800/Mile Workouts

This is absolute crap.

depends what your race goal is...it might be good for you but if you put it in mile pace terms, then you see that it comes to a 4:49. so, 20 200s equal a distance of 4000 meters or roughly 2.5 miles...i guess it's a decent high school workout for a guy who might want to break 10 minutes for 2 miles on the track or at best, a 9:45.

When I was training for a fast mile, I did a workout similar to this, except much faster, and fewer repeats. If you're gearing up for an 800, this is not fast enough to be quality speedwork, and not long enough to be good aerobic building.

You'll need something more along the lines of 24-25-26 second 800s with adequate rest, try doing 8-12 of them, depending on your fitness. If you're working on building aerobic base, 300s and 400s, even 500s are a better distance. Run at or just over race pace, and give yourself shorter rest (maybe 60-90 seconds). In order to get into good 800/mile shape you definitely need the turnover, and if you're running 4:40-something pace for 200s you'd be better off running that for 600s-800s-1000s. Good luck!

Dear horrible: This workout is very similar to a favorite of Seb Coe. Coe is one of the best 800/mile guys of all time. Not sure why you believe that the workout is absolute crap.

the workout is absulte crap because it was done too slow. if you are trying to get a base durring cross season, then this might be a good workout, although 400s would be better, but if you are trying to gear up for an 800 this season, you should probably just do about 8-10 200s with 200 meter jog in between. hit each 200 about as fast as you would go out in for an 800. So in other words, if you plan on going out in 52, then run 8-10 200s at 25/26.

How do you know if this workout was done too slow, too fast, or just right? Is 600runner's mile PR 6 min, 5 min, 4:40, 4:20? We don't know. Coe did 30 x 200 average in 27 seconds with a 45 second rest with a couple of quicker ones toward the end.

There's also a fellow named Kipketer who was known to run a workout of 20X200 with 30 second rest in 26. Other Kenyans use a workout of 8 X 200 at 800 goal pace with 30 second rest. People who don't understand that 25-26 sec/200 is WR pace for 800 don't know much about 800 training. If done on 800 PR pace and run correctly with 30 second rest, these workouts are VERY hard.

A 15-30 X 200 workout can be used for different things, depending on the intensity. I use 30 X 200 with equal time rest for high school runners late in xc season, but in this case, it is run at 3200 pace (Villat's 30-30), and if you can get in 15-20 minutes of running at that pace, it is a very powerful workout. As you run the 200's at faster paces, the workout becomes much harder. 20X200 at mile pace with 30-45 second rest is something that Coe and Morceli did. 8 X 200 at true 800 PR pace is something that many people can't even finish; You're better off starting with 3X4X200 with 60 sec (reduce to 30) rep rests and a 1 lap walk for sets.

Yes; it's a good workout for any middle/long distance runner. Just know what it does. It's a VO2max builder, very similar to what Daniels describes as an Interval workout (on the very short end) and to a Billat 30/30 workout (google her). And contrary to the earlier poster, it is long enough for most, and certainly for you if you're a 600m runner. You might also experiment with extending the length of the repeats while maintaining the same recovery ratio. No need to run the reps faster as the workout goes along either; keep them in the 2k-3k pace area.

i did 10x200 in 29 w/ 30 seconds rest a few weeks back.

I'd take that over 20 in 35-7 anyday.

Just answering mayne.

6x800m, 10x400m and 20x200m. IMO these are the old school "meat and potato" workouts for milers.

I think your average 200m pace for this workout would be slightly slower than mile pace.

I have a hard time believing 20x200m in 26sec with 30sec rest. Surely they would be much closer to 1500m race pace? 8x200m with short recovery MAYBE at 800m pace, but not 20x.

600mrunner wrote:

Me and one of my teammates decided to try this for the heck of it the other day. We did 20X200 with 30 sec break...and then did one extra at near all out. I did them in (38,37,36,36,35,35,35,35,35,35,35,34,35,34,34,34,34,34,33,33,27)

Any suggestions...is this a good workout for 800/mile?

this is a good workout. If you can hit 27 on your last 200m in this workout you can hit it on the last 200m of your mile and 800m.

I reckon doing 7-8 200's @ sub 27 sec pace is awsome for speed in the 800m , don't worry about recovery just think about speed. (I run rnd 1:58 so i am pretty shit if you were good sub 25 is what you would be aiming for )

Not that this is necessarily a good workout to be doing now, but a good threshold workout I would do in high school was 4 sets of 5 x 200m. The first set started with 75 seconds rest, then 60, then 45, then 30, and we would average about 31/32 seconds per 200. If you want to make it harder, start your rests out at 60 seconds and work your way down to 15 seconds for the last set. Don Sage would do this workout and average about 31 seconds per 200. He ran 4:00.03 for 1 mile in high school and ~ 8:48 for 2 miles.

I feel that the best workouts that I used. Was doing 3 sets of broken mile reapeats. I would run a 200 easy and run the next 200 at my 800 pace at about 29-30. And in between each mile have about 2-3 min recovery, but if you need more rest you should take it because this is supposed to be a tough workout but not a gut buster.

The sole purpose of this workout is to get used to running at your 800 pace, if your goal is to run a 2:10 you should run your fast part of your 200s at about 32-33. My junior year the only training I did was when mandatory practice started and only ran a 2:16 800, but I didn't really try then and by my senior year of doing workouts like this and really buckling down I thought this was my most productive workout and I was running 2:00-2:02 the whole year.

Pretty decent workout. Probably give you a 4:40-4:50 mile.

We used to do 16-20 at around 28-30 with 30-40 second jog.

There were a few sub 4 guys. Keep up the good work, maybe do a few less at a quicker pace .Good luck with your running.

[quote]Silly Little Effa wrote:

I have a hard time believing 20x200m in 26sec with 30sec rest. Surely they would be much closer to 1500m race pace? 8x200m with short recovery MAYBE at 800m pace, but not 20x.

[quote]

Of course any of Kipketer's workouts are only rumor, but this one's in the realm of possibility. Consider that 26.x is equivalent to 1:44-1:47 pace, and he did 1:41. Although tough, it's not impossible to imagine someone capable of 4x200m in 24.5 sec with NO recovery doing 2 seconds slower with SOME recovery for a high number of repetitions.

As long as the effort parameters are correct, your 20 x 200m workout should be a staple session for 800m runners everywhere.

To get the effort parameters correct, try the workout with the 200m reps run at about 2 seconds slower than your current mile race pace. This will likely seem too slow to be challenging, so you can increase the speeds to your mile race pace in the middle of the session. The effort by the middle of the workout should involve hyperventilation and a slight laboring feeling (maybe a little onset of "burn") during the last 30-50 meters of each rep, but should not involve actually tying up. Aim to run at least 15 reps and possibly 20. You are finished when you cannot continue the speed on the 200m segments without tying up, so try to work your way down after about 5 opening reps toward the speed that you think you can handle for 15 more reps.

The recovery should be jogged. Staying active during the recovery interval ensures that the muscles do not tighten and that your blood does not pool (you should stay above 65% of your HRR for this). Ever-increasing quantities of lactate produced during the session are better processed as fuel or reconverted to pyruvate in the heart if the circulatory system remains active and the muscles stay in motion.

If you were to use Veronique Billat's criteria, you would be jogging 100m between each of the 200m reps in the same time it took to run the 200m. But you are to become an athlete who is not restricted by external criteria; rather, you will know your body and you will know the purpose of the session. You will therefore begin with some reasonable guidelines but will learn to find the correct recovery pace and duration by intuition. You will also avoid asking yourself, "What could I run for race distance X based on workout Y?" This is not an indicator session, so it doesn't matter how fast it is, only that you got the correct training. You should improve your times for this session as you get fitter during the season, but you should not force the workout just so you can have a better average in your logbook and convince yourself you're faster. Therefore, do not repeat this session every week. Wait until your fitness and sharpness improves to the point that the times on this will be faster without your having to try any harder than before.

Once you learn and apply the correct methodology, you will discover that you do not require a lot of training at faster than race speeds.

RIGHT ON!