Stupidest Workout Ever? - 4x 1600m w/2:30 recovery - 4:52, 4:55, 4:55, 4:57

They're all within 5 seconds, give her a break.

You clearly don't understand physiology

ExPhys wrote:

You clearly don't understand physiology

Ok, explain it to us, and cite your sources so we can check you for accuracy.

Nonsense! wrote:

Why on earth would anyone do mile repeats with each one getting slower? This is exactly how you train your body to die in a race. Talented girl with fast times, but the coaching is pure sh*t!

https://tx.milesplit.com/articles/279945-brynn-brown-with-insane-sub-5-min-4-x-mile-repeats?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email

Seems like a good, solid workout. If she reversed the order she would be ready for a big kick in her next race? Where do you coach?

SDSU Aztec wrote:

[

Seems like a good, solid workout. If she reversed the order she would be ready for a big kick in her next race? Where do you coach?

Someplace where we don't run mile repeats that pregressively get slower.

Nonsense! wrote:

Why on earth would anyone do mile repeats with each one getting slower? This is exactly how you train your body to die in a race. Talented girl with fast times, but the coaching is pure sh*t!

https://tx.milesplit.com/articles/279945-brynn-brown-with-insane-sub-5-min-4-x-mile-repeats?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email

What's your problem? Why the freekout? Maybe she had trouble keeping her times at 5. Pretty small sample to be judging the coach by. Yeah, you are right about how it looks like it is bad training, but why jump all over the coach? Do you have some inside info that indicates the coach has asked her to do those mile repeats that way?

Relax, turbo! That's a 5-second differential ... you won't find many achieving that in a race. I think it's pretty damn impressive.

Yeah very stupid. I'm proud to hit all my mile repeats 5:50 right on the nose! #physiology

Nonsense! wrote:

SDSU Aztec wrote:

[

Seems like a good, solid workout. If she reversed the order she would be ready for a big kick in her next race? Where do you coach?

Someplace where we don't run mile repeats that pregressively get slower.

Slowing from 4:52 to 4:57 is no big deal. Maybe the plan was to run the last one in 4:50, but she didn't have it that day. She's not a robot.

RyecorDone wrote:

What's your problem? Why the freekout?

Probably trying to get clicks for his video

Shorter,Than Frank wrote:

Relax, turbo! That's a 5-second differential ... you won't find many achieving that in a race. I think it's pretty damn impressive.

Impressive and helpful are 2 different things. Going out and running mile repeats as fast as you can is just plain stupid. You can try to convince yourself that it isn't but it is. She gets nothing out of a workout like this. She may not have any competition in her state, but nationally in 2021 if there is a season, she will get smoked if this is the kind of workout she is doing. I assume that since Milesplit was there, this is one they wanted to showcase.

Similar to nico young’s workout. Young went 4:10 2:07 4:16 2:06. 6 second gap between his first and last 1600 split.

Nonsense! wrote:

She gets nothing out of a workout like this.

lol, hogwash.

she shouldn't do an all-out workout every week, sure. but to say she gets "nothing" out of this is stupid. and that's assuming it was actually an all-out workout for her and she didn't just accidentally just run the first one a bit fast and then adjust accordingly after.

totally disagree ... she looked pretty fresh upon completion. again, a 4:57 and a 4:52 are virtually the same time. how is this not helpful? provide your reasons/logic. This was simply a VO2 workout - period!

Huh? Some of you are saying that running this workout in 5:30 is better than 4:55? Good to know. College guys do this workout at 4:30 pace but they should run 5:30 in order to get faster. She should back off to 6 minute pace on them to get even faster and work up to 7 minute pace. By then, she can race a 21 minute 5k.

birdbeard wrote:

and that's assuming it was actually an all-out workout for her and she didn't just accidentally just run the first one a bit fast and then adjust accordingly after.

This seems like a likely explanation. If you told me to go run 4X1600 all at 5 flat pace, the workout wouldn’t be physically demanding for me, but I could easily end up with similar splits to hers just because it’s easy to get out a bit ahead of pace and then have to adjust.

It’s possible to not hit your goal paces perfectly even if you aren’t going to the well just because we aren’t robots. I mean I guess the OP decides he’s going to do a run at 5:20 pace and then proceeds to hit every mile mark at exact 5:20.00, but most of us don’t have this talent.

Nonsense! wrote:

Shorter,Than Frank wrote:

Relax, turbo! That's a 5-second differential ... you won't find many achieving that in a race. I think it's pretty damn impressive.

Impressive and helpful are 2 different things. Going out and running mile repeats as fast as you can is just plain stupid. You can try to convince yourself that it isn't but it is. She gets nothing out of a workout like this. She may not have any competition in her state, but nationally in 2021 if there is a season, she will get smoked if this is the kind of workout she is doing. I assume that since Milesplit was there, this is one they wanted to showcase.

Nonsense!, did you compete in HS? I ran many interval workouts in HS. Sometimes I felt great and would increase my pace towards the end of the workout and other times I struggled and would slow down. It didn't matter.

second that... article doesn't seem to say what the target times were... just what she ran... and the plan was probably to hit the same time each rep... close enuff

birdbeard wrote:

They're all within 5 seconds, give her a break.

Every runner is different. My body does not respond to this kind of training at all.

I know others who thrive off it.

It really depends on the type of runner. Distance runners with natural speed (sub 50 second 400m times) thrive with workouts where each rep gets faster. It trains the body to finish hard; which is how they are programmed.

Distance runners that do not have speed (say, 55+ 400 meter times) will not do well with workouts or races that require getting faster. They thrive off tempo runs, lactic threshold runs, and other max threshold workouts where you hit your lactic limit and hold it for a long period. Guys in between those 400 splits thrive off a combination of the two. Whatever the equivalent for women is applies the same.

This is actually why a lot of runners burn out in college. Almost all college coaches don't take the time to figure out what type of runner they are (i.e. ask their high school coach what kind of workouts they do). College coaches just throw every athlete into the workout plan and hope they get better. Some don't respond well, others do. It can be a toss up.

Without knowing what type of runner this girl is, it's hard to say if it smart or stupid. I suspect she's the kind that does not have a lot of natural speed. So she can hold a fast pace for a long time.