Training log and goals of an HS runner

alabama runner wrote:

You seem dedicated, which is the most important thing. I am also a junior, and here are my PRs and progressions:

800 - 2:30 - 2:23 - 2:14 - 2:08

1600 - 5:35 - 5:18 - 4:55 - 4:36

3200 - none - 11:50 - 10:45 - 10:11

5k - 20:50 - 18:25 - 17:50 - 16:53

My goal for this season is sub-16:00.

Here are a few tips I have for you:

1. Treat XC almost like base training. You shouldn't be doing ball-buster workouts all season long. Focus on getting your long run to 10-12mi and at an honest pace (6:45-7:00). Work your way up to 10-12mi first, then focus on speed. You don't need crazy workouts for XC, because it is more about aerobic strength than anything.

2. Do hills. Lots of hills. The few hard workouts you do should be hill workouts. They can be long reps (600m+) or sprint work (

Thanks for the advice, I'm not trying to do workouts that focus on speed, I just try and go hard some days to see what I can do. I've had shin problems so I haven't been able to do all hill workouts, but we're supposed to do about 10 or 12 400m hill repeats next Thursday. I'll admit, I hate Hills, I suck at them and maybe that shows with my times? I'll try harder on them. Thanks for the advice!

Aw sh!t. I spent a freaking hour writing 4 times that and it didn't all go through. I'll write it up again tomorrow on my pc, it'll be faster. For now, read this:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_zzkn1-wR0dYzkzM2U0ZjctMjE1NC00ZjI4LWI5YTgtMTRhY2NhYjBhZjQz/view

It's Renato Canova's philosophy. I'll explain it in your terms tomorrow.

alabama runner wrote:

Aw sh!t. I spent a freaking hour writing 4 times that and it didn't all go through. I'll write it up again tomorrow on my pc, it'll be faster. For now, read this:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_zzkn1-wR0dYzkzM2U0ZjctMjE1NC00ZjI4LWI5YTgtMTRhY2NhYjBhZjQz/view

It's Renato Canova's philosophy. I'll explain it in your terms tomorrow.

Hah, thanks man. I look forward to the other stuff, it means a lot!

So I just read that whole thing and wow, that was a lot of info. Makes me want to try it and stuff, but I'm not sure how I would, since I have a coach with a clearly defined training plan. your thoughts will be greatly appreciated, so thanks in advance!

Race strategy is key. Having a killer instinct is very important. Not letting people pass you and always pushing to pass the next guy. It's a fight to maintain your position, and I liked to think of it "that I worked hard to be in this position so no one will pass me" Obviously, it is easier said than done but a lot of running is mental. One thing I remember my coach telling me was to push beyond your comfort zone on hard days and most certainly race days. Mentally prepare your attitude and yourself before races. Plan how you're going to attack the course.

Increasing your mileage slowly will help in the long run for not being injured. I also would do core work on my own after my runs. At this age everything helps. Sleep is huge for recovery. Try to stay away from sugary foods and drink lots of water.

Like other posters have said, most male runners see big improvement their junior year. I was a late bloomer and didn't see anything until my senior year. I was more of a track guy though and ran the 400/800 but loved the atmosphere of XC and running with my friends.

I wish you the best of luck, keep up the training and stay motivated.

Hey man, thanks for the advice, it is much appreciated! I'm really going to try and focus on my mentality for races because I think once my body hits the wall, I just "give up" instead of pushing through it, but pacing is definitely a problem for me as well. We've been increasing mileage very slowly this summer, only starting out with about 15/week only going up about 5 to 10ish a week. I don't remember if I mentioned this earlier or not, but we do core Monday, Wednesday, and Friday every week and we follow our local community college's workout (a graduate from our HS went there and gave it to our coach) and I also forgot to mention, we do drills after practice for about 10 minutes on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Where I lack tends to be sleep and my diet, so I'll try and work on those. Thanks again!

Hey everyone! So, today for morning practice we did a warm up and then jogged the HS home course and I went out around 7:30 ish for the warm up (2 mi) and was just absolutely exhausted from past two days and really just jogged our 5k course at about 10 min pace. afterwards we did 2 laps on the track, sprinting straights and jogging curves ( I did a 400m stride/sprint instead for last lap) instead of x drills since our course is on/next to the track. I'm hoping I'll have enough rest for tomorrow for my 13 mile run, hoping to average 7:30, but I'll be happy with anything under 8:30. Tonight I have a 2 mi recovery run and I'll probably stretch throughout the day so I don't hurt for tomorrow. I'm really excited for the season already, as I can't wait to see my work come out and to try some racing again! Thanks for all the advice everyone!

Been looking at this a little, nice work. As other runners said though, I think your easy runs should be slower. In Indoor I did my easy runs in the sub 7:20 range, and am currently doing mine in the 8s (some 8:30s). I've been doing most of my normal runs at 7:20s, even though thats what my "easy" pace used to be. Even though I'm running slower, I'll feeling much better aerobically.

I'm also gonna do a 13 miler, though on Sunday. Gonna try for 7:20ish average, though I wouldn't be disappointed with 7:45ish. 2 days ago for a normal run I did 9.1 @7:23, so I think I should be able to go 7:20s for four more miles.

I'm gonna continue following this thread, good luck.

TNE wrote:

Been looking at this a little, nice work. As other runners said though, I think your easy runs should be slower. In Indoor I did my easy runs in the sub 7:20 range, and am currently doing mine in the 8s (some 8:30s). I've been doing most of my normal runs at 7:20s, even though thats what my "easy" pace used to be. Even though I'm running slower, I'll feeling much better aerobically.

I'm also gonna do a 13 miler, though on Sunday. Gonna try for 7:20ish average, though I wouldn't be disappointed with 7:45ish. 2 days ago for a normal run I did 9.1 @7:23, so I think I should be able to go 7:20s for four more miles.

I'm gonna continue following this thread, good luck.

Hey TNE, thanks for the reply! I've been thinking of running easier on easy days, I just get caught up in the group running with the team, but I'll fix that. My easy/recovery days are Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday and every other week we play capture the flag at a local park for speed work ( We get a little competitive, this last time our coach did top 10/Varsity training group against all girls and middle schoolers (about 20 in total) and it was tons of fun) I like to try and keep all my runs under 8/mi pace, but obviously that doesn't always happen. My "go to" pace is right around 7:30 to 7:40, ust depends on the day, but I like to push on long runs just to sorta see where I'm at. I can already see going easy and doing recovery doubles has been helping with my longer and harder runs with having more energy too. Good luck on your 13 miler, I'm hoping I'm in shape for 7:00 pace ( There's a bit of an unsaid, but known to my team standard of doing our 16 miler under 2 hours and I've only done it in 2:08, I always go out too fast doing 10 mi at 7:00 ish and then absolutely dying, and so I'm hoping a 7:10/mi 13 miler will be able to make me ready for a sub 7:30 16 miler. For a look at where I'm at, I did an 8.8 @7:15 with bad pacing, so I feel pretty ready. I'm really gonna try and keep this thread updated, I hate seeing a bunch of 2 page give up threads. Also, I think I've read a few of your posts before I decided to actually be active on here, I'll go check them out again, we seem to be pretty close ability wise, so looking forward to how we both turnout. Thanks for the reply, sorry this one was so long, haha.

I'm gonna be a senior with the same goals. Seems like there are a few of us here with sub 17 goals so we should keep updating how we do in our races. Gl. Currently 17:55,5:02,2:12,59 and goal is 16:59,4:40,2:05, and 55

Jdjdddjxxj wrote:

I'm gonna be a senior with the same goals. Seems like there are a few of us here with sub 17 goals so we should keep updating how we do in our races. Gl. Currently 17:55,5:02,2:12,59 and goal is 16:59,4:40,2:05, and 55

Yeah, I'm totally fine with everyone posting how they do, That'd be really fun. Good luck with your goals!

This week my team has done altitude training so for three days we went up to snow basin resort in Utah (like 30 minutes away) and did 7ish miles each day. We'd go from about 6200 to 7600 each day. This kind of training I highly recommend. I pushed hard and still averaged about 8:10 because it's so steep but this Im sure will lower my 5k time a ton. If you have mountains with runnable trails on them go run on them once or twice a week.

I live at about 4300. I'm doing a time trail in Cali (sea level) in a week and a half. I honestly have no clue what I'll get. my PR is 4:57 so hopefully I drop some major time off that.

Then tomorrow I'm doing a 12 mile run I have to decided wether to go 6:50 or 7:30 pace. I could probably keep a 6:30 pace but that's a little fast for this. Any suggestions?

That sounds like a lot of fun, but a lot of hard work. I live in Washington and I went to a place in Utah last year that had an elevation of 9000 ish feet and I could barely run 1 mile at 8:30 pace, although I'm sure it did help a bit. I look forward to hearing about your time trial! And for your 12 miler, just go out comfortable, see what your pace is, and then once you're warmed up, see if you can push it. Thanks for the update!

Hey everyone, so just an update on my run today. I was originally gonna do a 13 miler, but this week has caught up to me so I only did 7.5 mi instead. I was going at about 7:30 for the first 6 mi with rolling hills and then we hit the major hills and my coach just had me stop and stretch so I didn't over do it. I averaged 8:10 ish for 1 hr which is not too bad, I haven't been running consistently on Saturdays so it's a start. I'm really gonna stretch out this weekend and ice and all that to be ready for next week.

This Week:

Mon - 8.8 @ 8:04 with an 20 min LT at 2 mi in. PM 2 mi double for recovery

Tues - 5 mi easy @ 7:30

Wed - 8.8 @7:15 with first half @ 6:49 PM 2 mi double for recovery

Thurs - 10 ish mi @ 8:27 with very large hills

Fri - 5 mi really easy @ 8 - 10ish/mi

Sat - 7.5 @8:10 with rolling hills

Sun - Off

Total:49.1 mi

My "analysis" of this week is that it was a very hard week, maybe too hard, and I'm pretty happy with all my runs.

Next week's rough outline

Mon - mile repeats PM double for recovery

Tues - easy/recovery

Wed - Long, probably 35 min out

Thurs - 10 x 400m hill repeats

Fri - easy/recovery + capture the flag PM double/recovery

Sat - 1 hr comfort zone

Sun - Off

Total: Probably around 45, maybe 50 at most

Really liking my summer training so far, looking forward to the season! Also, little side note, Thursday this week was supposed to be 40 min out on big hills, but I had a Doctor's appointment during practice so I went early and miscommunication led to me doing 10 mi, about 1 mi more than expected of me (not an excuse, just a little more in depth of my training). I think I'm still getting used to doubles too, even though they aren't hard, so I'm hoping this next week will be just as successful. Anyways, thanks for reading!

Looks good keep it up, I hope you reach your goal I'll check back every now and then

PulledUp wrote:

Looks good keep it up, I hope you reach your goal I'll check back every now and then

Thanks, any insight on my training is always welcome!

Ended up doing it in 90 degree weather. I didn't realize how stupid it is to do long runs in heat. I had my bro and friend bike along because I knew I'd need some water. I ended up drinking about 32 oz of water during the run and another 15 right after and I still was super dehydrated. I weighed 166 after and Im usually around 172. I went to work right after and was borderline puking from exhaustion for the first couple hours.

First 3 miles I averaged 6:30 pace

First 7 was 6:44 pace

8-10 miles at 7:45 pace(to take the last ones fast) wanted to take the last two at sub 6 but I was hurting like everywhere so I did 6:4x pace

7:04 was the final average pace for 12.04 miles

47 miles on the week for me(would've done closer to 60 but the miles I did we're hard)

You might want to get closer to 90 minutes on Saturday especially if the day before and after are easy.

Wednesday I'd also recommend doing 6 miles am and 4 miles pm so your legs are more fresh than doing 10ish miles at once the day before hills