Realistic goals for the future?

Dump the junior year goals. They're a distraction for you right now. Focus on the upcoming track season.

Dump the easy track goals. What you're calling stretch goals aren't unreasonable.

So now that you know what you're aiming for in track season, the question to ask is what you as an athlete need to do to get there. I'm glad you've figured out that upping your mileage is important. Start there. Add some strides or something else to develop speed, too. Mileage, strides, and XC skiing should get you to where you need to be when you can start running full time again.

I'm copying and pasting the following from a thread that I recently made, we had kind've similar situations our freshman year, and now we are both sophmores (although I recently turned 16).

My goals for this indoor season are about

10:59 and 4:59. In outdoor I'd like to get under 10:30 and 4:45. Best of luck to you.

_________________________________

I am a 16 yr old sophmore in Hs. I started running my freshman year of highschool.

Freshman Prs:

5k: 21:54 (Xc)

3200m: 11:50 (Spring Track)

1600m: 5:11 (Spring Track)

800m: 2:24 (Spring Track)

400m: 67 (10x400 repeats w 1 min of rest, have never raced, but in a time trial haven't broken it).

This past summer, I was hoping to train alot so I could have a good season this year. My school is a relatively small school, and we are competitive in our county with other small schools. Our 1-7 all run around 17-17:50. 99% of my team couldn't care less about training, alot of the Top 7 ran 17:30s their sophmore year, and are running the same time as seniors. Anyway, none of them run over the summer. So this past summer, I ran about 5-6x a week average about 35mpw, hitting a max of 45miles in a week.

I started off the season in September and in my 1st race, I ran a disappointif 21:12. I was extremely bummed, considering I had worked pretty hard over the summer. A little side note, my team probably does about 15-20mpw, its a complete joke. The weeks leading up to my 1st race, we had "long runs" of 4 miles. My races following the 21:12 were :

20:16

20:12

20:08

19:47

19:22

18:51

19:03

18:47

Alot of kids on my team say that my summer training was a waste, but I don't think it was. Anyway, I want to know what times to aim for this Indoor Track Season and this Sping Track season, that would set me up for ~16:30s my junior year. I plan on running alot this summer. I really want to have a great junior year.

These are my goals for my junior year:

5k: 16:30

3200m (in): 10:15

1600m (in): 4:35

800m (in): 2:05

3200m: 9:35

1600m: 4:20

800m: 1:58

I know you guys are going to say "this kid is crazy" and I understand that these goals are probably crazy, especially since a 16:59 is an anomaly at my school, but these are my Senior year goals (and again, I plan on training a ton and having a breakout year junior year):

5k: 15:30

3200m (in): 9:30

1600m (in): 4:20

800m (in): 1:58

3200m: 9:00

1600m: 4:10

800m: 1:54

All these times would set me up for school records. Any advice would help me alot. So what do you guys think I should realistically aim for this Indoor and Outdoor season that could possibly set me up for my junior year times, which could maybe set me up for my senior times.

One last note, I know that alot of you guys are going to doubt me, and thats ok. I'm going to update this Thread about 2-4x a month from now on.

Thanks for your help!

Read more:

http://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=7848081#ixzz4QnHobun8

Cool. I'ma 15 yr old sophomore in a similar boat as you (I'm OK, but I'd like to be better)

(Freshman year: 20:2x, 11:0x, 5:0x, 2:14 relay split)

Got 17:58 this year in cross after off and on training this summer.

I want to run 2:05/sub 4:40/ sub 10:15.

No idea if it's realistic or not.

Good Luck!

If you can run close to 5 flat this year you can easily run 4:35 your junior year

Why don't we try to keep this thread going and post workouts/races. It'd be cool to log progress etc.

I'll start with today's workout (first of the season):

.5mi Easy, drills, 3x1k w/ 200m rest (3:25, 3:24, 3:20) 3x400 w/200 m rest (73, 74, 69) 3x200 w/ 200m rest (about 32 for each one),1mi Easy, stretches

Effort: tough but in control (maybe 7/10)

This was a shorter version of something I did last year at a similar effort, though I was faster this year.

trackislife12 wrote:

If you can run close to 5 flat this year you can easily run 4:35 your junior year

Not nessacarily bro, you don't know how much he's been training. Big jumps can happen, but are never promised.

I like the idea of keeping this thread for logging progress. I haven't been doing many workouts for cross country skiing other than 1 super hilly lactate threshold run. The pace wasn't fast because it was on slippery grass and hills but it felt like a good effort. I'm on pace for my most miles in a month which is good because I missed the first few days of the month recovering from my last 5k of cross country. I had 36 miles last week and I might be able to get that again this week if I get a pretty good long run in.

We are doing another lactate threshold type of run tomorrow which will get some good volume and up tempo work. Usually this workout goes 4 minute moderate, 2 minutes moderate hard, 4 moderate, 2 minutes moderate hard for 2-3 sets. The hills make it challenging which is good.

I'm just doing easy mileage for the rest of the week, with about a 70 min long run. Did 8 miles in about an hour yesterday and took it really easy today.

First race is December 3rd.

Yeah I had the same 5k cross country pr for my sophomore year and I got 5:10 for the mile, and around the same for the 800m and 3200m. You should aim higher though, as my results won't be the same as yours most likely, especially considering I have basically no talent. I'd say your stretch goals are perfectly reasonable as well, it all depends, just work consistently and hard for it and race your best and I'm sure you'll hit sub 5, etc.

Thanks! It's nice to hear from someone who was in the same situation. I've been working consistently hard but not too much. 4:59 was my high school track goal when I joined freshman year and it's cool to think I might hit that this year.

Just an update because I would like to keep this thread open. I haven't gotten much running due to the 10+ inches of snow in my area and actually being able to cross country ski. I don't think that I have lost much actual fitness, just running fitness because of the skiing. I know while I might be losing endurance, I'm gaining leg strength and gaining more lean muscle which is helping. Anytime I can run on a treadmill I try to go a couple of miles at a decent pace but I don't have much access to them. It's going to get warmer next week and I'm hoping to get at least 3 runs next week. I'm going on a winter training trip for skiing 2 weeks from now where I will be skiing for at least 4 hours of the day and hope that is some good cross training. I'm hoping to update this thread every couple of days so I can look back on it later or if other people want to follow it.

Another update.

Monday I did some easy skiing for an hour or so. I got 2nd in my race on Tuesday which was pretty cool. I'm gaining some endurance and also becoming leaner which I think helps. It's better than having no muscle. I'm getting lighter but also stronger. Did 1:30 to 2 hours of skiing Wednesday-Saturday. Saturday I did a slow easy run with no watch because I don't care that much about that stuff right now. Probably somewhere around 3-4 miles in 30-40 minutes. Feeling good about how I'm doing in skiing and looking forward to the start of track season soon. Still going to try and run 3-4x a week when it's not slippery and in the double digit degrees outside.

Been skiing a lot. I got bronchitis a little bit ago and took a couple days off from doing anything but I'm back to running and skiing. Haven't been doing much running lately. Ran 5 this morning at 8:00 pace which is my usual easy pace. Seems like the skiing has kept most of my running ability. Wasn't struggling that much to go my easy pace. It's gonna be warm next week so I'm shooting for about 5 miles every time I go out which will hopefully be like 3 times. Skiing is starting to wind down and it's nearing the end of the season so I'm hoping I can get up to running 30 mpw by the end of the season.

Focus on the process: if you train well and execute well, your results should be more satisfying than if you perhaps pridefully say I expect this much of myself.

ehhh?? wrote:

Been skiing a lot. I got bronchitis a little bit ago and took a couple days off from doing anything but I'm back to running and skiing. Haven't been doing much running lately. Ran 5 this morning at 8:00 pace which is my usual easy pace. Seems like the skiing has kept most of my running ability. Wasn't struggling that much to go my easy pace. It's gonna be warm next week so I'm shooting for about 5 miles every time I go out which will hopefully be like 3 times. Skiing is starting to wind down and it's nearing the end of the season so I'm hoping I can get up to running 30 mpw by the end of the season.

Skier, eh? You might find this of interest.

Sorry I haven't updated this in like a month I've been pretty busy lately with skiing and school. Okay, skiing is officially over now as of this week and it's been really warm where I live so now I'm completely back to running and it's going really well. I feel like the skiing has really helped me stay in shape and gave me a break from running and I feel really refreshed right now.

Monday: This was an easy ski and not really much happened that day.

Tuesday: Last day of skiing and it went decent. I felt strong and and I think skiing really ended up helping me with running.

Wednesday: Went about 6 miles at a moderate pace which was about 7:50 that day. It wasn't easy but I definitely wasn't struggling. I feel like it feels better to be doing this base work at a good pace rather than just chugging along pretty slowly. It also helps me with getting more miles in quicker and have more time for school.

Thursday: I didn't run, I didn't want to jump right in to running everyday so I went to a just for fun soccer practice and got some sprints in and it wasn't too much of a workout.

Friday: I went 11 miles at 6:55 pace which was the farthest I've ran before and at the end I really didn't feel winded because of the distance, I just felt tired because I kinda let loose on this run. I thought of it as a kind of long run so I went a comfortably hard pace. At no point did I feel like I was struggling to keep up the pace, obviously I was breathing a little heavy on the hills but I was never uncomfortable or needing to stop. Strava takes out the traffic lights time stopped so I feel like if you add in the breaks at traffic lights it would have been like 7:10-7:20 pace which is still really good for me.

Saturday (Today): Gonna go for about 6 miles today at a pretty easy pace which will hopefully be around 8:00. My legs are a little tight but I think 5-6 miles would help loosen up a little and couldn't really hurt much.

Sunday: Probably gonna go for around 7-8 miles depending on how I feel after the run today.

Overall this was the last week of skiing and the running ended up being really good this week. The run on Friday really got hyped and I feel like I might actually be able to get sub 11 in the 3200m which is my main goal. Just last year my 5k pr was 7:00 pace so it's kinda cool that I ran 11 miles at that pace and it wasn't even a race effort. I don't really know how paces work during base phase so I'm just going by feel and going a little faster than easy on everyday and I let loose some days/long runs.

I feel like I'm in really good shape right now because of the past 2 weeks although my foot has a little discomfort and I took today off and I'll see how everything is tomorrow. It feels like a little bruise on the ball of my foot so I'm assuming it's just because of the increased running and I need to cut back a little.

Monday: Rest day since I was sick that day.

Tuesday: 1 mile warm up. 3 miles at 5k pace from cross country. 1 mile cool down. (5 miles total) Now the 3 mile tempo went okay. I went the pace I was supposed to and kept it even but it was a struggle. My 5k pr on a good course was 19:29 so I was hoping for 6:45-6:50 pace and my splits ended up being 6:48, 6:46, 6:42. It was pretty hard and I think it was just because of the lack of track speed. Only had like 5-6 base runs before I tried this. Probably gonna slow it down next time and go longer because that's what my coach told me about peaking too early. If I do another tempo this week I'm probably gonna go 7:00-7:05 but maybe 6 miles or longer depending on how it is.

Wednesday: Went about 6 miles at a moderate pace which was about 7:30 that day. Wasn't bad at all, sometimes I feel myself pushing too much and end up accidentally running like a 7:0x mile on downhills. I don't know whether that is a good thing and I'm in pretty good shape or bad because I'm going too fast.

Thursday: Ran inside because it was cold outside and we just did a little circuit workout. Assuming I did around 3-4 miles. Nothing real special.

Friday: I went 8 miles at 7:20 pace. It ended up being way faster than I wanted/expected. It was never a struggle but it felt like a pretty fast moderate run.

Saturday: 6 miles at 7:40. Good feeling moderate run. Not much to be said about this one other than it felt pretty easy and the other ones didn't. Ball of my foot felt a little weird at the end of this run but I didn't think much of it.

Sunday: I was planning on going 12 miles at low 7's for my long run but I ended up going 6 at 6:58 pace because of my foot. About 3 miles into my out and back route my foot started to be kind of uncomfortable and I was switching my stride a little. I felt really good so I thought I might as well let loose pace wise because I wasn't gonna be able to get the distance in. Last 3 miles were 6:53, 6:38, 6:21 which was better than my tempo earlier in the week so I think the tempo might have just been a bad day.

Overall the week went well just a couple things happened. The last 3 miles of the attempted long run felt really good and I'm really happy with the mileage I'm getting in and the pace too. I'm gonna slow it down this week because track practice has just started and I'm going to be running with the team now so I'll just keep around the upper level guys that I wanna be around during races. I think I might do a tempo on my own later this week depending on how my foot feels and it'll probably be longer like 5-7 miles hopefully around 7:00 and under 7 by the end of it. Another thing is my cadence has gotten a lot better. I'm up to mid 170's on all my runs which is good since I was at 150's and low 160's during my cross country runs. Hoping to keep around 35 miles again this week. I hit 34 last week and was hoping for 40 with the 12 mile long run. I think 40 was a little optimistic and I'll aim for 35 this week.

Today is Tuesday and I ran 5 yesterday at about 7:30 with the top guys on the team. It was a little tough on the hills but I think I can keep this up until the workouts start and then I'll make sure to recover well because I don't want to peak early or burn out.

Ok so I'm just gonna give my last 2 weeks of training because I haven't been on this thread in a while.

Monday 3/20:

1 mile warmup at 9:30 pace.

10 minute tempo, 90 seconds rest, 10 minute tempo on the track.

First 10 minutes. 6 laps and about 150 meters (6:09 pace). Second 10 minutes. 6 laps and about 240 meters (6:00).

Tuesday:

2 miles at 8:50 pre meet shakeout + stretching and strides.

Wednesday:

2 mile warmup at 9:00.

Indoor 2 mile in 11:37. Splits were as follows. 88, 94, 92, 88, 85, 84, 87, 79. So a 6:02 first mile and a 5:35 second mile.

Thursday:

6 miles easy at 8:10.

Friday:

3 miles medium hard run at 6:59.

1 mile jog back because cramps.

Saturday:

About 8 miles in about 65 minutes. My watch died so I don't know.

Monday 3/27: 1 mile warmup at 8:20.

4 x mile with about 2 minutes rest between them.

6:05, 6:07, 6:03, 5:52

That workout felt pretty awful and I think it was because I was still tired from the 2 mile race.

0.5 mile cooldown.

Tuesday:

4 miles easy at 7:40

Wednesday:

1.3 mile jog to hill at 8:20

5 x uphill. About a 6-7% grade. Uphills were done somewhere in the upper 6 minute pace range.

1.3 mile job back at 9:40

Thursday:

4 miles easy at about 8:10

Friday:

5 miles medium at 6:55-7:00

2 mile job back at 9:00

Saturday:

9.5 miles at 7:10 long run.

Trackbot says that if that 2 mile was evenly paced that would be a 11:23.55 and I'm really really happy with that this early in the season and honestly I think that stretch goal of 10:59 isn't a stretch at all anymore. I don't have any races with week but I have one the next week and I'll probably run the 1600m and hope for about 5:05-5:10 but I don't know how realistic that is. I might also run the 4x400m at some meet just to see my 400m time.

Hey, so I responded to your questions on my thread and just read your thread. I saw that you recently ran 11 miles @6:55 pace, which I think is incredible. I also saw that your ran an 11:37 2 mile, which sounds pretty good to me, considering you think as of now that 10:59 may be a stretch. Considering you've ran faster than me over 2 miles, and my goal is sub 10:30, I think you should readjust your goals and make your goals similar to mine. Their is no reason that we both don't hit sub 10:30 this season, especially considering your recent workouts and runs. Your workouts seem to be going as well as mine were when I went sub 5, so i think you'll definitely be able to achieve sub 5 as well this season.

I think you can definitely hit sub 10:30 and sub 5:00 this season.

Best of luck with your season.