How should a hobby jogger best train for a new PR next year

I've only been running a month and my goals are to achieve your current PBs (sub 20 & sub 90).

If I was in your shoes, I would up the mileage slowly. You have gotten your results from just easy running. Run as much mileage as you can/want to. Keep it at that level until you plateau, then add speedwork.

Bear in mind... I have no idea what I'm talking about. It's just what I am planning to do.

Also, do you really think that it will take you til the end of the year to build up to 50mpw?

I would expect that building mileage would help more for improving your half PR, and doing speed work twice a week would help more for improving your 5K PR.

If you have a copy of Daniels' Running Formula, I might suggest doing the six week phase II & phase III from his 5K/10K plan*, 12 weeks total (you can probably skip phase I if you're already running 30-35 per week). Do this at around you current mileage, maybe increase to 35-40 in phase III, but make sure you're not too worn out to do the workouts.

*If you don't have a copy, Phase II generally consists of one workout of 200's/400's at mile pace (equal distance jog for rest) per week, one tempo workout (1 or 2 mile repeats), and one long run. Phase III replaces the mile pace workout with a 5K pace workout. For your volume, I would recommend something like 8x400 or 4 sets of 200/200/400 for a mile pace workout. Tempo workout might be 4x Mile with a minute walking rest, or 2x2 Mile with 2 minutes rest. 5K workout could be 4x1200 / 3 min jog rest or 6x800 / 2 min rest.

At the end of these 12 weeks, you can try running a 5K time trial, and maybe take the week after a little easier- no workouts, ~30 miles. Then shift gears and work on half marathon fitness- this would mean dropping one of the workouts per week, and just doing a tempo run and long run each week. Make up for the lower intensity with more volume, adding ~5 miles every four weeks. You can try increasing the volume of the tempo workouts to 5 or 6 x Mile, or 3x2 Mile as your total volume goes up, and do a long run of 25-30% of your weekly mileage. Do this four about 12 weeks, half marathon time trial, week easy to recover, and there's six months.

What I like about this is I find track workouts easier during the summer- muscles feel looser, you don't have to worry about snow on the track depending on where you live, whereas longer runs and higher volume feel easier in the fall when there's less chance of overheating. After spending much of the summer working on mile pace and 5K pace, your half marathon pace should feel easier when you shift your focus back to that in the fall.

Thanks Jimmy James! I'll look into this.

Both, just not at the same time. While building miles, do some mellow tempos but focus on duration. . When you adapt to a mileage level, drop miles a bit and emphasize workouts. Look up periodized training. Really though, you are likely to improve no natter what you do if you stay healthy and are consistent and increase stress while balancing recovery. That’s the beauty of being a new runner.

-More miles

-Add a drop week every 3-4 weeks where you cut miles 15-20%

-Weekly long run of 90-105 min.

-At least once a week strides

-Once a week rotation of 20-30min tempo, 20-30min fartlek, 4M moderate effort just so its not all boring easy miles.

If you do that you'll be ready when races return to jump into a 8-12 week 5k specific or HM specific season and crush your PRs.

This is a really well written, easy to understand, succinct post.

1:28 is a nice PR for the Half. That is mine when I was 40.

This year is kind of difficult since you can't plan for any races.

I think you should just run and enjoy the process.

Don't add too much mileage right now. Just keep running. You can start building up for next years races in December or so. Go for a HM in March.

If you are prepared to hire a pro coach to reach your PB:s you are welcome to me and my world class coacing. www.coachjs.se

This may sound simple but you should sleep more. Most sub-elite and amateur runners simply don't recover as best as they could. You can't push the miles if you keep getting shin splints or other injuries. Your training should be built around proper recovery. After that is nailed, more miles trumps speedwork for everything above 5k.