Is it OK to do a 5k pace workout every week year round?

I am sure there is someone who can do it but most people last 12-16 weeks or so. Now what I am not sure is if you took every 3rd week off if you could do a year. Also wouldn’t want to bet on if 16mins of vo2max gets better results than 25 mins of work 10s slower. My guess is that the optimal is a mix.

note if you are like a 24min runner the math is a bit different. Same thing if you are running 20mpw.

Some runners can probably make that work, but I don't think it's the best way. You can probably do better with less work by changing things up a little more.

You can and should run a variety of paces year round. It's just a question of how much. For example, it's fine to do 800m pace work at any point in the year, but, until you're getting within 2-3 months of a peak race, it's usually a good idea to keep it to reps of 200m or under with sufficient rest that it doesn't become super anaerobic.

I was curious because I want to stay in good 5k/parkrun shape year round like other people I race against.

So 200s/shorter reps are the way to go?

Honestly that's sort of the recipe for a lot of run clubs. Sometimes you'll see less workout volume than a 6x800 or 5x1k for a club workout. Consistency/holidays/life can break it up. You'd get stale, or maybe even injured, if you did 6k-8k worth of 5k volume every single week. For a lot of runners, 3k-5k worth of "speed work" once a week is fine & better than no session. Could it be optimized? Sure. But it's probably ok. The mileage isn't going to be there to bring in some of the other injury risks.

You definitely need to rotate so you could do a two week cycle where your doing your 5k workout one Tuesday and the next Tuesday a mile pace work (eg 8x400). Thursday you could do cruise intervals one week and a tempo run the next. And a weekend long run if not racing.

Are you serious, just one ‘workout’ per week? Do you mean per day, instead?

I'm just finishing off an article on this very subject.

The crux of it is:

For long-term development, you either need to periodise your training or barring that, simply focus on intensities at or below the anaerobic threshold.

Continually doing workouts which involve a heavy Glycolytic contribution will ultimately hamper your aerobic development.

Remember, the metabolic demands of a 5k are ~95% aerobic. By doing a VO2 Max type workout every week, you're devoting a considerable amount of your overall training load to developing the 5% at the expense of the 95. While VO2 Max is a measure of aerobic capacity, training at it requires a large anaerobic contribution, and so you'll get all of the drawbacks such as the byproduct dump that delays recovery and the sabotaging of aerobic enzymes.

Use that precious training time more wisely, and spend it developing your aerobic system.

If you are running a 5k every month, you are probably getting enough 5k work. Do some strides and hill sprints to get used to running fast and a ton of threshhold running and you will be fine. Odds are you mileage is going to matter more than your workouts.

Yeah that the if you are running 25mpw you can do anything since you have so much recovery built in. Go google some of the 4x4 studies where they do it 3x/week and people survive cause that is all they do. Get closer to your limit and you need to be a lot more careful. I survived doing 2 5k/week for 10 weeks in HS cause I was young and doing 40mpw. Do that at 80 and I would have broken down…

Big Jim (Ryun) didn’t break down. Neither did Wes (Santee).

They also didn't run the 5k.

I think yes but it’s important to factor intensity in for periodization.

Could look like 10-12x400m @5k pace with 2:00 rest so it’s not stressing your vo2max too much during base phase, and turn into the more grueling 8x800m or 3-4x1600m off of less than 1/1 rest type work you’d do to prepare to race as you sharpen up.

No, its ineffective and a waste of your time.

Now that does not mean you cant do workouts that have 3-5k pace every week, but long hard repetitions should be started 8 weeks before your peak race and not be done year round.

Year round workouts where you run 3-5k pace would be:

Deek Quarters: 8x400m @5k with 200m float @ MP or Fartlek 1min on 1 min off.

I think Deeks Quarters are really great.

And they had decent cinder tracks to train on.

Can you site or provide links to this research? Are you referring to “The Norwegian Method 4x4min/3min rest”?

They literally claim it’s “the fountain of youth”. However, one of the issues I have with that method is how loosey-goosey they actually are in the specifics of their method.

If I’m not mistaken, they say to run for 4mins with the Heart Rate in the 85-95% range. Do they mean the Max Heart Rate or Average Heart Rate over that 4minutes?

Additionally, 85-95% is a huge window, in terms of workout intensity, covering sub-LT2 up through on to a big anaerobic stimulus.

If you are not aware, I’ll site a couple of videos describing the “The Norwegian Method 4x4min/3min rest” method.

Not sure who the idiot would s that downvoted this, because the Africans still have decent cinder tracks, at altitude, to train on.

Care to site your references regarding the “sabotaging of aerobic enzymes”?

In this video, the principal investigator, Jan Hoff, calls it “the fountain of youth”:

For sure, definitely not advocating for it. Didn't get the impression OP was running 80-100mpw. 1 workout/week is better than nothing for a lot of people. It's probable that not every week would squarely fit into VO2 if that ends up being the structure. If I'm OP I would still obviously cycle through different workouts & periodize training.