Modifying the Norwegian approach to lower mileage

Did you buy a knock-off or something? The laces aren't great, yeah, they are similar to Adidas Boston 12 laces but a little thicker -- but the Challenger 5 absolutely does not feel like a paper shoe or hard, quite the opposite; it's soft and bouncy.

The RH8 is more comfy and versatile though, yeah, Challenger 5 is for workouts or even races.

Cheap compared to what though? Have you seen the upper, tongue, and laces Adidas has been using these last few years?

I'm interested in <5000 too. How are you modifying this to be more suited for those distances ?

On AliExpress it looks like there are two different versions of uppers for the Challenger 5. Anyone who has both and can compare?

As competition season approaches (or even later into base building) I do 20-25x400 w/45s weekly hitting around @78-80. Every 15ish days or so I would aim to do 16 x 200m @mile effort on the track or as hill repeats.

However, I had some achilles issues recently which forced me to only do easy jogging for 2 weeks and I'm only 6 weeks into my current base build so avoiding anything faster then sub T and only hitting light strides (3k effortish) sparingly.

I'm doing a 2 mile race next month aiming to be in the 9:40s range so we'll see how much this sort of base fitness can carry me. I know from past experience that I can run low 4:30s off of only easy runs so it should be interesting either way.

Thank you. How would you progress that as you get closer to your peak races? 300s with less rest? If you're comfortable with it and don't mind, could you drop a hint to your Strava without doxxing yourself so I can follow along and maybe get some training ideas

Challenger upper (in fact whole shoe) reminds me of the Saucony Pro 3 or Speed 3. The quality of the upper is good IMO.

The Red Hare Pro 8 has a very cheap feeling upper and the tongue is too long but not wide enough. The foam is perfect though.

Thanks for sharing the links, I ordered the singlet too and it’s great, definitely very similar to the soar material and cut. I’d say size up quite a bit though, go one size bigger than your usual EU. I’m 6 ft 2 80kg and got xxxl Asian size xxl eu and fits about the same as Xl in soar. Has anyone found a t shirt in the same material as the singlet? Also some good split shorts?

Yes. 10-12 x 300 off of 60-70s rest is a good indicator of 1500 / mile fitness without being as taxing as doing 400s or even longer reps, which I've always thought was overkill.

One mixed race pace workout I've made for myself was: 3 x (5 x 300) starting at 3k pace working down to mile pace, then 6 x 200 at mile. 1 min rest between reps, 3 min between sets. Quite a bit of volume at a pretty good intensity, but if you're honest with the effort and start out conservatively, shouldn't wipe you out - still not a workout that should be done every week.

I've started working with a new coach this season though, so my workouts will probably look different? I'm not sure what racing season will look like.

For my Strava if you want to follow: athletes/108040492

Just purchase the singlet, will report back on quality and sizing and compare to my actual Soar singlet

I wear US 11.5 in Nike, Adidas, Saucony, etc. Li-Ning size 46 and Do-Win/Qiaodan size 45 fit very similar to the US 11.5s.

9 weeks in and I've noticed my 120 mins easy runs are getting faster and the same heart rate as my fitness slowly improves.

Could we please stop the cheap chinese shoes talk?

Chinese shoes embody the spirit of NSA. Sirpoc’s favourite idiom is bang for your buck. The interest in the shoes is borne from the same feeling that inspired so much interest in this method: the feeling that we’ve been mislead and there has to be a better way. There’s a reason that when someone posted a few pages back trying to generate discussion on “the NSA of recovery methods” it didn’t take. People here aren’t looking to spend more time and more money than they need to on things that don’t move the needle. For better or worse, we’ve reached the point in running technology where shoes absolutely do move the needle, and this thread just happens to be the best place on the English speaking web to discuss them.

There’s a book on the way and there’s countless resources and testimonials already, and discussion of one topic doesn’t preclude the discussion of any others that you’re welcome to initiate.

How much rest on mile reps?

Assuming that’s a rep length of 5 - 7 minutes rest should be 60s to 75s

As someone coming back from injury looking to just do something sustainable, is this method worth a go? 33M, almost 20 years of running. Ran in college, and ever since I graduated. Mostly road stuff, very traditional training with moderate to high mileage.

Just looking to get my legs back under me, and the lower intensity is wildly appealing at this point. No immediate racing goals. 16:49 5k / 34:45 10k / 1:18:45 Half if it helps. Thanks!

Speaking of rest, is anyone else surprised by the amount of leniency given between reps with this program?

We always hear how much attention to detail is involved & easy runs have the 70% hard cap, workout intensities are fairly restricted etc. But personally I feel there's a huge difference between jog for 60 sec vs stand around for 2 min, especially as more of a fast twitch type. (Give me 2 min of standing around & I feel nearly fully recovered, which is why I do 60 sec jogs for all unless it's hot.)