More adults should train like sprinters

Yeah, I feel sorry for the trudgers. My wife and I (mid to late 50s) do plyos and short speed every Saturday. There's a need for fitness and work capacity also, but I think it's important to try to stay springy.

As someone who has run up to 140 mpw consistently in the past (now not training seriously), I honestly don't feel "better" going for 2-3 mile jogs, they usually make me tired and cranky. Doing short hill workouts or 15-30 min w/ lots of strides in the middle actually gives me energy and makes me feel better the next day.

Forgot to add to also do plyometric as well. Of course

I know a 73 year old who does the same training as Simone Biles and he can do 27 for 5K.

You do plyos in your 50s? Not sure I would recommend that.

Sprints and interval training to get the heart rate up, sure.

I do them in my 60s and love them.

For the record I was just completely making that up.

I was a decent high school marathoner, now in my 60s I train like a 400 guy, including hurdles. Mentally refreshing yet still challenging to top my times on a regular basis.

Mostly "training like a sprinter" just means spending a ton of time in the weight room, which a lot of adults already do.

If you're just talking about the track work part, an entire track workout for a sprinter might be something like a handful of 30m sprints all out with full recovery. You aren't going to get anything out of a workout like this unless you already have the strength and sprint mechanics to really hit each one all out. Your average fitness runner is just going to accelerate to 5 minute mile pace over 30m and finish the whole workout feeling like they've just done a few light striders. It's just harder to do this kind of training on a casual basis.

Your idea wold be better applied to mid-d training than sprint training. The average fitness jogger could definitely benefit from doing som 800m type workouts like 200m/400m repeats at various paces/efforts.

Bro, we do. That’s the only way we run. HIIT 4 life, bro!

People in their 50s and 60s doing plyos - what does a typical plyo workout look like?

60 yr old Superman:

I disagree with a lot of this. I do "sprinter" workouts and sometimes do them with people who weren't athletes like me.

A few minutes of dynamic stretching/warm up drills.

10–15 minutes of running drills/plyos. Basically doing 10s of intense work every minute, on the minute. If someone's advanced/skilled/trained they can do A-skips and fancy stuff. If they're not, I'll have them stick to high knees and high knee buttkicks and pogo hops, easier movements. Basically a knock off of feed the cats.

3–5xshort hill sprints, like 5–8s w/ 1–2 min rest. Then a few 100s or soccer field strides.

Sometimes we'll finish with some core or some strength, simple stuff like walking lunges or bodyweight squats.

I've done this with pretty "regular" people.

On the weightroom side of things, it's just getting in 2–3xweek for 45–60 min. Something explosive, something heavy, then a few accessories.

Ride a bike or go hiking or jogging once or twice a week on top of this and you're all around very fit for a normal person.

Plyos don't become dangerous solely because you get older. They become dangerous because most people don't do them in any capacity.

That said, any exercise becomes more risky the older you get, but you can't limit it to just plyos. I've met a lot of older "joggers" with borderline ruined bodies from too many easy miles and never any strength. Most of the masters sprinters I've run with were pretty spry.

I'll describe a bit of what we do, but it's constantly evolving.

We bike to the local highschool which has a nice turf field that isn't occupied on Sat mornings.

The plyos are an extension of a dynamic warmup that we do before doing a bunch of 10m falling starts, 20m flys, and 40-80m reps.

The dynamic warmup is typical high knee skips, bunny and single foot hops, scoops, zigzag speed ladder. Then single leg RDL for balance and mobility, followed by a second set where you jump at the top of each rep.

Move over to the bleacher which has a flight of 6 steps. Two feet together, light hops, one step at a time for a few passes, then two steps, then three. Then hopping up the steps on one foot, followed by two steps at a time on one foot.

Then go down an aisle of the bleachers. Step through the seat launching up, with opposite arm action. A couple passes in each direction.

Then onto the turf. Do a deep lunge and explode into a broad jump landing feet together. Do several reps each side.

Then squat to the bench and burst up for height, and then for distance.

Optional bounding.

Then a few build up runs of 60m before doing the speed work.

Older people have tighter posteriors, usually. It is easy to pull something with any strain.

MP intervals is a way I’ve kept easy work stimulating.

Not the 60 yr old adult, I can feel things pulling and ripping just thinking about doing it.

No, just run baby !