800-Mile Workout Quality over Quantity

Decent PR's, but I'm thinking a 800-mile workout probably burn you out more than anything!

My current college coach coached a runner in high school who made it to Foot Lockers on 35 miles per week. You can count that as an example if you so wish.

U of T.A. in Chad studied Cheetahs.

This study clocked, timed and observed 14 cats over a 3 year period.

Cheetahs who lived and hunted in very active zones - active prey, were found to be on the move more and tended to jog, trounce, run, canter and walk around their territory 2, 3 and 4 x as much as Cheetahs who were in zones that had herd traffic, migratory and random, but less active of an environment.

They moved at one speed or another up to 200 miles per week.

The docile Cheetahs moved around an average 80 miles per week.

The result?

The top speed of mature males for 25 metres averaged 62.3 miles per hour for the non 'active' Cheetahs, before they had to slow down and recover.

Whereas the constantly moving, more active cheetah's top speed was 63.7 miles per hour and they could sustain this top speed for nearly 60 metres, 2.5 times as long AND required 13% less time to recover, before displaying a willingess to hunt again.

This is the Lydiard system at work.

Good luck with that.

Regards,

Wetcoast,

Cultist.

viciouscycle,

I had similar PR's for awhile during college but once i increased the mileage my mile, 5k, 10k all dropped....

Wetcoast wrote:

Wetcoast,

Cultist.

Call IQ100 = Skuj lately?

Westcoast, that's a very interesting study, do you have a link to or better citation for this study? I am searching google scholar but haven't come up with anything yet.

the cheetah study is ridiculous. if a cheetah cant catch its prey in 1', it gives up.

the animal with the best stamina is the sloth or slug. these creatures go top speed all day.

as for the OP, on your work schedule you should be able to get in enough miles to run a good 800m or 1500m. Bannister broke 4' on less than 20/week. And I can assure you that low 150's 800m are doable on as little as 10 miles/week.

cruising speed on tempo runs is not as important as you might think for races 6' duration or less, and tempo runs are not the only option for improving your over distance cruising speed. a far better predictor of 1500m performance is vV02 (which shouldn't be a big surprise) and your basic 400m speed. the best milers run a mile just a bit faster than 5x their 400m best.

my advise would be to set a meaningful goal, like 3:52 1500 and worry less about the details.

here's a decent schedule 2 hard days, 2 medium days, 2 light days

S 6 miles fartlek somewhat hard

M rest

T 1x 1000m, 1 x 500m hard w/ 5-7' or 5-7x400m w/ 400m walk

W light 3-5 miles

Th 10-12x400m somewhat hard to hard on 2:30

F 4 miles light

S 1x 700m test medium hard

How many miles do I need as a master to go under two mintues indoors? My 400 time this year is 56.67 in a workout.