Is running at moderate pace a waste of energy?

trainingsmart wrote:

My 5k and 10k times are 18 and 38 minutes. My easy pace is 8 minute miles.

For a while I tried running harder. I did a tempo run once a week and everything else at 7 minute miles. The hardest tempo run I have done is 10 miles at 6:40, however, I usually tempo 3-5 miles at 6:30-6:45 pace.

What I have found is my times did not improve despite running much harder.

Therefore, is training at moderate pace (i.e. 6 and 7 minute miles for me) a waste of energy?

Instead is it best to do 1 interval session per week and run everything else at an easy pace? My gut feeling is threshold and volume are the only things that work and everything else is a waste of energy.

Thoughts on this?

The concern is that the medium pace running may leave you with less energy than needed to maximize an upcoming, more intense workout. If it doesn't, you're fine. But if such runs leave you unable to hit goal paces in subsequent harder workouts, then back off. You're sacrificing hard workouts to do a run that neither works you out, nor allows you to recover.

Keep in mind that although moderate pace is sort of in nowhere land, as far as benefit, if you believe progression runs have benefit (which I do) then it's hard to say medium pace has no benefit, since you will spend some time there during any properly done progression run.

CAA wrote:

For another alternative, look at Klaas Lok's Easy Interval Method.

A minimal description is fartlek every day. No steady runs at constant pace.

I'd pass on that.

Easy days Easy, Hard days Hard. FTW

Sure if you feel great on an easy run then toss in some strides, but the focus should be on crushing your Key workouts with proper execution by almost treating them like races(mentality,nutrition,rest,recovery,ect...)

Tempo won't improve your 5K and 10K times as much. They will help you in 10 mile and 1/2 marathon races. You need shorter and quicker intervals to improve in 5K.

trainingsmart wrote:

My 5k and 10k times are 18 and 38 minutes. My easy pace is 8 minute miles.

For a while I tried running harder. I did a tempo run once a week and everything else at 7 minute miles. The hardest tempo run I have done is 10 miles at 6:40, however, I usually tempo 3-5 miles at 6:30-6:45 pace.

What I have found is my times did not improve despite running much harder.

Therefore, is training at moderate pace (i.e. 6 and 7 minute miles for me) a waste of energy?

Instead is it best to do 1 interval session per week and run everything else at an easy pace? My gut feeling is threshold and volume are the only things that work and everything else is a waste of energy.

Thoughts on this?

You say you ran "much harder" and went from running 8min miles to 7min miles on your easy days plus a 3-5 mile tempo run at 6:30 pace. This is really not very hard training, and it's also got practically no variety in it. Could be good training for early season base training, but probably not very effective in the short term.

"Running at a moderate pace" is important for all runners -- maybe the most important thing. But your issue like many others have said is modulation/variety. If you do one thing all the time, you'll end up being pretty good at that one thing.

You need help thinking about variety and how to put together a plan. Try Brad Hudson's "Run Faster" -- best 5k book I've read, though Jack Daniels is also tried and true. Follow what they say. Think less; train harder.

You can run and recover from about 3 workouts a week. Any more than that and you aren't fully recovered. This applies to 99% of runners.

It seems like you may be asking whether or not a weekly tempo run is worth it. I believe that it is, with some caveats. A tempo run is different for different people. I use tempos primarily as lactate threshold workouts. You're 10 mile tempo was too long. That'll just leave you drained. Look back at your log, I bet you didn't do much/ran like garbage the days following that 10 mile tempo. Tempos should be 3-5 miles and they're aerobic runs, not lung busters. The point of a tempo run is to push up your lactate threshold, 3-5 miles is all you need to stimulate that adaptation.

When running your easy days, you have two objectives - the first is to recover for the next workout. The second is to get in a modest increase in aerobic fitness. If you want to do more, Wednesday would be a good day to do it in my schedule above, you have an extra day of recovery. There is no point in running easy/recovery runs any faster than you need to. The worst possible thing you can do on a recovery run is to not recover. Its as bad as bombing a workout, maybe worse.

here's how I schedule my week, we are pretty similar runners:

S. long run (workout)

M. easy run (recovery, pace doesn't matter)

T. intervals (workout)

W. easy run (recovery, pace doesn't matter)

Th. easy run (recovery, pace doesn't matter)

F. tempo (workout)

S. easy (recovery, pace doesn't matter)

If you are doubling, add in more easy runs. If you are taking a day off, take off on an easy day.

A couple of other things to keep in mind as you figure out what works for you.

1. You want to run fast, not hard. Sounds silly, but there's a difference. Hard is an effort, fast is a speed. see summer of malmo threads

2. Each workout has a specific purpose. You don't get any bonus points for overdoing it. This is especially true for easy runs.

3. You don't get faster in workouts, you get faster in recovery.

4. Cumulative training is more important than any individual workout. This is why recovery is important. You need to keep coming back week after week to get faster. No one workout will make your season, but it can break it. There's only a handful of workouts each year where you will go to the well. If you dig too deep too often, you end up in a cycle of not recovering, this is when injury/overtraining happens.

You'll get it figured out though, everyone does it a little differently. You learn every year and hopefully change accordingly.

trainingsmart wrote:

Therefore, is training at moderate pace (i.e. 6 and 7 minute miles for me) a waste of energy?

My gut feeling is threshold and volume are the only things that work and everything else is a waste of energy.

Thoughts on this?

I have integrated the Easy Interval Method (EIM) into my training. Not all but something. The EIM were your main run is something like 6 x1000m at sub-threshlod pace with 5min easy pace in between. That method specially recruits the type 2a muscle fibers, and makes them more aerobic functional. The adaptation takes time but i can say it works. Moderate paces are the fundament for higher paces.

However you need also to train at higher paces, as some mentioned.

At the end of the day, you get better at around that pace you train...

lol there is more bro-science in running than anywhere else.

it recruits more type2a muscle fibers? bwhahahahhaa

I've been doing the Easy Interval Method for at least some of my sessions, and it' been working quite well.

I do the 6x1000m session as 6x1000 in about 10k pace (4:05/4:10 - I'm 64 years old) with 800m recovery at about 8 min per mile pace, and with warm-up/warm-down it comes out to an 8 mile run.

Other sessions I do are 12x400m with 400m recovery in 1:50-2 min and 16x200m with 200m recovery in about 55-60 seconds.

I do still do the occasional long run, and an every week two or three of easy runs (around 7:30-7:45 per mile)

I find it gives a way to get quite a good volume of faster running in without the stress of a hard interval session which works at this advanced stage!

potato_salad wrote:

lol there is more bro-science in running than anywhere else.

it recruits more type2a muscle fibers? bwhahahahhaa

Haha. That why your name is potato and salat. Like your words.

Your name is well selected. :))

No pace or intensity is useless for running, but the different paces give somewhat different adaptations and need increasing recovery time. It is the combination of different paces and adaptations that is important. Plenty of people have touched upon that in this thread.

Still so much ignorance.

To get better at running, you do lots of running.

In an ideal world, it would all be fast.

However, you’ll get tired and injured.

So, you run a big chunk of your miles easy - by feel, so you don’t get tired or injured and then you work out a few times a week.

Do we really need to repeat this forever?

This model is not proven to be the one above them all and answer to everything. Basically, running a bunch of easy by feel miles and throw in a couple of workouts will not work very well and if it was that simple, why on earth would we need coaches.

Ther is evidence that on average the 80/20-model works the best, but we know not for who it does not work and to get the best you optimal training for you is needed and not what everyone on average does.

I would think such a gross simplification displays ignorance

Be a full sender, no half sending.