikke

A typical week for me is a 100 min long run on Sunday, 2 workouts a week, and 65 minute runs the rest of the week. I haven't been doubling at all. To increase my mileage to 90-100 mpw, I was thinking of doubling 3 times a week so my schedule would look like this. We'll use 7 min pace as the avg. pace.

Sunday: 2 hour long run = 17 miles

Monday: 65 am, 45 pm = 16 miles

Tuesday: Workout day, 75 mins = 11 miles

Wednesday: 55am, 65 pm = 16 miles

Thursday: 75 mins = 11 miles

Friday: Workout day, 75 mins = 11 miles

Saturday: 90 mins = 13 miles

So this would be anywhere from 95-100mpw depending on pace.

This look good?

Fats McGee wrote:

Keep doing what your doing!

This

You are making great progress. Plus you have already tripled your mileage in 2 years. You may see benefits to jumping to 100mpw, but it sounds like you are already in indoor season.

I'd say that once indoor ends, try increasing your mileage for a few weeks to see how it feels. I'd say come back down into the 70mpw range for outdoor season. After all, you dropped over 30 seconds from your 1500 time by going from 15-25 mpw to 35-50 mpw. From your 8k CC time, it sounds like your jump to 70 has already paid dividends. Try to consolidate your gains at 70 before moving on again. My guess is that you will be well under 4:00 for 1500 this season and should be in the low 15s-high 14s for 5k. This is a huge improvement from where you were 2 years ago.

Once track is over, you can experiment a little more freely with higher mileage. If you feel good with your 90-100mpw goal during the relatively low stress summer period, you might think about keeping that level through next fall. Extrapolating that far in the future gets a little tricky, so keep re-evaluating where you are, while still keeping your long term goal in mind.

If you run D1 doesn't your coach give you daily workouts to run??

TrackGuy336 wrote:

Sunday: 2 hour long run = 17 miles

Monday: 65 am, 45 pm = 16 miles

Tuesday: Workout day, 75 mins = 11 miles

Wednesday: 55am, 65 pm = 16 miles

Thursday: 75 mins = 11 miles

Friday: Workout day, 75 mins = 11 miles

Saturday: 90 mins = 13 miles

So this would be anywhere from 95-100mpw depending on pace.

This look good?

I would make the days before a workout easier, and make the hard day in doubles and more mileage than other days.

On monday you´re still low on glycogen, and you plan to run almost as much as the long run was, the day before a workout, not a good idea. You could run doubles on saturday, with more volume.

This way:

M:easy, low mileage

T:Double day with the workout, big mileage

W:Double day, big mileage

T:Easy, low mileage

Fr:Double day with the workout, big mileage

Sat:Double day, big mileage

Sun:A Long Run (or doubles), big mileage

Every 4th week I would take an easy week with day(s) off. If you can´t handle this for 3 weeks, you´re doing too much.

Thanks for the advice everyone, this seems like a good plan here. I did 90 miles this week and will stay at 90-95 for the next 3 weeks, then drop down to 80, then come back up. So far I'm feeling a little tired but that is to be expected until my body adjusts.

I gotta admit I am jealous, I'm near your age and doing 80 mpw and can't even crack 16. You definitely have the potential, my advice is just don't forget recovery with your new workload and your goals are gonna be here before you know it. Good luck!

Why do you think that mileage will make an improvement?

It helped you an your first big ramp up of mileage but now gains will be smaller.

If you want to improve your mile focus on running 63 to 64 sec 400 pace with some 200s in 28. run that pace as often as you can. Do some doubles with tempos and hills and with that you will see improvement

800M or Bust wrote:

Why do you think that mileage will make an improvement?

It helped you an your first big ramp up of mileage but now gains will be smaller.

If you want to improve your mile focus on running 63 to 64 sec 400 pace with some 200s in 28. run that pace as often as you can. Do some doubles with tempos and hills and with that you will see improvement

Don´t believe this, doesn´t know what he´s talking about. Stick with the REPEATABLE good mileage with some high end aerobic running in there, and leave the ~400m @ mile race pace intervals close to competitions.

Ok guys so my outdoor track season was pretty much a bust. I tried running the steeplechase and ended up getting hurt and running pretty slow. I didn't get a chance to run a 5k like I would have liked.

Now I am on my base building phase. It slowly builds up to 100 miles a week by the time the first official practice rolls around in August.

I am dead set on trying to break 25 minutes for the 8k this coming season or getting as close as possible to it. I am running my runs at a quality pace for me (around 6:30 pace). I have heard that during base building you shouldn't do any hard intervals and just stick to easy running. I want to maintain my speed though. Transitioning from middle distance to longer distance, I feel has robbed me of some of my speed.

Mondays are light days so I was wondering if I did 4x200m @ 30 seconds w/ 30 seconds recovery followed by 2-3 150m sprint float sprints would be beneficial in helping me keep my finishing kick come XC? I'll do 3-4 80-100m strides every other day as well.

You can drop 6 seconds RIGHT NOW, you just gotta try harder in the race.

Stick with 90mpw this summer and read this thread:

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=4068677

Just be careful upping your mileage AND trying to maintain your speed. Slow down on the daily mileage and add one tempo or workout as you describe once every 7 or 10 days. Strides are beneficial just about anytime of the year, just don't turn them into workouts.

Your speed will come back to you later after you build a strong base and start focusing on shorter, faster stuff.

Good luck and I appreciate you updating this thread with the results of your season. We rarely see that.

What was your injury?

In my experience increasing the quality of your runs will benefit you more than adding more. 70 MPW with a good number of quality miles is better than 100 MPW with a lot of slow junk miles.

joho wrote:

Just be careful upping your mileage AND trying to maintain your speed. Slow down on the daily mileage and add one tempo or workout as you describe once every 7 or 10 days. Strides are beneficial just about anytime of the year, just don't turn them into workouts.

Your speed will come back to you later after you build a strong base and start focusing on shorter, faster stuff.

Good luck and I appreciate you updating this thread with the results of your season. We rarely see that.

What was your injury?

I'll definitely be careful when doing strides and speed. I bruised my heel pretty bad on a water jump during a steeple race. It was my first race and I landed really hard. Beginner's mistake. It ended up making my ankle swell and I wasn't able to run for about 10 days. I had to hit the bike everyday which really sucked.

Do it do it. Be nice to hear from you in a year or two. Post your results.

Ok guys, so summer training has been going well, been running 60-70 mpw, feeling really good, taking care of the little stuff like pushups, pullups, core, etc. Mpw should hit 100 by the time school starts.

There is only one problem. My tonsils were killing me yesterday and today to the point that I had to go to the ENT specialist and get a steroid shot for pain and inflammation. Turns out have been chronic tonsillitis and will have to get my tonsils removed asap. The doctor said it would be 2 weeks of no running.

If I can't run for 2 weeks it will be a MAJOR setback...all this progress to get shutdown like that especially since there is the potential for me to be the number one XC man this year. Is it possible to recover and save my XC season or am I doomed to suck? There is no way in hell I am going to let the people who always doubted my potential and I am beating now, beat me again, I can't give them that satisfaction.