Towards the middle of indoor season, I strained my groin muscle and pulled my hamstring all in the span of about a week. Pretty disappointing as it was looking like I had a valid shot at sub 1:50 by the end of indoors. What this did do, however, was give me a good opportunity to experiment on my way back. Here’s what I did over the last 5 weeks.
Monday - 2 mile jog to preserve running mechanics, 45 minutes high resistance elliptical training, weight training
Tuesday- 2x30 minutes elliptical, one session easy, one session fartlek
Wednesday- 5x300m in 39-41 with 3-4 minutes rest, 30 minutes elliptical easy.
Thursday- 2 mile jog to preserve mechanics, 30 minutes easy elliptical
Friday- 12x400m w/ 1 lap jogging rest, 1:15-1:10, 4x150m 90-95% effort, lifting
Saturday- 30 minutes easy on the elliptical, 30 minutes threshold on the elliptical with high resistance
Sunday- 3 mile steady run at 5:40 pace and 20 minutes easy on the elliptical + plyometrics.
Now for the results.
I’ve been time trialing this past week and here’s what I came up with.
400m: 50.2 solo, previous PB 50.9
800m: 1:56 solo, previous PB 1:53.7
1600m: 4:36 solo, previous PB 4:14 (4:16 mile)
(all official PBs slightly shifted to preserve anonymity)
So now that I’m back to normal training, here’s what I noticed:
- Fast paces feel much much smoother now. I was expecting to see 2:05 or so on my stopwatch for my 800m time trial when finishing. Instead I was only about 2.5 seconds off of a PB with no competition.
- My aerobic strength is now garbage. If you couldn’t tell from my mile time lol. A 6 mile run at 7:20 pace is now somewhat difficult for me, where I used to run 10-12 miles a day at 7:00 pace give or take at less than 50% perceived effort.
-My lungs are in searing pain after time trials, but I’m no longer feeling much strain in my muscular system. This has been the opposite for me over the last year or so.
-My legs feel much more fresh and I feel a lot better and energized going into workouts most of the time.
-I’ve had a visible positive change in muscle tone and have lost about 6 lbs.
My coaches have decided I should meet in the middle and run 35-45 mpw for the rest of track season, and then rebuild for cross. Hopefully this will help me get back in shape for the 1500/mile and up, but the main focus will be 400/800m for this outdoor season until I can get back into 4:00/4:20 shape or better, which I’m okay with.
This was an interesting little case study and I now can really see the merit to both high volume and low volume training. I thought I’d share for those interested both in my personal progress and training philosophy in general. Thanks for reading!