Speed in the offseason

400 and 800 repeats. Little rest as well, if you feel good after the workout then do 1k's. 200's might be a possibility but I wouldn't do those until track season time. Goodluck

400 and 800 repeats. Little rest as well, if you feel good after the workout then do 1k's. 200's might be a possibility but I wouldn't do those until track season time. Goodluck

Very similar scenerio for me so I am wondering the same thing for my winter base, but wouldn't 400's and 800's with little rest make you peak if your doing mileage?

Thanks for the advice, I think the problem is that 400s are the shortest workouts we do in the spring... My coach usually has us running 1000s, long hills, or 400s. So I was wondering if I should do shorter sprints in the offseason to build speed early, or wait until the track season starts and do strides

Joe Rubio had his milers running 200's in the off season,

but at a slower pace.

What pace? Mile pace? Or even slower?

Do strides regularly after easy runs.

speeed wrote:

400 and 800 repeats. Little rest as well, if you feel good after the workout then do 1k's. 200's might be a possibility but I wouldn't do those until track season time. Goodluck

NOOOOO. My god how are 800 repeats going to improve his speed?

workout 1: 10x 10-15 second max effort hill sprints with full recovery.

workout 2: 3x30 meters, 3x60 meters, 3x90 meters, 3x150 meters max effort with full recovery

workout 3: 6-10 x200 starting at current 800 pace working down to goal 800 pace with 2-3 mins recovery

im also planning on doing the same thing except im running the 3k and steeplechase. Should i do 800's and 1k intervals for two workouts a week, strides on easy runs and maybe one sprint workout a week?

Hills hopefully 150 meters and mark every 50 meters

Speed comes from muscle so you need to be lifting and doing plyos and explosive speed as per a prior poster.

None of you speed work needs to be longer than 300.

Train like a 400-800 runner this winter and your times will get down where you want them to be.

Good luck!

dial it up wrote:

speeed wrote:

400 and 800 repeats. Little rest as well, if you feel good after the workout then do 1k's. 200's might be a possibility but I wouldn't do those until track season time. Goodluck

NOOOOO. My god how are 800 repeats going to improve his speed?

workout 1: 10x 10-15 second max effort hill sprints with full recovery.

workout 2: 3x30 meters, 3x60 meters, 3x90 meters, 3x150 meters max effort with full recovery

workout 3: 6-10 x200 starting at current 800 pace working down to goal 800 pace with 2-3 mins recovery

This. 800's with little rest is not speed work. That's more like a 5k specific workout.

Short uphill repeats to improve stride and power

Short downhill (not too steep) repeats to improve cadence

For slower 5k type runners that want to run a good 800 I suggest focusing on repeat 200s. There is little benefit for distance guys to do short sprints like 3 x 30m.

I like hill sprints close to all out that last 30 seconds.

First see where you are with a 5 x 200 workout. Run them as cutdowns. What can you run at a hard effort? My guess would be you could do 30 seconds down to 28 with 2 min rest. If 28 is your time you will continue to work on hills, bounding, drills and fast strides. Once a week you will test your self on 200s. Can you work down to a 27? Mix up the 200 workouts. One week you will do them at mile pace with short rest. The next week at full effort and full recovery.

In the spring you will test your strength by adding some 400s at 800 pace. 3 X 400 full recovery.

continue hill workouts into track season. In February you want to do some 45 to 60 second hills and add another workout of 10 second hills. short hills can be combined with a track workout.

Add strides after each run as well. Maybe add some muscular strength to get the myosine heads to work faster!

How many 30 second uphill sprints at MAX effort can you run? Not many. That would produce a HUGE amount of lactic acid and not be an effective way of improving speed. Now if he were in a specific sharpening phase for the 800 then maybe your workout would hold some water.

5 x 30 second hill sprint. The hill does not need to be steep. 4-5% grade. A distance runner will not hit much "latic" but he will feel it the next day. It is strength work and it works. You have to adapt to the training load and it takes time. To run fast middle distances there can be a 9 month build up to peak race.

Runners that complain that they have no speed generally do not work enough for that specific pace to gain a benefit.

I agree that it takes quite a bit of time to build up to a proper middle distance peak. But your workout is not founded in physiology. It works the incorrect system. There is some carry over so I am sure you are getting SOME benefit but it does not accomplish what we want to accomplish. A great example of someone who would agree with me is Coe.

It accomplishes what the poster asked and that is to improve speed in order to better run middle distance races from the perspective of a 5k runner. My workouts provide testable outcomes for this.

Hills mixed with track work has worked for many runners.

It seems to me that *dial it up* is taking an approach that works strictly on raw acceleration and top speed while *2X around* is taking an approach that forces the runner to cope with more lactic acid, as well as making the runner's muscles explode more powerfully off the ground (hill repeats emphasize this for a stronger kick).

Both would increase the speed of a middle distance runner, but in some different ways. And both methods would work.