Is it bad for college coach to insist our distance guys run 6:10-6:25/mile on a daily basis?

Ummm are you new to college. 6:10-6:25 is an aerobic pace for any 4:05 to 4:15 1500 guy. I am assuming that the guys on your college team can run that.

Yes, but I'm pretty sure elites don't even go that quick.

Matt Gerard wrote:

Is it bad for college coach to insist our distance guys run 6:10-6:25/mile on a daily basis? Should we listen to him?

Think about it this way: I know over a dozen men who have broken 13 minutes who normally run around 6:00 minutes a mile in general training.

What comes first? Running sub13 mins or being a pimply faced college kids with 14:50 to 15:30 5k PRs running 610-625 every single day?

Matt Gerard wrote:

Yes, but I'm pretty sure elites don't even go that quick.

you're very wrong then.

as a sub-4 miler in the 90s, i was running about 80 miles/week (25-30 were from morning runs mon-sat). other than maybe the first mile of most runs, i doubt i ever ran slower than 6 minute pace. my coach was an igloi disciple; your coach sounds like he's following jack daniels' prescription.

short answer: no, it is not bad, nor unreasonable, for your coach to insist on this, if you're at a decent program, and you're roughly a 15:30 5k runner...

Are you trying to say that wejo and JK training is BS when they say that the purpose of a run should be kept in mind?

And Didn't wejo tell us that this was why he sucked in college?

Matt Gerard wrote:

Are you trying to say that wejo and JK training is BS when they say that the purpose of a run should be kept in mind?

And Didn't wejo tell us that this was why he sucked in college?

The guy above you just told you his experience, which was better than Wejo's. Why do you seem so stubbornly against running 6minute pace? Why do you listen to Wejo and not the sub4 miler?

sorry to say, don't know the history of this site's founders.

two issues at hand here:

1) you asked if it is "bad"--to be honest, without the full picture of your training, i suppose i shouldn't have bothered to answer. of course under various circumstances it could be horrible, and under others, perfectly acceptable. that's why i included the word "unreasonable," and i was just trying to give you my perspective and what worked for me.

2) i could be wrong here, so feel free to correct me, but it sounds like the seeds of doubt in your coach have not only been planted, but have already taken root. if this is the case, and assuming you stay with the program, you really have two choices: 1) believe in your coach, and have a CHANCE (there are never guarantees) at success; or 2) don't believe, and probably be doomed to fail.

to be clear: i'm not saying blindly accept your coach's mandates; however--and this is coming from a lifelong skeptic--skepticism has little room in athletics when the gun goes off.

hope this helps, and good luck,

cush

YES and NO.

It depends upon:

#1. The purpose of the day's run.

#2. How your body feels THAT day and what the goal of the next day is.

It's good to have a GENERAL idea of what training pace you should be able to hit on an aerobic run; however, that doesn't mean on day X of your training schedule you are going to run exactly 6:10/15 for every mile. It just does NOT work like that. If the purpose of your run is to get in an aerobic effort BUT RECOVER, and during that day's run it's 45 mph winds...well then NO. You don't need to average 6:10 pace. Maybe you ran 6 X 1k the day before and your legs are trashed. Maybe you are racing a 8k in two days and you are not feeling rested 48 ours before and you want to be as recovered as possible. Is that 6:10/mile going to make you fitter in 48 hours? NO. It's going to make you tired. However, if the goal is simply to train through a meet or workouts until a much longer term goal is reached, then maybe you should run a bit harder that day and not stress.

There are a lot of "IFs". But the thing you need to make sure of is that you are always communicating with your coach and that you both have the same goals in mind and you are working together on them. Nothing good will come from butting heads. TALK to your coach about your concerns. If he/she is truly a good coach, he will listen and make changes when necessary. He/she should also be able to back up their reasoning for prescribed paces and workouts. It's good to question...just never doubt your training.

ditto (and probably put more clearly than my preceding post)...

Your question is also dependant on how many miles you are expected to run at this pace and how much intensity you are doing on the other days.

If you run this pace and can't recover for the following day, then you are either running too long, or too fast. One of those variables would need to change.

Hey Cush, it's always awesome to see great runners posting on here. Can you tell us a bit more about your training?

if you run 6:15-6:25 on recovery days long enough, couldn't you get 6:15-6:25 to be your comfortable recovery pace?

socalcush wrote:

sorry to say, don't know the history of this site's founders.

wejo = weldon johnson, 28:06 pr

the 411... wrote:

socalcush wrote:

sorry to say, don't know the history of this site's founders.

wejo = weldon johnson, 28:06 pr

He had a very brief career at that level. Ran a lot of miles after college, many of them slow, got pretty fast and then fairly quickly injuries slowed him down. Not sure I would use him as an example, unless of course he was consistenly running those times over the years or continually improving. Nothing against him, but I would rather look at the training of guys who had longer careers.

Haile G does some 9min pace runs

Looking back, I feel the reason I never ran that well in college was that I was running too hard. Many of my runs were in the 6:15-6:30 range, but my track sessions were WAY faster than any realistic race pace for me.

I feel like the too fast quality sessions were more a factor in me underachieving than the distance runs at 6:15-6:30 pace. After a track session, I would barely be able to climb the stairs in my appartment. I would put up great times in those workouts then run like crap on the weekend. However, after college, I ran a lot more miles on my own and did many of them at that same 6:15-6:30 pace. I did way less quality work, felt better on a daily basis.

Your coach may be on to something, so long as the intensity of your quality sessions is kept in check.

junk trunk wrote:

Haile G does some 9min pace runs

Source?