Jack Daniel’s principals on easy running wrong?

I followed Scott Fauble for awhile back in day. From what I saw his average easy pace was about 710. I follow Klecker and Mantz on Strava. I see a lot of 7 Min miles. Salazar liked his guys doing 6 min easy runs but Rupp ended up needing Achilles surgery.

There is none. Easy running is about aerobic development. Nothing more.

Pro runners are trying to squeeze out every last drop of adaptation but you really get the lion’s share of aerobic benefits at a pace about twice as fast as walking. If you think about it, it makes sense from a biological standpoint. It allowed our ancestors to make double time.

I ran for Jack Daniel’s and the goal was to teach your body to recover at a faster pace. Much like you learn to increase your mileage you learn to slightly increase your recovery pace. This builds strength. There wasn’t Strava back in the VanCortland days but there were plenty of seniors recovering at 6:30 pace. It was tough for the freshman.

Did Jack Daniel’s have you lifting weights?

Daniels program predates super shoes. He used the program to win 8 NCAA d3 titles, lead 31 athletes to individual titles, and 130 athletes to all American status before the first super shoe.

Its a program with proven success and that could still see athletes achieve all American status today.

Who is talking about running fast? We are talking about 2 mins off 5k pace. That is slow.

There is zero point in being a workout hero that kills themself so they have to hobble around the days after. You get plenty of training stimulus by doing normal workouts and running and normal easy paces. And the injury risk is a lot lower. But you don’t get that cool workout to post on Strava

Yeah for me the rule of thumb was that the pace should be easy enough to hold a conversation. That always seemed to help keep the pace in line.

I always keep the auto lap off when I'm easy running & tend to not look at my watch more than a couple of times each run - easy days are what feels easy, I don't see a use in obsessing over numbers. Makes the run more enjoyable too when you don't have to know everything the whole time.

That being said I ran 15:12 for 5k last year & usually run my easy runs end up anywhere between ~6:50 and ~7:20ish pace all by feel, which I guess is basically between 2-2.5 minutes slower than my 5k pace (except I'm 32 and not in high school lol).

I feel like people should focus more on a pace range, rather than a specific number for easy runs - like somewhere between 2-2.5 minutes slower than 5k pace, rather than specifically 2 minutes slower. Not every easy run is gonna be the same pace as the next!

based on everything that i've learned over the years, yes, jack daniels got it wrong. there was once a time when people were more "hardcore" and they set out to work hard instead of smart. these people ultimately ran slower times in the record books and perhaps even burned out quicker than the rest. this isn't to say that his methods were bad, but that his methods could be improved based on new studies and performances over the years.

my rule of thumb these days is that an easy run of 6 miles (or 10k) should average 70% of your max heart rate while a long run can average about 75% of your max heart rate.

he does give a range. It is about 90s-2.:15 slower than 5k pace. And there is plenty of text about adjusting based on feel. If you watch his videos about stuff like this he is pretty mellow. I doubt he would be stressing too much about 20s like some people here are. How he would react to someone wanting to run 4 mins off their 5k pace like some people seem to want to, I have no clue.

Do any of you actually take your HR on your easy days? I do. I'm in
hobbyjogger aerobic shape with decent sprint speed and run a 20:00 5k. I can't run any faster than 11:00 mile pace and keep my HR under 130 on my easy days. Without a solid warmup, running my easy days at 8:30 pace would be putting me at 85% max HR minimum. 5k + 2 minutes seems like way too hard of an effort on the body. I'm +4.5 minutes and that's still faster in relation to 5k pace than some Kenyan "junk miles"

Zone 2 will suffice for recovery.. you really don’t need to be be under 130

How do your other 2 runs of the day compare to what the Kenyans are doing? Doing you think that 15k progression run they did at 6am matters more fitness than the 40 mins the spend jogging super slow? The guys only doing 2 sessions rarely do easy runs this slow. Most are like kipchoge who does a mile or two slow to warm up and then bangs out some 6:15-6:30s on some hilly dirt road at altitude..

if you run <17 in the 5k and running 7:20-7:45 is too hard for you then you just shouldnt run

Hey moran, it's not called a "not difficult run". It's called an easy run. Anything slower than race pace by definition isn't "too hard". That doesn't mean you should train at that effort level just because it's manageable. For some reason a lot of runners think a 7/10 effort is easy, 8/10 is moderate, 9/10 is hard, and 10 is race effort. In reality 3/10 is easy and 60-70% of your max heart rate. It feels like NOTHING is being accomplished. The goal is to recover for your next workout while still putting some time on your feet and moving the fitness needle in the right direction.

I agree this 5k pace plus 2 minutes per mile on easy days seems way over the easy threshold unless you're some fitness god. In the powerlifting world many people are doing sets at 60% of their MAX EFFORT! This is obviously easy. They can lift 90% and feel like it's not hard. But some training requires true EASY effort. Just because something doesn't feel hard doesn't mean it's easy and it's why so many runner are out there banging out threshold runs on their easy days because it doesn't feel hard so it must be easy right??

if 7:20 is threshold pace for a person running 5k in 5:08 to 5:25 pace, you a really weird aerobic system.

zero people are saying to run fast easy miles. The 5k+60s crowd is pretty small and I have always wondered about their course measurements🤣 But the idea of if easy(+2:00) is good even easier(+4:00) is better is pretty questionable.

For me, 90s/mile slower is totally fine. I have run with highly successful runners who have done their easy runs both faster and slower than that. While it IS very important to make sure you're not running too fast/hard on easy days, personally, I have felt best when I'm still running an okay pace and not just slowly jogging along. If a runner is decently well trained, they should be able to run anything up to about 10s/mile slower than LT pace for whatever distance their easy run is without much problem (after several miles of easier running). When I was in really good shape, sub 4:20 mile in HS and ~14:00 5k in college, it was common for me to run my easy runs slow at first and then cruise at 6:10 pace or so for probably the second half of the run and feel totally fine. I was doing ~70mpw in HS and 90-105mpw in college. This was at altitude, so probably would have converted to just a tad under 6:00 pace for sea level running.

I don't think what I just described is too uncommon. I had a friend who ran just a little under 29:00 who would do his easy runs at about 5:50 pace and said that felt totally fine. As long as you're not bumping into LT pace, you're generally pretty okay, if you're young anyway. Recovery is harder and takes longer as you get older.

Who says "add 2 minutes to your 5k pace"? It's actually worse than that. According to his VDOT charts, for the 16:XX runner, Daniels' E pace is 6:45 to 7:01. 7:20 would be for the 17:30 runner.

This is a frequent criticism of Daniels' E-pace, yet his E-pace is still slower than what some self-coached novices would run, without any guidance. I also second "ConcreteJogger" making the distinction between "recovery" and "easy", with "recovery" being slower.

I think it is a mistake to think of "easy" as any fixed "pace", rather than "effort". It would be better for the novice to run them with a heart-rate monitor, over an unknown distance, without a stopwatch.

This topic comes up a lot. In Jack's own words, he thinks 60% VO2max is about right, but can be slower, so long as running form doesn't break down:

https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=2265488

Same here. I'm an ok sprinter and poor distance runner, around 21:00. And 2:00 or even 2:30 slower than 5K pace puts me at 85% max HR.

However, 2:30 slower than 5K pace (i.e. 9:15/mile, 5:45/km) feels absurdly easy on the legs and breathing - it's conversational, run-all-day effort. But my HR at the end of it (two fingers on the neck immediately on stopping) is always around 85%.

Given that, I'm not going to run 11:00 miles (6:50/km). I can actually walk at that speed. And when I walk reasonably hard for an hour my HR is around 70%.