When Did You See Your Biggest Fitness Improvements?

When I quit running and started crossfit.

I know you said 20 or later, but I'm only 20. So...

My sophomore year in high school I PRed by 21 seconds in the 800 (2:31 to 2:10) in the course of one spring season. I was just chugging away at my coach's training plan, and already had a sort of base from 3 prior track seasons

After a solid 5 months of the consistent base (MAF type) then ran two all out 5ks within two days of each other. Was a tired for a week then hit a new level of fitness.

For me the secret is nearly all out hill repeats of 10 x ~30 seconds each on a 10% grade. 1 min recovery w/jog down the hill. Even with just easy running and low mileage, this really builds power in the legs, increases lactate tolerance and VO2max. You should be breathing very hard at the end of each rep, nearly max heart rate. It's a very effective workout that doesn't take much time.

crossfitt wrote:

When I quit running and started crossfit.

Now thats funny

When I joined a group a running group and increased my running mileage from 3 miles to 20 miles a week my fitness spiked drastically and now I have finished a 5k race in 32:24. Next time my goal is to break 30 minutes.

15 months of high mileage ( up to 155 in a week ) , then a severe injury racing, then low fast mileage with off day recovery.

I saw my biggest fitness improvements after I started training with Aden.

When I did consistent doubles (~12 runs/week). Amazing improvement, almost immediately.

Doubles helped me bump up volume to 75mpw during the Winter. I set a 1min+ 5k PR during Spring track..

Was a 3:12 marathoner at age 25. Then found the massive hadd thread and it clicked. Raised my mileage in the summer of 2004 from 45ish to 70 a week doing the hadd thing for 12 weeks then 8 weeks of marathon specific work. Ran 3:03.

Did it again in 2005 and got down to 2:52.

Did it again in 2006 and ran 2:47.

Did it again in 2007 getting all the way up to 125miles a week and got sick and hurt.

From 2008-2011 I did normal training and went 2:45, 2:43, 2:41 then 2:39.

Only 1 marathon since. Lost motivation to train after breaking 2:40.

But hadd mileage got me a lot of that improvement.

Went from 2:12 to 1:57 in one season my junior year, ever since then, been constantly improving my 800 to mile times

Increased mileage from ~40-50/week to ~80-90/week and slowed down my easy runs by about 20-30 seconds/mile at the beginning of summer and then dropped a consistent 2 minutes off my 8k XC times in the fall.

lease wrote:

When I did consistent doubles (~12 runs/week). Amazing improvement, almost immediately.

Haile Gebrasalassie said he only ever did singles. Who do you think had the most amazing improvement you or Geb?

1) mid-forefoot landing as opposed to heal slapping.

2) pelvis pushed slightly further forward.

3) added in 2 hard fartlek sessions per week, with either 5 x 80m really fast added in.

4) diet change: less sugar, black pepper on veggies, garlic bread, less red meat.

5) morning core strength sessions.

I increased a couple of my daily single runs from 45-60 minutes to 75 minutes.

As a coach, I run with the kids (but often have to pull my runs short for the slow, low mileage kids--at 45 minutes--to supervise their post-run stretching, and then the rest of the kids would trickle in from their runs to stretch too).

But, after the kids all went home, I started going back out & doing another 15-30 minutes. All very slow miles (because I'd already cooled-off from watching kids stretch & get picked-up after practice), but I was okay with that. Slow slogging.

I noticed after a few weeks of doing that, I felt so strong!

M: 60-75 minutes total

T: 60-75 minutes total

W: 60-75 minutes total

TH: 60-75 minutes total

F: 60-75 minutes total

S: 80 minutes steady (long run)

S: 35-45 minutes easy

But, I wasn't doing workouts. I simply added some extra slow miles. That's when I noticed my biggest improvement.

(I remember a couple years prior, I experimented on myself doing low mileage two-a-days. 30-35AM & 30-35PM. I found working a bigger base, like above, in singles worked much better for me. Those low mile two-a-days didn't give me any endurance. I was just tired. The PM run was always really slow. This experiment on myself simply meant lots of chafing, lots of bathroom visits, lots of laundry. But, no endurance.)

answer this.. wrote:

lease wrote:

When I did consistent doubles (~12 runs/week). Amazing improvement, almost immediately.

Haile [Gebrselassie] said he only ever did singles. Who do you think had the [more] amazing improvement[,] you or Geb?

The thread asked when I saw my biggest fitness improvement.

I answered the question.

BTW if you think HG never ran more than once a day, please come to NYC. I have a beautiful bridge that I can sell to you for a very attractive price.

Gavin Newsome wrote:

Was a 3:12 marathoner at age 25. Then found the massive hadd thread and it clicked. Raised my mileage in the summer of 2004 from 45ish to 70 a week doing the hadd thing for 12 weeks then 8 weeks of marathon specific work. Ran 3:03.

Did it again in 2005 and got down to 2:52.

Did it again in 2006 and ran 2:47.

Did it again in 2007 getting all the way up to 125miles a week and got sick and hurt.

From 2008-2011 I did normal training and went 2:45, 2:43, 2:41 then 2:39.

Only 1 marathon since. Lost motivation to train after breaking 2:40.

But hadd mileage got me a lot of that improvement.

This is interesting as I have been training largely via Hadd's recommendations this summer while slowly building mileage. I have gotten a lot faster at lower HR paces, but I haven't tested anything faster.

I'm curious about your '08-11 period where you said you did "normal training." What did you mean by that? Lower mileage and more common plans with tempos and track work?

From 19 to 20 went from 37:20 10K (debut, but xc) to 32:54 on roads in less than a year. Mostly mileage based, from 40 mpw summer training at 19 to 70 mpw for most of the next year following that summer. Spent much of the 2nd summer running with an elite/sub elite group of runners and that was a huge boost. That 10K was a bit over my head as I tied 5K PR and ran PRs for 4 an 5 miles along the way, and it took several years to break those PRs.

Then at 25 I broke through again, and ran > 1 minute faster than old 10K PR, and ran PRs for all major distances (5K, 1/2 marathon, and marathon; plus 5 mile) as well. Can't explain this one other than having a year of semi-stability, a good place to train, and learning how to run on my own. Mileage was less than last two years of college (when I'd been doing 80 to 100+ mile weeks), but it was consistent.