How do you train someone with a large aerobic base?

Arthur Lydiard

What does low miles and high intensities mean?

It seems as though what you want to do first is emphasize the longer long run and recovery runs first.

Do a little of everything but slowly add more and more of the speed/sprint and especially be cautious of adding hard anaerobic training. Make sure to put in a recovery run almost every other day, especially early in the season. Do not be afraid to take a day off. Distance running is a talent as much as any other sport.

Anything that someone has not done before could get them injured if you add a lot of it too soon.

May I suggest fartlek? You will have to keep a close eye on them but you can train all of the speeds using that kind of workout.

Make sure that you are teaching all the time. It's not about just grinding things out.

You are lucky to be blessed with such a kid and great parents. Just be sure they do not push him too fast. Often parents think there kid is a wonderkind. Tell them 3212 kids ran under 2 minutes last year for the 800. A 5:00 mile or 17:00 5K is not special. We're happy but not greedy.

Geeze I wouldn't let my kid touch your program.

So, my son had nearly the identical background because I am a masters runner and he liked to run with me. His high school coach took a Lydiard approach to training. He got faster each year in high school and in the low mileage 90's ended up winning CA CIF section XC and getting 10th at the CA state meet. He ran 4:27/9:35 in track. He went to a DII college and ended up becoming an all-American in XC and qualified for Nationals in the 3K SC.

I would like this as a base phase. I would keep him near his current mileage and do the following:

-Give him a long run progression. See what his current long run is and then add 5 minutes per week until he gets to something you deem appropriate. For us that is 75-90 minutes depending on age and ambition of the athlete. If he is actually running (not slogging), then you could add some enhancers at the end that would help with fast-twitch fibers. Put something like 6x1min @ mile pace in the last 15 min of his run. Or 2x5-minute tempo with 5 minute steady state in the last 15 minutes. He'll get some bang for the buck without having to introduce any really fast sessions.

-Have him do short hill sprints or some max velocity work once weekly. This would be low volume with longer rest. Start with distances of roughly 40m and build up to around 70m over several weeks. He would gain with as few as 3 reps per week. Chase it with some plyometrics. Start simple. Hops, etc. Progress to some single leg plyos over time. This grouping will help with running economy (can be done before, during, or after daily run so long as it isn't too intense)

-Begin weight training. We like to progress from somewhere around 1-2 sets of 10 rep max to 3-4 rep maxes over time. We emphasize multi-joint lifts (deadlift, step-up, etc.) after some higher rate of speed lifts such as kettlebell swings and kettlebell squat jumps. (speed before strength in session.) The heavier loads and lower volumes yield improvements in strength without mass. Also helps running economy.

I think that would serve as a good base. He might also benefit from a weekly tempo run, but I bet you could wait until mid-summer to introduce those.

Good luck.

Forty miles a week is only a lot of running relative to what your other kids have done. It's not going to give him a "large" aerobic base, just a larger one than many others might have and even that isn't a given. He could get a much larger base with a lot more miles. Your other runners probably would benefit from doing more of what this particular kid has done but that isn't your question. The answer to that is that this kid is probably as well if not better prepared to handle "low mileage and high intensity training" than anyone on your team is. But you shouldn't just slam him with a lot of hard running immediately. There should be a transition period and again, I don't think low mileage and high intensity is the best way to train kids even if it does seem to be working out alright. I just need to say that.

That's the general answer. It is important to note here that runners don't always respond to the same type of training in the same way. So while this kid may be able to do the type of work the rest of your kids do, he may not respond to it as well. Or he may respond to it better than anyone else does. It's always a dance and you have to respond to what your partners do in response to what you've done.

I've never had this experience, but would like to add a few unsupported opinions

1. Run him in a 1 mile TT and find out where he's at.

2. Ask how difficult those 40mpw are. He might be sitting at a heart rate of 120 the whole time and getting very little from the training.

3. To introduce harder stuff (assuming that all of his runs truly were "easy") try to explain steady state effort (fast but no discomfort). Have him work up to steady state for the last few miles of his runs maybe 2 x per week.

4. Run some short reps (i.e. 200-300m) at slightly faster than mile TT pace. Allow for plenty of rest between reps.

One of my criticisms of high school coaches is that all they know how to do, or think they know, is how to run people into fitness.

You seem to be the poster child for that criticism. Memo to you. High school kids get better just by getting older. You have a kid who loves to run. You should love to have him. He may know more about running than you do. Maybe. He certinily knows how to run 40 miles a week and isn't injured.

Find out how much he knows. Is his Dad an ex coach or athlete? Does he know how to manage him season? Has he ever raced? Has he been hurt? What does he think is his strength?

Likely you will find that he will do well on shorter more intense stuff. If he doesn't then change it. Clearly you have a pattern you run by. He's a freaking kid. Join him in. He's not Ryan Hall come visiting.

You are making this real hard for yourself unnecessarily.

This is not a problem but is a blessing.

It appears to me from the little short note you left that you are a very young coach.

We find way too many coaches in America that want to jack up the hard interval training.

This might work for some kids in the short term but many will get injured, sick, or stale. You will lose them. Coaches or athletes say all the time that it's bad luck for these things to happen. (Well sometimes it's youthful stupidity---not sleeping enough, eating foolishly, drinking, etc.---but usually it's just ramping up the training at the wrong time.

But I do not care who you are...anything new much be approached with caution....but I would take that approach with your entire team.

If they come into you without a base then you must give them one. I know of a coach that only did 6 mile runs during the season, with 6 mile fartlek runs late in the season that make it to state for 20 years in a row. (They did play some tag games almost every day but otherwise that was it.)

"Training does not have to be complicated, give them the mileage, with a little bit of speed all along the way." paraphrased from Joe Newton, 28 state titles