800m runners how did you do sub 2 min?

As a high-schooler, I ran 2:02-2:03 till I couldn't see straight. Didn't matter what kind of race strategy I used or who I raced. I was plenty fast, could split 51-52 in the 4X400, but didn't do much mileage.

Got to college, a D3 school, ran with the cross-country guys but wasn't good enough to compete. However, that base was the number one thing I did differently. I ran the 'easy' runs with them, which were still pretty challenging, and ran some on my own, did a sensible transition to track work, like hill reps and fartlek. First time out, without much formal speed work, ran 1:57. Never looked back and never ran slower than 2 again. I suppose it was partly mental, but the main thing was being strong enough to maintain from 400-700.

Another guy went after her and I raged out a 1:55.

I broke 800m twice my senior year. I relied more on strategy. Workouts were pretty much the same as the year before. Occasionally did 600m

pure hate

I moved up from the 400m by training w/ the XC team in the fall. Never broke 29 minutes for 8k, but broke 2:00 in the first indoor meet.

400m training doesn't require much mileage so I don't get how one extra lap warrants that much mileage. Anyone have the physiological reason for this?

800m does not require that much mileage. At least not for 1:59. My friend went 1:57 his soph year with 25-30 mpw. He secret was he was a sprinter before he was a sprinter first then he started doing distance work.

To be a good 800m guy. Sub 2 - you need speed. Lots and lots of it. So - first work on getting your 400m time down. THen work on endurance workouts.

Then why is Nick Symmonds running 20 milers? I've heard of others doing up to 15 milers as well.

The amount of mileage obviously depends on the runner, but getting too much mileage isn't necessary and if your mileage is getting high, then chances are your workouts aren't fast enough. If you're coming off of cross country training then you should have a great base from the summer and fall. I've been on a schedule of repetition (FAST) workouts on Monday, interval or tempo style workouts on Wednesday, and easy the rest of the days with solid strides after... If you're not already racing then you'd substitute a race with race simulated speeds. My long runs still were 75-90 minutes. The longer days (if you can handle them) will be the make or break that last 200 meters...

Senior year of HS. About 20 MPW, with the runs being done at 8:00+ pace.

Week was something like this:

Su: Off

Mo: 4 miles.

Tu: Primary workout. 3x600 at 1:38ish, full (almost 8 min) recovery between. Some 500s once or twice, and I do remember a 3x300 where the first and last 50 were strides and the interior 200 was a full sprint.

We: Sprint workout. 3x(150-100-50) with walkback recovery between reps and a few minutes between sets.

Th: 3 miles.

Fr: 2 miles, strides.

Sa: Race.

I was in mid 52 shape, which is just a hair faster than my junior year, when I ran 2:04. I had been trained as a sprinter for my first year and a half of track and relied heavily on my speed, as I missed most of base my senior year.

This plan worked for me and was what I needed given my training circumstances, but I would not recommend it for your typical distance runner.

who says you can't run 15+ mile long runs and do speedwork? i'm sure nick does plenty of both. you only lose what you don't train. long runs don't inherently make you lose speed. but not training your speed will make you lose speed.

2nd lap wrote:

Then why is Nick Symmonds running 20 milers? I've heard of others doing up to 15 milers as well.

I went sub 2:00 after about 2 years of intense interval workouts (designed for distance runners, not 800m runners). We would do 5 x mile with 2-3 minutes rest. Sometimes we even did stuff like 20x400 with 45 seconds rest averaging 65 seconds. But anyhow, I was never an 800m runner. I was a 5000m guy.

I'm not saying you can't run 20 milers...my question is, compared to 400 training, why does one extra lap warrant that much mileage? I can kinda see it if you're running multiple rounds for championships or if one does multiple events, though.

I am working on my milage to 65 miles a week, seb coe trained with multi pacing workouts which is what i am doing now, and no i dont have 22.5 200m speed i have 28 200m speed and am trying to get my 400m down to 52-54 this year my best 400m is 60 sec.

2 sessions per week and one race.

1.)10min jog warm up.

10x200m

5min jog warm down & bodyweight circuit.

2.)10 min jog warm up

10x100m hills w/5min recovery fast.

5min jog warm down & bodyweight circuit.

3.) Race: 1:53.88

2nd lap wrote:

I'm not saying you can't run 20 milers...my question is, compared to 400 training, why does one extra lap warrant that much mileage? I can kinda see it if you're running multiple rounds for championships or if one does multiple events, though.

Ever hear of Peter Snell? The 800 is a much more aerobic event. If he had not started doing the long runs, no-one would have ever heard of him. Some guys can get extremely fast training their natural capacity for speed, but will fall short of achieving their best possible time without base. I wonder whether a number of today's 800m talents substitute PEDs for base.

You need to look at you 400m time when saying I did limited training and cracked 2 mins easy

For example if you can do 52 400m then ran 1:58

The best 400m runner can do a 4 second coversion, but you should at least be looking at 5 seconds

So 52 + 5 x 2 gives 1:54

If you are running 1:58/9 off 52/53 sec there is no point saying wow look at me I did this off 25 miles a wk

To the op look at increasing you leg strength to get you 400m time while also maintaining your training mileage and workouts. You don't need to be doing 15 mile long runs but work towards 10m

For this look at hills, circuit training and weights, then move on to doing faster based stuff on the track

4 sex endurance requires huge mileage. 5 seconds requires near enough 100km per week aswell. I got to best 400m + 6 seconds running 60km per week. 2min 800m isn't hard though unless your speed is incredibly slow.

auskick wrote:

4 sex endurance requires huge mileage. 5 seconds requires near enough 100km per week aswell. I got to best 400m + 6 seconds running 60km per week. 2min 800m isn't hard though unless your speed is incredibly slow.

100km a week is not huge mileage and 60km is definitely too low

I ran a 4 second conversion off 80km training training once per day. Perhaps that was because my 400m was so slow and I should have done more to get this down but I was training for 5km so an 800m runner should do close (depending on age and development of course)

Loads of runners (at college age and above) are doing 1:53/4 off a 53 best timed in a race