4:35/9:57 in HS - how much faster will i get in college?

With respectably good coaching, figure 31' 10000m

With excellent coaching, probably closer to 4:15 1600 / 14:35

Most NCAA coaches will tend to treat you as expendable, so you're

probably better off training on your own, or finding a coach.

up to sophomore year our prs are pretty similar. My advice would be to work on your pure speed, and do some lifting (power cleans, squats, deadlifts, etc). When you have better speed everything else becomes easier. Couldn't break 60 in a 400 sophomore year but could run 52 after a year or so of weight training.

Random HS Dude wrote:

The subject is the question. I just graduated HS. I ran 4:35 for 1600m, 9:57 for 3200m, and 16:20 5k XC as a senior off of 45-50mpw. I ran 5:04 as a freshman and 4:49 as a sophomore, off of 25mpw or so, just to give you an idea of progression.

Wow, are you me? I pretty much ran those same times/years.

I went to a smaller college for a year after HS and went ~4:00 in the 1500m my freshman year (4:18-4:19 equivalent for 1600m). Things looked good to keep improving too, I just, for a variety of reasons, stopped competing for a few years.

My training that year was pretty shotty, but that didn’t stop the increased training load from college to make my PR’s plummet. Went from 35-40 mpw in HS to 55-60 mpw that first year of college. I got up to 65-75 a few times but that wasn’t my average. Lots of workouts (that I ran too fast), and like 8-10 miles a week at tempo pace. I think if I kept going, and was more consistent at running on my own when I needed to, I probably would have run quite a bit better that year, and would have kept improving too.

I didn’t run the 5k that year, but the distance oriented guy and the middle distance oriented guy that were roughly my speed, or maybe a little slower even, went 14:40s and 15:10s for the 5k, respectively, so I was probably around there, but could have cared less at the time (wish I had ran it though).

When you come from 40-45 mpw, the world is open to you for how much you can improve. The improvement comes fast as hell too once you start running more.

Hello! I was just a little better in high school: 4:32/9:41/16:25. 5:09 as a frosh. 4:44 as a sophomore. 40-45 mpw in high school. I ended up running a 15:12 freshman year of college and 25:25 the next fall. Good things will happen for you if you keep training hard and stay healthy. Coaches see you as expendable at first, but you’ll prove them wrong.

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'd love to be able to go sub-15 eventually, but I wasn't sure how realistic it was.

Anyone else want to weigh in?

I mean, you basically have reached apex human performance there, brochacho. Don't @me.

Random HS Dude wrote:

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'd love to be able to go sub-15 eventually, but I wasn't sure how realistic it was.

Anyone else want to weigh in?

Depends how bad you want it and if you get in a good situation, but I think that sub-15 is a very realistic goal. Just be willing to put the work in. Make sure to have stepping stone goals and re-evaluate your goals as your progress.