david45 wrote:
By average guy, I mean someone who is around 18-30, at a healthy weight, runs with 2 workouts and one long run per week, and trains for a year. How fast would he get in the mile, 5k, and 10k?
At 52/53, I used to do something like a week made up of-
6x1000m at 5k pace
4 miles hard
7 mile 'long' run, steady/hard
The other 4 days were 2 mile jogs with dogs
So that's about 25 miles.
Off that I ran 17:32 5k, and 5:06 for an out and back road mile with 'U" turn. For the mile I changed the two main sessions to 8x400m and a 1200m time trial for the three weeks before the race.
Age graded that was about a 14:58. I was a reasonable club runner when younger and had been running since school, but I think you can run faster than people expect off low mileage/high intensity IF you are a fast-twitch runner.
The downside is you can't hold a peak very long, and go "off" pretty quickly.