How to gain one minute for 5k?

My 5k PR was 20:02, and I dropped close to a minute off of it in only 9 weeks!

My training was:

Monday - OPTION 1: 5x4 minutes @ around 3k-5k effort, 3 minutes jogging rest

OPTION 2: 30 minute tempo run (5k pace = 40 seconds/mile)

Tuesday - 60 minutes

Wednesday - AM 30 minutes; PM 60 minutes

Thursday - OPTION 1: 15-20 short hill sprints with 1-2 minutes rest

OPTION 2: 6x1:30 hills @ very hard effort, 4:00 rest

Friday - 45 minutes easy

Saturday - 2 hours easy

Sunday - OFF

~50 miles per week

pics?

I like this simple plan - what is your thought process on choosing between the various options you listed on those days? Down to feel? Alternate?

In order to improve your times you will need to improve your strength. This is the secret.

You will need to lift a lot of weights. With your arms, with your legs.

A Lot of push ups , pull ups, abs work, dead lift, squats, bench press.

You are doing handball, you cannot afford to become lanky and weak like a specialized distance runner.

Is this really necessary to run that much to improve just by one minute? I don't think I can. I already train handball 3 times a week , can I reach that goal with only your options days or is this impossible?

OP that plan isn’t great. Long run is way too long, 1:30 hills with FOUR MINUTES of rest??? And that’s only 9 total minutes of hills.

6 days a week

2 workouts, 3 easy days, 1 long run, 1 day off

workouts:

One day: a tempo ~25-30 minutes or cruise intervals totaling about 7000-8000m of volume (7x1k, 8-10x800, etc) on short rest (60-90 seconds)

The second workout hill repeats with 1:1 rest:work ratio roughly (jog down recovery) aiming for about 12-15 minutes of work or shorter intervals (300-600) with slightly longer recovery aiming for about 5000m of volume

Long run: aim for 25% of easy mileage. Alternate east and moderate effort every week. Probably about 75 minutes for 40mpw

If you do 3x Handball per week

I recommend

Adding 1 long run at Easy Pace with your girlfriend and 1 Tempo session per week. Handball replaces your speed work.

Mo rest

Tu Hand Ball

We 4x6 Min 1" @ hm pace

Th Handball

Fr rest

Sa Handball Match

Sun long run

Something like that...

Thank you I will try it for the next month.

How steep should be the hill? Is it better longer and moderate slope or shorter and hardest??

Mix it up, it doesn’t really matter. All hills help. Go with about 40-50 minutes very easy for easy runs and make sure to do 4-6 strides after easy runs

Thank you.

hm pace is half marathon? For me it would be around what pace? I have never run an half, I am not trained for that at all.

Is it the same thing that tempo that the previous message recommended for 25-30 minutes?

The hills wouldn't be necessary in your plan?

Very easy is like jogging for warm up?

I will try your plan. Do you think that it's going to successfull in a couple month?

Yes, something like that. My 5k PR is 15:32 and my easy runs are about 4:45/km or 7:30/mile, so pretty slow.

It should work if you do it right. There are many training methods that work but the one I described is basically just a super simple 5k plan.

What is your current 5k PR? That will help with knowing what paces to target for the workouts.

Oh, I just saw that you run 20:10. For the 25 minute tempos, aim for about 4:20/km or 6:50/mile. For shorter repeats, say 600m, target ~3km pace, which for you is probably about 3:50/km, so target about 2:18 for 8 x 600m with 2 minutes rest. After a couple weeks try to do it a little faster.

For easy runs just go easy/by feel. Maybe about 5:30-5:45/km.

You are very strong. I will definitely try your plan starting next week.

My best is 20:11 from almost 2 weeks ago. I would like to run 19:05 like her but can't run as much as she does since it's her sport.

I appreciate your help.

I would do a little speed work, as suggested. But just running more miles will greatly help at your stage. My 5k dropped by 2 minutes, and I always did the speedwork (like 1-2 times a week max). But when I added more volume, it just "magically" happened. Of course, if your main constraint is time, that could be an issue. I'll bet increasing your volume by 10-15 miles a week for a month (just steady-state running, not tempo) will get you one minute, leaving everything else unchanged.

I can coach you to fast improvement and fast better than your GF. Take contact at messenger / fb / Twitter/ Instagram. Cheers! 🧙‍♂️🇸🇪

Forget all the complicated advice here. An athlete doing gaming sports, almost always lacks basic endurance.

-> You have to do just easy running (but not too easy) additional to your handball training. The long run is especially good.

Lol at you, you still there? You're trying to tap up hobby joggers now?

The only way he becomes faster than his girlfriend with your involvment is that you start to coach his girlfriend. She would immediately regress and become slower like all the people you coached in the past and therefore he would end up faster than her.

It's majiq!