Hi, I'm a freshman in HS with a mile PR of 5:38 and weekly mileage of 35 and I'm racing the 3200 on Sunday with the aim of breaking 12. I think I'm able to do it, I just want to gain as much fitness as possible before the race so I was thinking about doing a tempo 5k on Thursday, easy run Friday, and shakeout Saturday. Would this be a good idea or would I be too fatigued for the race?
I'm aiming for sub 20 on the tempo, would that indicate sub 12 in the race?
Hi, I'm a freshman in HS with a mile PR of 5:38 and weekly mileage of 35 and I'm racing the 3200 on Sunday with the aim of breaking 12. I think I'm able to do it, I just want to gain as much fitness as possible before the race so I was thinking about doing a tempo 5k on Thursday, easy run Friday, and shakeout Saturday. Would this be a good idea or would I be too fatigued for the race?
I'm aiming for sub 20 on the tempo, would that indicate sub 12 in the race?
Thanks!
If your race is on Sunday, there is not much left you can do for your fitness. The main thing is staying sharp. Maybe try 3 reps at goal 3200 pace. You could tempo, but regardless you would need to keep it controlled and almost easy. Maybe slightly slower than tempo effort. A sub 20 5k tempo if it's controlled would indicate that you can break 12 for sure. But whatever workout you do, you should keep it under control. Any hard workout a few days out from the race will do more harm than good. So, I would do something light like a tune-up. But my recommendation would be something like 3x800m at 3200 with 2-3 minute rest. A light tune-up track workout just to get the feel of race pace is best. Also, you want to keep the muscle tension in your legs so stay off softer surfaces in the few days leading up to your race. You want to keep the spring in your legs.
Hi, I'm a freshman in HS with a mile PR of 5:38 and weekly mileage of 35 and I'm racing the 3200 on Sunday with the aim of breaking 12. I think I'm able to do it, I just want to gain as much fitness as possible before the race so I was thinking about doing a tempo 5k on Thursday, easy run Friday, and shakeout Saturday. Would this be a good idea or would I be too fatigued for the race?
I'm aiming for sub 20 on the tempo, would that indicate sub 12 in the race?
Thanks!
If your race is on Sunday, there is not much left you can do for your fitness. The main thing is staying sharp. Maybe try 3 reps at goal 3200 pace. You could tempo, but regardless you would need to keep it controlled and almost easy. Maybe slightly slower than tempo effort. A sub 20 5k tempo if it's controlled would indicate that you can break 12 for sure. But whatever workout you do, you should keep it under control. Any hard workout a few days out from the race will do more harm than good. So, I would do something light like a tune-up. But my recommendation would be something like 3x800m at 3200 with 2-3 minute rest. A light tune-up track workout just to get the feel of race pace is best. Also, you want to keep the muscle tension in your legs so stay off softer surfaces in the few days leading up to your race. You want to keep the spring in your legs.
You get vo2 max benefits a lot quicker. Long term tempo or 800 might give you more aerobic benefit, but I’d probably limit the longer intervals. I’d maybe do a 2-4-6-8-6-4-2 ladder at pace 200 easy jog recovery. First 2-4-6 should feel super easy, last 8-6-4-2 should feel closer to race effort. All but the last 4/2 should be close to race speed. Last 4/2 can be a little quicker.
Otherwise, I’d probably do like 6-8x400 w/200 easy jog recovery. All at race pace but last 1 maybe a bit quicker.
My former D1 coach told us that we are not to do, nor will he schedule, a hard tempo close to a major race. In fact, the last of our tempo runs occurred 10 days before our final, important race.
Up until the race, it was easily mileage and strides and some short pace work.
So if the race was Saturday. The week looked like this: Monday - 4-5 miles Easy Tuesday - 3 mile warm up / 3x800 at Race Pace with 400m jogs / 1 mile cool down Wednesday - 6 Miles Easy + Strides Thursday - 3 mile warm up / 4x400 at Race Pace with 400m jogs / 1 mile cool down Friday - Off - but sometimes it was 4-5 miles easy. Saturday - 2 mile warm up / strides / Race hard or die trying.
Hi, I'm a freshman in HS with a mile PR of 5:38 and weekly mileage of 35 and I'm racing the 3200 on Sunday with the aim of breaking 12. I think I'm able to do it, I just want to gain as much fitness as possible before the race so I was thinking about doing a tempo 5k on Thursday, easy run Friday, and shakeout Saturday. Would this be a good idea or would I be too fatigued for the race?
I'm aiming for sub 20 on the tempo, would that indicate sub 12 in the race?
Thanks!
1. You will gain next to zero fitness from that tempo by the time your race comes, aerobic supercompensation takes more than 3 days to set in. It can help in the mental fitness department but your perfect 3200m time will be the same as before you do the tempo.
2. You’ll be fine if you do it, shouldn’t be sore by the time the race rolls around and it’ll help by the next time you race.
If your race is on Sunday, there is not much left you can do for your fitness. The main thing is staying sharp. Maybe try 3 reps at goal 3200 pace. You could tempo, but regardless you would need to keep it controlled and almost easy. Maybe slightly slower than tempo effort. A sub 20 5k tempo if it's controlled would indicate that you can break 12 for sure. But whatever workout you do, you should keep it under control. Any hard workout a few days out from the race will do more harm than good. So, I would do something light like a tune-up. But my recommendation would be something like 3x800m at 3200 with 2-3 minute rest. A light tune-up track workout just to get the feel of race pace is best. Also, you want to keep the muscle tension in your legs so stay off softer surfaces in the few days leading up to your race. You want to keep the spring in your legs.
You get vo2 max benefits a lot quicker. Long term tempo or 800 might give you more aerobic benefit, but I’d probably limit the longer intervals. I’d maybe do a 2-4-6-8-6-4-2 ladder at pace 200 easy jog recovery. First 2-4-6 should feel super easy, last 8-6-4-2 should feel closer to race effort. All but the last 4/2 should be close to race speed. Last 4/2 can be a little quicker.
Otherwise, I’d probably do like 6-8x400 w/200 easy jog recovery. All at race pace but last 1 maybe a bit quicker.
Bingo
If this is your peak race, do something like 6x400m trying to hit goal 3200m race pace exactly each rep, and then 2-3 fast 200s after, plenty of rest.
1. You will gain next to zero fitness from that tempo by the time your race comes, aerobic supercompensation takes more than 3 days to set in. It can help in the mental fitness department but your perfect 3200m time will be the same as before you do the tempo.
2. You’ll be fine if you do it, shouldn’t be sore by the time the race rolls around and it’ll help by the next time you race.
This. From my experience it takes at least a week, sometimes 9-10 days to fully absorb the benefits from aerobic workouts. It's too late to gain fitness in the last week, all you can do to take off more time is sharpen up and get those legs rested to be fresh.
Unlike exams, you can't study last minute for a running race... the time to build fitness has already passed. The work's been done.
I don't understand. I always thought you gain fitness from the run/workout once you fully recover from it. And obviously 3 days is more than enough time to recover from a tempo. Can someone please explain this concept to me? Because everyone here is saying that the OP won't gain anything from doing a tempo 3 days out.
This post was edited 45 seconds after it was posted.
I don't understand. I always thought you gain fitness from the run/workout once you fully recover from it. And obviously 3 days is more than enough time to recover from a tempo. Can someone please explain this concept to me? Because everyone here is saying that the OP won't gain anything from doing a tempo 3 days out.
The recovery process of the aerobic system takes longer than your muscular system, and the current and probably accurate model of training physiology is that you do your workout and then this happens:
-You are sore/fatigued 1-3 days as muscle tissue and cardio respiratory system is damaged
-You return to baseline for a few days
-Your body supercompensates, meaning it makes your lungs/muscles/heart stronger in order to better handle that stimulus
That’s a pretty brief explanation, but if you look up aerobic/muscular supercompensation you’ll find plenty of graphs and articles written by actual physiologists/coaches
I coach a high school athlete (15:45/ 4:25 / 2:00 type) who ran a 4 mile cutdown starting slower than tempo and finishing the last mile at tempo three days before a race.. it was something like 6:00, 5:55, 5:45, 5:40. It was a “comfortably hard” effort, but not really tough. He could likely run another 2 miles at that pace. Three days later he ran a big PR in the mile, so I don’t think the moderate tempo hurt him.