coahc wrote:
When I first saw your post several months ago I was thinking about what the training I do for 18 year old athlete. First of all we don't generally run 16x400 as a session but we do things very similar. In November we started off with 2x7x400 on 1:45 cycle so basically 35 seconds rest and our guys and ladies would run anywhere between 69-74 We eventually do 400's on a 2min cycle but never 14 of them and if we need something faster we finish with 200's. We do lots of threshold running, 6-7x1k efforts and at times we go fast on the track but primarily we do lots of high end aerobic running. Hills are also a part of our program.
With this type of training my 18 year old has run 3:54 1500m 8:25 3k and 14:39 5k, but also a 14 year old has run 1:57/4:02 for 800/1500m in he last 3 months. Obviously talented athletes but smart training does make a difference.
Good luck in your 3k in a few weeks. I hope things work out for
Thank you for the input. 35 seconds rest sounds great for locking into a rhythm and preparing for the continuous nature of a race once you've gotten used to it. For us the shortest rest we get is around 45 seconds but we start off with more at the beginning of a training cycle.
Your athletes sound talented indeed, I was around 4:16 and 5 flat at their ages (18 and 14 respectively), admittedly off of very inefficient training. As you said, smart training makes a difference - I never touched high end aerobic running until last year when I first started doing more steady and threshold runs. Before, I just slogged long slow distance and did race pace intervals.
Hills are also very important, we dedicate 4 weeks of our season to long hill repeats. I've found they're very good for strengthening our biomechanics.