Modifying the Norwegian approach to lower mileage

I agree that this is a great thread.

I think the 'Norwegian method' is just as applicable for those runners training just 7 hours a week in that you're maximising the 'hard' time in the training week, really not that hard, as a percentage of those 7 hours, and mimimising the chance of injury or overtraining.

As this thread probably slows down a little, this is a good point to basically say how spot on you are. It's consistently doable, all year around as well.

I just ran my first ever 10k today and did 35:52, so I'm quite happy that I'm still improving training like this as a hobby jogger. 😊

I'll say to the people who don't believe in threshold, the cynics and the skeptics, I'm sorry for you. I’m sorry that you can't dream big. I'm sorry you don't believe in miracles.

Joking aside, I think we know we’re ultimately an experiment of one. For me, I started on the “classic” 1 long run, 1 tempo run, 1 interval, and 3-4 easy runs template. This worked of course as I was starting out, but I plateaued. I tried adding more volume but always found the interval session seemed to beat me up and zap my stamina.

I have tried higher mileage and two interval sessions a week, lower mileage and two interval sessions a week, higher and lower mileage with just one interval session a week… all permutations lead to, what I felt were, below optimal results. This, along with curiosity and a desire to optimize my time spent training, lead me to adopt a 2-3 tempo sessions per week approach.

I have really detailed data on all my training and checked this so that I’m not just idealizing what I did. The first time I used this approach, in 2017, for a 24 week period, I averaged 10.5 hours per week of running, with a high of 12 hours and a low of 7.5 hours. As a side note, this was and is my highest ever, I since have stopped running doubles and aim for 9-10 hours in singles for 7 days or 8-9 hours if running 6 days per week. During that time I ran 2-3 tempo sessions per week (if I did 3, I included it in the long run for that week). The sessions were very basic and consistent, 12*1km w/ 200m, 6*2km w/ 400m, 4*3km w/ 600m, 3*4km w/ 800m.

My HR_Max is 195 (tested, not guessed) so it’s pretty easy to know where I am as a 5% change is almost exactly 10 bpm. On those workouts, my HR never exceeded 90% HR_Max and basically stayed in the range of 80%-85% HR_Max. Part of this, I believe, was due to the volume I was running, as well as the fact these were in interval form. I find that if I can get to running 75-90 minutes average per day run, this gets me to the same fitness as if I average more, say 90-105 minutes, which I was doing during that time for some weeks. On 60 minutes average per day run, I know I have a little more fitness to squeeze out of myself, but I’m not far off from my best on that volume, particularly at 5km.

For some performance specifics, I ran a 10km time trial as fast as I ran a 10km race a year earlier and did it at 88% of HR_Max! When I ran the 10km race I ran a PR and did it at 94% of HR_Max (about 10 days after running the time trial). I also have other data, from testing, that shows even when I maintain volume if I start doing VO2 Max intervals, after just a few weeks, my performance declines. Also, if I drop the volume of my threshold sessions to 30 minutes, twice per week, at LT (instead of a little slower) my fitness is not as high as when I did 48 minutes at slightly slower than LT.

I know most aren’t likely interested in this level of minutia but as others have said, trying to get the most out of our training given time constraints and other obligations is the goal for us amateurs. Knowing we are doing that, at least for me, is a satisfying feeling and makes the training all the more fulfilling. Plus as others have said, the sustainability of it is most satisfying and impressive. Yes, you’re tired, but never trashed if you keep disciplined pacing.

Dude posts all thread about a make believe way to make yourself faster, then says he did his first ever 10k sub 36) no chance, prob wasn't even 40. The training he posted is weak. No chance. This whole thread is a troll, right?

The 7th day. You're welcome.

The real Henrik I?

Do you think this could be adapted to marathon/half?

I could see doing an adapted single-day threshold model if I did 5k training though, great post!

Nope just the above post.

Hilarious that ppl don’t or can’t imagine how 3 Threshold workouts a week could get you 98% fit.

The fallacy is thinking that ‘VO2’ work is required. If you have completely plateaued from aerobic/threshold work, sure, hit some very hard intervals in a short block. Otherwise, all you are doing is fatiguing yourself for races and actual opportunities to advance your fitness.

VO2 workouts has been biggest honey trap for runners going on 3 decades now, but some ppl just cannot break the vicious cycle at this point

Great thread, 3 pages in so far. Sounds similar to the Tinman CV pace in concept (even if the paces are different). Just enough to keep moving the upper bounds of your training. From an HR perspective it can be seen equivalent to the 2400m test done by Hadd, where you raise the upper bound over time using HR zones.

Dude you even read this thread? He's been mentioned like 100 timed. Great thread though. Spoc, good time. Sub 36 is no joke despite what a lot of people here would say. Especially with hobby jog hours. Be nice for u to keep dropping in now and again and see how you are progressing.

Henrik is going to have to post a shoutout to his brother on IG if its really him

This is getting to be a long thread so maybe you didn’t see my earlier post but I used this method for the 10k, half and marathon in the following way:

Sun - AM: 60 min PM: 30 min
Mon - AM: 60 min PM: 30 min
Tue - 12*1K, 6*2K, 4*3K, 3*4K @ 93-98% LT
Wed - 90 min
Thu - 12*1K, 6*2K, 4*3K, 3*4K @ 93-98% LT
Fri - 90 min
Sat - 120-150 min (including 8-10 miles of threshold)

I included a threshold workout in the long run most weeks. An example would be:

3-4*3200m @ 90-95% LT + 30-60 min + 2-4*1600m @ 90-95%LT

I ran a half, marathon, half, and 10km race, all 6 weeks apart, all PR’s, and all in line with predicted performance.

I actually used a 5*2400m @ 70%-75%-80%-85%-90% HR_Max as a standard workout leading into the races to have for comparison and as an easy workout before the race.

The 4 easy days were all VERY EASY. In terms of HR percent I did them no faster than 70% HR_Max. I felt I had go that easy in order to run the workouts consistently.

With the strength I built from the volume and threshold work, I found I ran my best races with a minimal taper (3-5 days). When I start to cut volume, both easy and threshold running, I find my fitness quickly declines, especially for 10km-marathon. Hope that’s helpful.

To the guy who claims I'm lying about this training, I'm not sure why I would come on to a random website, post goodness knows how many times about a random training system just to lie about running sub 36, when I'm sure many other hobby joggers wouldn't even be impressed 🤣

As for applying this to a half marathon, don't see why not. Now I've ran my first 10k and was super strong the whole way, I'm actually going to enter a ten miler. I'm not going to change my training one bit. Not a half marathon, but even if it was I probably wouldn't change anything other than just making all the easy runs an hour, maybe extending the long run 5-10 mins and making 3x3k 4x3k, purely out of interest to see what happens. Unbelief understands this type of training very well himself anyway, so I would just follow that as he actually knows what he's doing at the distance rather than my guesswork. But I can now safely say this works fantastically well for me for 5 and 10k 😊

I wouldn't even acknowledge the posters trying to discredit you. You and I both seem to have very similar experiences and performances. I'm a sub 1:20 half and sub 2:50 marathon. My experience is that with the half you should be able to run in line with your 10k time given what you're doing. I found that running 7.5 hours per week, with 3 threshold efforts, like 3*10 minutes, 3 easy 60 minute runs, and 1 90 min easy/moderate run got me almost as close to my best as when I was running 10.5 hours per week. Based on my data, it was a 2% improvement that I saw in the half with the higher volume mileage and threshold. So, basically a 40% increase in overall weekly volume and a 50% increase in threshold volume per session, lead to only a 2% increase in race performance at the 10km and half LOL. I had to know though and I wouldn't have if I didn't try.

It sounds good for guys and gals in their 30s and 40s that want to live and love this sport for decades without killing themselves AND seeing a steady (if not linear!) progression. I'd be open to trying this.

Thank you sir! A throwback to the good old days of LRC, before the trolls and crap came through. Lots of in-depth conversation. I love it.

Using Tinman's calculator to find current (NOT GOAL) CV paces across the board, and may start using those to build the one-a-day thresholds (3 threshold, 3 EZ, 1 LR) as noted.

Tinman did not event the CV thing, but he was clever enough to use it.

Running has exactly the same problem cyclist had decades ago, when they compared efforts from athlete to athlete. Then power measurement came up in cycling and later the %FTP stuff. Everyone was talking the same language, and efforts got comparable and measurable. This was some kind of game changer, and the communication between athletes and coaches got better. Cycling is now way ahead of running.

%CV for runners can be a replacement to %FTP for cylists (no it's not the same), maybe it's even better and the efforts can get comparable.

I did 30min@85%CV (as an example), that has to be the language we communicate!

I will occasionally read the physiology journals and even among researchers, I see aerobic threshold, anaerobic threshold, lactate threshold, lactate turn point, OBLA, MLSS, etc. It perplexes me researchers can't agree on terminology to describe the same metric. I don't see this level of variety in mathematics and physics research, not that that is the standard barer. It would be nice if intensities were conveyed in terms of a percent of a specific velocity, whether vVO2, vCV, vLT.