Tips on running fast without competition.

Actually, there are secrets to it and it isn't all about balls. Certainly, going out in 55.0 for the first 400m of an attempted 4:05 mile would be gutsy, but it probably wouldn't produce good results. Yes, of course the best racers have balls, but they are also smart. They think about how to run a race before coming to the starting line.

ashamed wrote:

milers left out wrote:

Does anyone have any tips for how to run a fast mile and 3000m without much competition in the race?

Jesus kid, this question speaks volumes...if you want to run fast, grow a pair of BALLS and run fast!

like there's a secret to it...

i wish i could have gotten my hands on you in a race 20 years ago.

jesus.

mr. milers left out,

how post-collegiate are you? i'm curious how hard/easy it's been for you to keep up running at that high of a level after college (probably without much support, i imagine).

and also - i find that going out conservatively in a low-competition race is still fine, if you're running a shorter distance race. most of the times the people you're competing against will go out hard and falter in the latter half of a race - if you are on pace, you will have targets for hopefully a fair bit of the race.

admittedly, 61ish pace is probably not going to be held by any low-key competition for very long. checking your splits every 200m seems like a good plan, or at least having someone shout them at you. i'm not a great judge of 'pace' per se, but i'm pretty aware of relative effort / how a race should feel at each point - for the distances i'm any good at.

in the mile, slightly relaxed the first 400 to avoid dying. second 400 should feel dead-on like the pace you 'should be going.' third 400 (where having people to pick off really helps) should be a slow building of muscle death, and the last one you just flail your way to the finish line as fast as possible.

with a decent sense of how much effort equates to even splitting and a watch, you should be able to gank a pretty good time. good luck.

(and i totally agree - anyone who steps on the line without any sort of forethought is going to get trashed. it does take balls to run solo..especially the mile..but balls won't cut it alone)

To answer your questions, I am 3 years out of college, and although it was difficult at first training and racing without a team's support, I am running a lot faster now--at road 5ks, 8ks, and 10ks--than I ever ran in college. However, since it's been a few years since I've done a mile on the track, my old PR's are no good as entry times for entering big competitions. I'm curious to see what I'll be able to do this winter/spring. Really I think that I have improved precisely because I have gotten smarter at both training and racing.