You can follow the "no plan" plan and still hit up the track for workouts. Once you've got a good feel for the kind of things you want, kind of intensities you need to hit, etc., there's no reason to avoid the track. When I'm on my own my track workouts are usually just made up on the spot and shortened, lengthened, made faster, etc. based on how it feels.
Floris wrote:
I've long thought about quitting my current training (1 day each of intervals, threshold, and long run, EZ the other days) and just run 10 miles a day (give or take a few miles), every single day. Alarm goes off, throw on my running clothes, and boom, out the door to run however I feel.
Why haven't I done this? I guess I'm too concerned I'll miss hitting system such as specific-endurance, speedwork, threshold. How the hell do you know if you're working these systems properly? If you're feeling like a racehorse one day, how do you determine if it's best to do a fartlek or an hour hard running? Questions, questions...
Do it already. It sounds like you're squeezing blood out of a turnip; you're doing the same routine every week and constantly struggling against diminishing returns.
It almost sounds like you've been brainwashed by one particular plan or coach. Keep reading and keep running. The more practiced and informed you become, the easier time you'll have making your own training decisions.
FYI, even a lot of the coaches who use the same jargon you're citing are advocates of periodization, which would involve focusing on each part for longer periods in order to maximize the benefit, rather than just throwing them all together every week and repeating it ad infinitum.
Just want to make sure the OP is not referring to Plan as in "Papillon" the bestseller fugitive memoir written by Henri Charriere in 1969.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papillon_
(autobiography)
It explains what a plan is in the synopsis graf. Some great endurance in that book.
In anycase, great to see a lot of Jazz out there. Makes me think of Sunday at Ryles in Cambridge.
the point could be wrote:
Just want to make sure the OP is not referring to Plan as in "Papillon" the bestseller fugitive memoir written by Henri Charriere in 1969.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papillon_(autobiography)
It explains what a plan is in the synopsis graf. Some great endurance in that book.
.
!!!!!!!No, not that.
I say be 50% random. I run everywhere, class, walmart, home, friends houses. But I need that team practice to get my speedwork in and hit longer runs.