Breaking 9:00 in the steeple

I ran a 10:04 steeple as a high school senior. I only got to 9:06 in college. I probably had adequate speed (3:55 1500) but wasn't strong enough to get under 9:00. I never really got above about 70mpw. You probably need to be at 90-100mpw plus some solid strength work in the weight room to have a shot a sub-9:00.

Unless you're quite elite on the barriers, you should set a goal of being able to do a 8:20 3k in indoor to know you have a decent shot to break 9 in the steeple.

Your mile/3k/5k prs are decently comparable, but being more than a minute off your flat 3k PR suggests something isn't where it should be in hurdling/water barrier work, but if last year was your first doing steeple, that's not unusual.

What do you make of your current hurdle and water barrier ability? Are you losing ground on people in clearances?

You need to break 10 first!

Do some intervals over the barriers. No point practising barriers completely fresh.

You need to get under or at least close to 150 by more training & cut out junk food. Do strength work but no weights

Lots of varied advice here, but the one thing that I would agree with on all of the other posts is lots of work over the barriers.

As a frame of reference, my college teammate was D III national champ in the steeple way back when and ran 8:56 to win in a strategic race. He was a 4:12-4:14 miler and a 14:42-14:45 5k guy that season. He was also close to your size, but a few pounds lighter (6' 0", 150).

I ran under 14:20, under 30:30 and just over 8:30 indoors for the 3k, and was national runner up in the 10,000m; but my form over the barriers was awful, and in the one race that I ran the steeple that year, I only ran 9:08 (admittedly a solo win on hot day, but I am not sure I would have gone much under 9:00 even under ideal circumstances).

The difference was that while my top end ability was better, he did the bulk of his workouts over barriers while I dabbled.

Either way, to get under 9:00, you simply need to get much fitter as a preliminary step as none of those times is close to being equivalent to a sub 9.

My form over the hurdles isn't world class but its not horrible, I do believe I lose more time in between them. Where I struggle is switching back into that 3k pace between landing and next approach. Last year was my first year trying it and mileage has hung between 75-90 a week for cross.

Fully agree with this. Form over the barriers saves you in so many ways. My PRs (also was D3) aren't terrific: 8:38 3k indoors, 15:00 5k, etc. But I have really good hurdling form and that helped me to get under 9:00 a few times last season.

I never did any practices over the barriers, though. I just did normal workouts with the 5k guys and my mileage never got over 70 miles at any point. I just went over the barriers a few times every other practice to get a feel for it. I am uncannily flexible in the hips as it is so I can get aways with it.

So literally the best and only advice I would ever give is have great form over the barrier. Make it so that you can hurdle with both legs without even thinking about it or expending that much energy. The more you can keep your rythm during the race, the better.

I would agree that incorporating hurdling into workouts is important. However, use a standard hurdle set at the correct height. Slamming into a steeple barrier during a workout could end your season.

Yeah, not everyone is cut out for the steeple. I think lots of people tend to gravitate towards it because the standards for most meets (D III nationals, for example) are softer there than in the 1500, 5000 and 10,0000. That was part of the appeal of it for me, to be honest.

But if you are what I think of as a rhythm runner, then the steeple can be a tough race because there is a constant disruption of your rhythm.

I am not saying that you are not cut out for the steeple, just giving you food for thought.

And for the record, I think the challenge that you are facing goes to the very nature of the steeple - it is the challenge that everyone has.

As I'm sure you are aware, everyone is different... so not everything will work for everyone. My take is the two most important things for the steep are athletic ability and strength. If you have both of those items and also have good leg speed (meaning 1500 guy instead of 10000 guy) you can be really good.

My suggestion to you would be up your mileage and the intensity of your distance runs - tempo work. It seems to me you have some leg speed because, relatively speaking, your mile time is faster than your other times. You should also add barrier work on some of your runs... as someone suggested, set up hurdles at the proper height in the proper place on the track and just do some miles over them. This will teach you how to to refocus after each barrier. Then when you get to your in-season speed work you will already be comfortable going over barriers because of all the reps you have done.

Again, as I said above, everyone is different so maybe others will disagree but I know this worked for me. (btw, when I say athletic ability I mean are you good at other sports? Do you have a decent vertical? Are you quick on side to side movements? Did you play soccer or hoops growing up? Of course, if you didn't I don't mean to say you are not an athlete and I also am not saying if you don't have that element you can't reach your goal. Desire and dedication are really the most important elements. Good luck! I hope you get there!)

I ran 9:00, and had PR's of 1:52, 3:49, 8:25 and 14:46, did about 60-70 miles a week for my college years.

Did some intervals over the barriers and water jump, not too many but enough that I became a better hurdler.

Maybe I could have run faster off of those times, maybe not, seemed to work out for me. Thought I would provide them as a guideline

Get Ricardo Cabrera to pace you.

Meet with the hurdles coach for a set of drills to do 2-3 times/week.

Some modest bounding, possibly up stadium steps of hills.

A consistent stretching & weight routine.

Weekly intervals over hurdles as others have said.

Get faster, bring your cross country aerobic fitness forward (that also had some good steeple change of pace in it), but start chipping away at better speed now to improve your 800/1500 races indoors and in the spring.

Do you think it would be more beneficial for a steepler to train with the 1500-3k group or the 3k-5k group?