20x400m workout for high schoolers

Maybe this is for an indoor track so the 400s aren't as long

yea......don't worry they won't run them fast enough to cause any harm.

Coaching 9th grade girls is often like herding cats. This workout is a success if they can do 20x400m without using snapchat.

Only 2.5 wrote:

Maybe this is for an indoor track so the 400s aren't as long

It also might be D2 or D3 400s, in which case they're much easier than D1 400s.

i think it's crazy, especially for a freshman. not like any of the kids are going to run even pace, so what's the point?8 is enough, and still a lot if it's "quality".

Another idiot coach? wrote:

My daughter is a freshman in high school and just showed me her schedule for this week. It calls for 20X400 on Thursday. 5 miles of quality when they haven't done more than 2 at this point.

Her teammates say the coach doesn't tell them how fast to run them. They run it as a 2 person relay so the recovery is standing rest for as long as it takes her partner to finish. Probably 1:30 to 2:00. I told her to run them around 10k pace to try to limit the damage and don't listen if he tells her to run harder. Everyone else will be going all out.

Is her coach just an idiot or has anyone heard of something like this for high school training?

OP- Sounds like you need to get this coach fired and take over as the coach. At the very least sit down with the athletic director and principal to voice your concerns.

Whether or not it causes injury, that is a ridiculous workout for a freshman. Most freshmen on my team would rip through the first 6 or 7 at mile race pace or faster then slowly jog the last part. No freshman is going to know how to pace it correctly.

Make you better wrote:

20x400 in teams of 2. So each girl runs 10x400.

4x800 last week= 3200, 10x400=4000. Seems like a logical progression.

This guy gets it. We did this workout in high school and it was a lot of fun. Coach just happened to call it 20x400 instead of 10x400 relay. We also did 36x200 in teams of 3. Both were really fun, and a good chance to get in extra handoff practice.

Also, from a high school coach's point of view, my policy is to take everything a kid says with a shaker full of salt. At that age, human brains aren't fully connected yet. It's not intentional or malicious, they just don't comprehend subtleties of language and grown-up social dynamics/politics. I once said calmly to a handful of athletes: "We can't afford to wait for you to get out of Student Council" (at the time we were borrowing someone else's track and only had a narrow time slot--we literally couldn't wait for them or the rest of the team would lose their practice time). When they told their teacher/advisor, that message had become an angry "I am tired of waiting for you to get out of Student Council." They were good kids, they just didn't realize the difference.

You guys are out of your freakin minds. What planet are you all from. Yea I want to get 9th grade girls out there and run 20x400! What monkey carp are you trying to lay out. Don't give me or anyone else hes the coach listen to the great HS coach. You got like 7 good ones in the country. Apparently you guys have not dealt with HS so called coaches. You also have not trained 9th grade girls...20x400 what the heck, who are all you people.

"If her coach was having them do this exact workout on the roads, you would be complaining that her coach has them out gallowalking, and that it is way too easy, and that you are a runner, so you know that continuous running is the only way to do things and that in 20 years you've never needed to gallowalk."

Great post.

20x400, in this context is just a broken tempo. Helicopter OP is "telling" the kid not to go faster than 10k pace, which they'd probably average oanyway. (Also, how does such an inexperienced runner a "10k pace" she can reference?)

This is a good early HS workout. Far better than the usual "jog five miles" alternative, where half the kids race it and half end up walking around. This brings in some quality and a nice camaraderie with the relay format. Helicopter OP, stop undermining the coach. You're not helping your daughter.

Well, I guess you people would really have some problems with my 8 year old son doing 24 x 200 at 5k pace with 60 seconds rest. And then the subsequent weeks of 16 x 300, 12 x 400, 10 x 500, 8 x 600, 7 x 700, 6 x 800. This week we're doing 5 x 1000 and then onto 4 x 1200, 3 x 1600, & 2 x 2400. Then two weeks later he runs his first 5k of the season.

Now I don't really see where this coach pulled 20 x 400 from. Too many coaches just have kids run intervals to run intervals. There needs to be a specific goal and progression to each workout. Train to race, not train to run.

But its high school girls so keeping them focused on anything is almost impossible. Track to girls is a social gathering in yoga pants. Last week I had to wait for the local girls team to get off the track and watching their workout was so disappointing. I thought I was watching a crossfit workout instead of a track practice.

Manbearpig wrote:

Well, I guess you people would really have some problems with my 8 year old son doing 24 x 200 at 5k pace with 60 seconds rest. And then the subsequent weeks of 16 x 300, 12 x 400, 10 x 500, 8 x 600, 7 x 700, 6 x 800. This week we're doing 5 x 1000 and then onto 4 x 1200, 3 x 1600, & 2 x 2400. Then two weeks later he runs his first 5k of the season.

How did you deduce his 5k time? Progression from his 8 year-old time? Or based on a 3000m TT?

Good training plan, although the 500/600/700 is a waste of time. Just go 400s/800s/1200s/1600s/race.

that's my training plan wrote:

Manbearpig wrote:

Well, I guess you people would really have some problems with my 8 year old son doing 24 x 200 at 5k pace with 60 seconds rest. And then the subsequent weeks of 16 x 300, 12 x 400, 10 x 500, 8 x 600, 7 x 700, 6 x 800. This week we're doing 5 x 1000 and then onto 4 x 1200, 3 x 1600, & 2 x 2400. Then two weeks later he runs his first 5k of the season.

How did you deduce his 5k time? Progression from his 8 year-old time? Or based on a 3000m TT?

Good training plan, although the 500/600/700 is a waste of time. Just go 400s/800s/1200s/1600s/race.

He ran a 7:32 mile back in November and we sort of thought 24:30 would be a good goal to work towards by the end of this summer. We had a mild winter in NY so he is way ahead of schedule. I think he is in about 6:45 mile and 23:15 5k shape right now. After his first race we will reevaluate his goals for the rest of the year.

As for skipping to the longer intervals sooner, I don't want to progress him too fast. This plan is a 12 week cycle that we can easily repeat 3 times a year all the way through high school.

The cycle is helping with his long runs. He popped a legit 49:06 6 miles a few days ago.

I ran a 16:03 5k back in my day and he is a bigger, stronger, faster, and hopefully a smarter trained version of me.

Manbearpig wrote:

But its high school girls so keeping them focused on anything is almost impossible. Track to girls is a social gathering in yoga pants. Last week I had to wait for the local girls team to get off the track and watching their workout was so disappointing. I thought I was watching a crossfit workout instead of a track practice.

That's interesting, I have had a very dissimilar experience. My girls team works extremely hard and takes running very seriously. There are new kids who may not be sure about the sport yet, or have any idea what they're doing, as there are on ANY high school team. And some will drift away before the season ends. But for the most part it's the same as any other dedicated team. Yes, they chat during stretching and at the end of practice. No, that doesn't mean it is a social club.

This is actually a common logical fallacy whereby a characteristic of a certain individual is believed to be caused by their membership in a certain group. See this relevant xkcd for an illustrative example:

What you saw last week could probably be most accurately described as a bad team, not a girls team.

That said, props to you for the crossfit jab--nobody likes those guys.

Manbearpig wrote:

He ran a 7:32 mile back in November and we sort of thought 24:30 would be a good goal to work towards by the end of this summer. We had a mild winter in NY so he is way ahead of schedule. I think he is in about 6:45 mile and 23:15 5k shape right now. After his first race we will reevaluate his goals for the rest of the year.

As for skipping to the longer intervals sooner, I don't want to progress him too fast. This plan is a 12 week cycle that we can easily repeat 3 times a year all the way through high school.

The cycle is helping with his long runs. He popped a legit 49:06 6 miles a few days ago.

I ran a 16:03 5k back in my day and he is a bigger, stronger, faster, and hopefully a smarter trained version of me.

Impressed by this. Does he get bored being out running for so long? I am amazed by kids that age when their attention span passes 30 seconds or so.

Also, does he do other sports between these 12 week cycles?

This kid is going to be burnt out by the time he's 12. Great job dad.

He doesn't really get bored. I have to be careful and give him an extra easy day here and there or day off when the weather is bad. I need to keep in perspective that he is 8 years old still and that he has plenty of time to run. My most important task is to keep him injury free.

He has played baseball and football the last three years also. He is a very good baseball player. I hear from alot of coaches and other parents how good a lefthanded swing he has.

During those seasons we still run - lots of easy 20-30 minute runs but we will still follow the workout cycle but over a more stretched out time frame.

Another idiot coach? wrote:

My daughter is a freshman in high school and just showed me her schedule for this week. It calls for 20X400 on Thursday. 5 miles of quality when they haven't done more than 2 at this point.

Her teammates say the coach doesn't tell them how fast to run them. They run it as a 2 person relay so the recovery is standing rest for as long as it takes her partner to finish. Probably 1:30 to 2:00. I told her to run them around 10k pace to try to limit the damage and don't listen if he tells her to run harder. Everyone else will be going all out.

Is her coach just an idiot or has anyone heard of something like this for high school training?

Whether this workout is appropriate or not, your are doing your daughter a disservice by questioning her coach in front of her. If a kid doesn't believe in the training they will not succeed. Leave it alone and let her believe in what her coach has her doing. You are hurting your daughters development more than you know.

We used to do this workout every year about 3 weeks before the season started on a dirt track when I was in high school. I was a 9:46 two miler my season year and our coach would usually have me do 90'' for the first 4, 85'' for the second 4, 80" for the third 4, 75" for 12-16, and sub 70 for the last 4. Was always a hard workout mentally but manageable physically. I wouldn't have been able to do it as a freshman though. Good luck to her and her season, this workout shouldn't destroy it as much as help her build an aerobic base.

Freakinfreaks wrote:

You guys are out of your freakin minds. What planet are you all from. Yea I want to get 9th grade girls out there and run 20x400! What monkey carp are you trying to lay out. Don't give me or anyone else hes the coach listen to the great HS coach. You got like 7 good ones in the country. Apparently you guys have not dealt with HS so called coaches. You also have not trained 9th grade girls...20x400 what the heck, who are all you people.

Im with you. Ive been to a lot of hs xc meets and i havent seen more than a handful of freshman that could run 20x400 @1:30 with even rest, boys or girls. Not to mention that 14 yo girls cant pace for crap. Sounds like a blown day to me. Whats the point, anyway?