4x300 @ 43, 800 prediction

The 800 is hard to predict from workouts, especially from reps less than 400. Someone with decent speed and good (running-based) aeorbic strength can go blast a high volume of 200s and 300s, but if their legs (and arms) haven't felt the burn of sustaining the pace for more than 30-45s, they are likely to tie up.

Given that you say this was full rest, I'd predict 2:00, assuming good aerobic strength. 1:58 would be if the rests were more like 1:15.

If it's in a perfect race where he can zone out and draft then maybe 1:58 is possible.

I'm gonna say more like 2:05-2:08. He only ran slightly faster than sub2 pace for 300m with full recovery? When I was in high school I could probably do those in 40s with full recovery and I only managed around 2:01, but granted I was more of a two miler.

But as the other poster pointed out, depends how well they can sustain that speed.

It honestly depends. As someone who I like to think has quite solid raw speed for a middle distance runner, I’d be hitting these at least sub 39, and I’m looking to go sub 1:56 by the end of outdoor, with about 8:55 3k strength. I’d say 300s with full rest shouldn’t be all that slower than 400 pace. 39 is 52 pace, 42 running at about 56 pace, I should be gunning for sub 50 by the end of this season, your athlete will want to be at least sub 54 to get in that 1:58 zone.

I guess my conclusion is that your boy has a pretty solid chance, get him in a solid 400m race spiked up to get an idea of where his speed/speed endurance is at.

My guys have run 1:49.7, 1:50.1 and 3:43. Just finishing long season. What works for us is threshold running, 400-800m efforts at 3k pace. Short hills but also longer ones for lactate tolerance. Volume not very high. Athlete did 3x300 yesterday in 40, 39, 37.5. 800 Nats next week. Everyone is different.

CopperRunner wrote:

It honestly depends. As someone who I like to think has quite solid raw speed for a middle distance runner, I’d be hitting these at least sub 39, and I’m looking to go sub 1:56 by the end of outdoor, with about 8:55 3k strength. I’d say 300s with full rest shouldn’t be all that slower than 400 pace. 39 is 52 pace, 42 running at about 56 pace, I should be gunning for sub 50 by the end of this season, your athlete will want to be at least sub 54 to get in that 1:58 zone.

I guess my conclusion is that your boy has a pretty solid chance, get him in a solid 400m race spiked up to get an idea of where his speed/speed endurance is at.

CopperRunner, You are generally a very quality poster but come on... you are not hitting 4 sub 39 300s as part of a larger workout and keeping things in control when you are just a tiny bit below 2 minutes. That sounds like an all out effort or potentially not doable for someone at that fitness level.

CopperRunner wrote:

It honestly depends. As someone who I like to think has quite solid raw speed for a middle distance runner, I’d be hitting these at least sub 39, and I’m looking to go sub 1:56 by the end of outdoor, with about 8:55 3k strength. I’d say 300s with full rest shouldn’t be all that slower than 400 pace. 39 is 52 pace, 42 running at about 56 pace, I should be gunning for sub 50 by the end of this season, your athlete will want to be at least sub 54 to get in that 1:58 zone.

I guess my conclusion is that your boy has a pretty solid chance, get him in a solid 400m race spiked up to get an idea of where his speed/speed endurance is at.

Sorry I didn't read your post. My athlete who has run 1:50.15 has a 400m pb of 51.1. You probably aren't training correctly.

It really depends on how much effort is put into the reps and the type of runner.

I could do 8 in 45 with a 100m walk recovery and only managed 2:05 (probably could have run 2:03 as was really windy)

But I could only do 42xx flat out and was training for 5km so it all depends

Other guys (mid twenties) I trained with could do 8 in 43 and go sub 2 say 1:57/8. Teenage runners may not have the endurance. None of the class runners I trained with would end a session feeling comfortable they would do the reps as fast as they could providing the times were consistent.

CoachB I would recommend not doing 300's at 800 pace early in the season.

CoachB wrote:

Full workout included 1200@ 4:10, 1 min rest then 800 @ 2:48. Those were supposed to be tempo effort.

Full recovery between the 300s. Athlete was not struggling. Run in trainers

Predictions for 800? I think he opens his track season with a sub 2:00 in 2.5 weeks then ends up around 1:58

I think, like 2:06-2:08.

Nothing about that workout indicates sub 2 min.

in my experience, kids who run these in 43 range are right around 2 minute runners. I've typically done them 3 minutes rest--though it can go as high as 5 by the end.

This was the first workout back after our mini cross country season, where he ran 16:40 on a moderately hilly 3 mile and 17:26 on a moderately hilly 5k with lots of long grass. He had done a couple of easy runs in the days prior to coming for the workout

I’d had to hold him back during the final weeks of cross due to a sore Achilles. So, he’s likely lost a little aerobically, but he looked a lot fresher and ready to absorb training again.

We’re going to do some 600s at his estimated vVO2 on Friday. Probably 6x600 @ 72-74 pace with up to 4 min recovery. This should be fast enough to force a little anaerobic accumulation on each rep, but not too deep. The long rests should allow each rep to be good.

The tempo pace is really weak (4 minutes and 3 minutes at roughly 5:30 mile pace???), and 4 x 300 isn't very much, and with full recovery he should be able to fly much faster than his 800 pace. So no way he's running 1:56... Probably 2:07-2:10 or so like other people said with a huge positive split. He goes out in 60 and closes in 67. That lack of endurance will determine how much he blows up.

Oh. And our first race is April 23, final race is May 25, so really, we’re moving right into a peaking type of training block.

The 300s were designed as a bridge that would eventually lead to something more like 3x500@ the same pace with 10 minutes recovery.

I don’t think this is a useful predictor. Maybe your athlete is in sub 2 shape but nothing about this workout indicates that type of fitness. I could’ve done this easily in high school and I never came close to breaking 2:00.

jleieojdhwkd wrote:

I don’t think this is a useful predictor. Maybe your athlete is in sub 2 shape but nothing about this workout indicates that type of fitness. I could’ve done this easily in high school and I never came close to breaking 2:00.

I never planned the workout with the word predictor in mind. As I said earlier, the kid had had a little break and I wanted to bring him back in with something not too hard, but that would start to stress the anaerobic systems, since we only have about 6 weeks until the last race of the season.

I was actually just hoping he'd run 45s, then when I saw he forgot his spikes I was like, "oh well, he might not run 45s today".

I'm still calling 1:58 ish by the last race of the season

CoachB wrote:

Oh. And our first race is April 23, final race is May 25, so really, we’re moving right into a peaking type of training block.

The 300s were designed as a bridge that would eventually lead to something more like 3x500@ the same pace with 10 minutes recovery.

are you a bit of a christensen guy?

i've definitely taken pieces from his philosophy to great success. might be especially positive with limited training time like this year.

I have spent the past couple years ironing out when to utilize his philosophy and when to RUN from it!

1:58-2:04

I ran 2:07, could not have done that workout.

I found 300s hard when I went under 45. Hard as in hard to do another one under 45 in a rep session.

Greg wrote:

1:58-2:04

I ran 2:07, could not have done that workout.

I found 300s hard when I went under 45. Hard as in hard to do another one under 45 in a rep session.

I did this session "3x300,1x200 43,43,44,28."(3 min recovery) a month ago- quite an easy session and would've had no chance of breaking 2 at the time.

Unless the athlete has incredible stamina I think you'd need to be cutting down those 43s to 42s for any chance at a 1:58 clocking.

bez23 wrote:

Greg wrote:

1:58-2:04

I ran 2:07, could not have done that workout.

I found 300s hard when I went under 45. Hard as in hard to do another one under 45 in a rep session.

I did this session "3x300,1x200 43,43,44,28."(3 min recovery) a month ago- quite an easy session and would've had no chance of breaking 2 at the time.

Unless the athlete has incredible stamina I think you'd need to be cutting down those 43s to 42s for any chance at a 1:58 clocking.

not surprising, considering you slowed down on the 3rd of an already brief workout, and had to cut to a 200 at the end.