Just graduated a couple years ago and training primarily on my own. Pretty much hit around 55MPW on average last spring. Decent long run, a threshold once a week, and some repeats at 5K pace pretty much got me there. Should I increase mileage? Throw in more threshold? Just looking to see what others did that helped the most.
Id bump up to 65-70 mpw and maybe add a little more threshold volume. But hard to say regardless without seeing more of your training and workouts and getting your background.
OP, I agree with bumping up the mileage to 65-70 as going from 55 mpw to that might do it alone. I would add in one tempo or threshold workout a week perhaps. For example tue and thurs tempo or threshold workout and sat either hills or 5k pace work depending on what phase you are in. Keep the tempo or threshold workouts very controlled though split up into intervals if you can.
But regardless people usually a good bump in fitness going 55 -> 70 mpw once you start going above 70 to 80 and even 100 etc. there are some diminishing returns perhaps but the idea is to do as much volume and threshold as you can handle while still recovering fully.
The answer to this question is going to be the same until you're looking for the last 1% performance. As long as your body has room for growth, you simply need to run more easy volume and more tempo volume, and you'll get better. 65 mpw and upgrading your threshold volume by ~20% as well (like going from 5 miles to 6) without changing anything else will likely yield improvements. Keep doing that until you hit your goals and quit, or burn yourself out (then reduce by ~10% and focus on the little things).
Just graduated a couple years ago and training primarily on my own. Pretty much hit around 55MPW on average last spring. Decent long run, a threshold once a week, and some repeats at 5K pace pretty much got me there. Should I increase mileage? Throw in more threshold? Just looking to see what others did that helped the most.
The first question is 400m speed. If you’re at 56, or slower, it’s probably not going to happen.
OP, I agree with bumping up the mileage to 65-70 as going from 55 mpw to that might do it alone. I would add in one tempo or threshold workout a week perhaps. For example tue and thurs tempo or threshold workout and sat either hills or 5k pace work depending on what phase you are in. Keep the tempo or threshold workouts very controlled though split up into intervals if you can.
But regardless people usually a good bump in fitness going 55 -> 70 mpw once you start going above 70 to 80 and even 100 etc. there are some diminishing returns perhaps but the idea is to do as much volume and threshold as you can handle while still recovering fully.
Good post. I mostly agree, though I would go to 75-80 mpw. And I wouldn’t do both at the same time. I wouldn’t add an extra workout & increase mileage simultaneously. Get comfortable running 75-80 first.
The answer to this question is going to be the same until you're looking for the last 1% performance. As long as your body has room for growth, you simply need to run more easy volume and more tempo volume, and you'll get better. 65 mpw and upgrading your threshold volume by ~20% as well (like going from 5 miles to 6) without changing anything else will likely yield improvements. Keep doing that until you hit your goals and quit, or burn yourself out (then reduce by ~10% and focus on the little things).
This is good too. But I’d still get to 75-80 mpw. That’s key.
Appreciate the responses. Seems the best idea is to bump up the mileage and add a bit more threshold (but do it carefully). To the other poster, I can around 52 for 400. Also, I kind of already mentioned what my training was like in the initial post. But to add a bit more color...
55MPW, 1 threshold per week (tempo or 4-6 mile repeats at 10mile race pace), 12-15 mile LR uptempo a bit, and then a 5K workout each week for a few months during racing season (repeat K's at 3k/5K mostly). It worked fine, but I did get a bit burned out by end of season. I think I spent 4 months doing weekly VO2max workouts (just once a week). Oh, and I threw in some 200's here and there. Nothing much else.
Just graduated a couple years ago and training primarily on my own. Pretty much hit around 55MPW on average last spring. Decent long run, a threshold once a week, and some repeats at 5K pace pretty much got me there. Should I increase mileage? Throw in more threshold? Just looking to see what others did that helped the most.
I coach a 19-year-old who ran 14:00.23 in March (with PBs of 8:05 for 3k and 29:37 for 10k road) off an average of about 55–60 miles per week. The short answer is yes — more volume may help, but only if you can stay injury-free. When you say “throw in more threshold,” what exactly do you mean? In our program, we typically do: Tuesday: 400m reps with 30-second recoveries Thursday: Broken threshold efforts up to 10k Saturday: Hills or 1k repeats It’s a tough question to answer because so much depends on how you approach it. Good luck!
The only real answer is whatever allows you to do more work within the 90-110% of race pace zone. If more easy miles helps that, then more easy miles. If more threshold helps, then more threshold. If you need more speed work to handle the slower 5k pace speed, then do more speed work. Maybe you need more miles to handle more speed to handle more 5k pace. Everyone is different and this is why a (good) coach is necessary for continued progression at a high level (unless you learn from trial and error, but it's pretty hard to have continuous progression with trials and errors).
A couple years of sensibly bumping up mileage and threshold work should get you there. I would definitely try to add in another threshold day or make the uptempo portion of the long run a bit more intense and structured.
A couple ideas for a weekly structure:
Easy + some short turnover work (strides, flying 40s, short hill sprints, whatever)
25-35min of short threshold reps (400m-1000m)
Easy
30-50min of longer slower threshold reps (2k-5km)
Super short easy/cross-training/off
Some sort of short pace/efficiency work (could start with 200m hills early build, then transition to the track as you head toward the competitive season
Easy long run (gotta keep this fairly easy and not too long in this format)
Or maybe more similar to your current format
Easy + short turnover work
25-35 min of threshold reps
Easy
Hills/track work
Easy
Long w/ some sort of structured tempo (progression run, 3x5km, alternating threshold/float 1km's, etc)
Super short easy/cross-training/off
No definitive right or wrong answers when it comes to training specifics, really just whatever works for you to sustainably expand that aerobic workout over the next couple years.
Appreciate the responses. Seems the best idea is to bump up the mileage and add a bit more threshold (but do it carefully). To the other poster, I can around 52 for 400. Also, I kind of already mentioned what my training was like in the initial post. But to add a bit more color...
55MPW, 1 threshold per week (tempo or 4-6 mile repeats at 10mile race pace), 12-15 mile LR uptempo a bit, and then a 5K workout each week for a few months during racing season (repeat K's at 3k/5K mostly). It worked fine, but I did get a bit burned out by end of season. I think I spent 4 months doing weekly VO2max workouts (just once a week). Oh, and I threw in some 200's here and there. Nothing much else.
No, you should stay at same mileage as now. And to add I see you do some mistakes; 1) You should cut tempo and that 4-6 milereps at 10 mile race pace. It is just too fast to improve your threshold . Will just be counterproductive.Instead 1-2 weekly real threshold intervals ( close to half marathon pace) 2) You should run a 5 k pace ( skip the 3 k pace) workout almost every week but not 1000ms , enough with 400m- 600m reps .
And work a little on your top end sprint speed with strides and sometimes pure sprintday. With your 52 sec all out 400m sprint speed you should be able to run at least a 13:45 5000m ....but only if coached by a magician)) 🇸🇪🤠🇸🇪
Great responses on training, but you can also think about how you might plan races differently next season.
Not sure what your background is, but on the extreme end, if you've barely raced at all since college then just stringing together a few tries in a row with decent fields might get you most of the way to sub 14 even without changing training too much.
Regardless, it's worth doing the logistical work well in advance of your season to choose a peak race with a great field, presumably next spring/summer, then find 2-3 other 3k/5ks that you don't peak for, plus a 1500 (or a few if you think speed is a weakness) and even a 10k if you think endurance will be your weakness. Again depending on recent racing experience, but it can be worth choosing a deliberately sub-optimal race strategy for 1 or 2 of the 3k/5ks just to push yourself and learn from it (eg college coach made me go out too hard and fade in a scrub meet once, just so I'd stop being afraid of it and not be so sheepish at the beginning of races, which was embarrassing on the day but good for me overall)
Just graduated a couple years ago and training primarily on my own. Pretty much hit around 55MPW on average last spring. Decent long run, a threshold once a week, and some repeats at 5K pace pretty much got me there. Should I increase mileage? Throw in more threshold? Just looking to see what others did that helped the most.
Keep doing exactly what you're doing because it's working. Once you feel like you're stagnating consider changing something.
Add 5 mile to your week (so go from 55 to 60), stay there for a month or two or three to fully adapt, then add 5 more miles to your week, stay there for a month or two or three …. Repeat
Once at 60+ miles a week, the best way to do that is adding in 1-2 short second runs per week, until eventually running 13 times a week.
Once at 13 runs a week mileage increases will be to lengthen your runs a little.
Key will be to do this while preserving (not impacting) your two quality workouts and long run each week. That is why increases are kept small and plenty of time to fully adapt is given.
This is essentially what Frank Shorter advised and did.
You can keep this up until no longer seeing improvements or hitting the max amount of time/energy you are willing to put into your running.