I need to run a 5:00 1600 in order to get onto my high school track team. My time last week was 5:35. Any advice?

What HS requires a mild of 5:00? That’s insane

When are the tryouts and what were your splits from your recent attempt? Were you running alone?

5:00 is a fast standard for a high school team. You're close enough though that you can make it with some effort.

Make sure to get super shoes. That will knock off 5 seconds.

It’s utterly weird to cut everyone who can’t break 5 from a HS program.

Newbury Park had only 1 person not break 5:00. But there are no cuts on the team

I totally agree, but I don't have many options since my parents aren't going to move and let me attend a different school just so that I can run on the team. The school is Santa Monica HS:

FWIW, juniors and seniors need a 12 flat 100 or a 55 400 just to make the team, but if you want a varsity letter, you "only" need a 24.5 200.

I'd ideally like to peak on 2/11, but if there's bad weather that day, I'm screwed. Going for 1/14 would be the safer option, but it'll be tough to drop 35 seconds off my time in less than 2 months.

There'll also be an after-school tryout in January, but I'm thinking that it'll be harder to run a fast time then since there'll be less of a competitive atmosphere.

Bull sh!t.

This is freaking insane, this coach is a hack

Build up to 30-35mpw and run workouts twice a week. Race every all comer meet. If you show effort and willingness to be on the team there should be no coach that wouldn't have you on the team

If you just started distance running dropping 35s in 2 months is very doable. The competition alone should get you most of the way there.

With a 12.X 200 and a 56.8 400, have you considered going for the 2:10 800m standard?

56.8 is plenty of speed to run 2:10, you'll need to work on your endurance and lactic acid resistance. Since you seem to have a good sprinting base, you can try to work on both these goals. I think 2:10 may be easier for you, but 800m training can be more complex than 1600m training. For the 1600m, given your speed, it may be enough to crank up the mileage and add threshold runs, hills and short repeats.

Yeah, the coach might be missing out on a ton of good talent. One of my HS teammates ran around 5:10 in his first 1600 as a junior, ended up running sub 4:40 that season and breaking 15:40 in the 5k as a senior. If he was cut after that first race who knows if he would've stuck with running. And Santa Monica HS isn't good enough to justify having cuts, they didn't even make it to CIF prelims ffs.

Jim Ryun wouldn’t have made this team at first

Thanks. I'm planning to go from 18 mpw last week to 24 this week, 29 next week, and 33 the week after that. Does that sound good, or is that an overly fast buildup and an injury risk? I'll definitely race every all comers meet even though I have no chance of running under 5 on the December 10 meet.

I did hope that effort and willingness to be on the team would make a difference, but that wasn't the case last season. During the previous all-comers meets, I helped set up the hurdles, raked the long jump pits, and did some post-meet cleanup, but was pretty much told something to the effect of "thanks, but you also need to improve your times if you want to run for us." Mentioning good non-track work habits like a high GPA and a near-perfect attendance didn't do anything for me either. Maybe they'll show me some leniency this time since it's my senior year and my last chance of making the team, but I'm not holding my breath.

Is this perhaps that you run JV if you haven't met the standards? My HS team only took certain athletes to invite meets but everyone competed against the other schools

Those are good splits, a nice even pace. With your speed I think you'll be able to break 5.

Good point, that's definitely worth considering.

The tricky part is that the 800 is run after the 1600. I hope it doesn't come down to this, but I can see myself running a 5:0x 1600, followed by a 2:11 800 later that day. If I skipped the 1600, I would have been fresh for the 800. But what if I had that in mind, skipped the 1600, and still didn't break 2:10? I would then lose the chance to run under 5.

I suppose I'll do a 1200 time trial a week before the race. If I get a 3:45 or better, I'll do both events. If not, I'll just do the 800.

That's not too fast of a buildup for someone in high school as long as most of the miles (at least 2/3) are relatively easy, and you back off if you feel niggles or strains or anything other than general soreness and tiredness. You shouldn't feel exhausted all the time or you're building up too quickly.

If you were 40 and just starting to run, that would probably be too fast of a buildup. But young people recover quickly.

It looks like there’s different standards for freshman sophomore and the coach expects you to be varsity by junior/senior year.