Slow + High Mileage = Success?

I think you should start sentences with a capital letter.

Sounds like it'd be worth a try. If it doesn't work is he much worse off? I've known a number of folks who've made huge improvements after a year or so of steady higher mileage, and some who haven't.

You'll never know unless you try though.

Yes, this is a great idea. You look at many great runners, and they attribute their success of going from mediocre to great to consistent high mileage (making sure to take easy days very easy, and then really hitting a couple hard workouts a week).

This is the road to success.

See this interview from Lisa Koll (w/ sample training week included) for a great example of this:

http://www.eliterunning.com/2010/03/interview-with-iowa-states-lisa-koll/

Well he can train through, but he might as well do some races to get some experience and to develop the higher end aerobic stuff. A lot of slow stuff is good, but in my experience you need to have some variety of paces and longer tempo workouts to reap all the benefits from it.

Azz wrote:

I think you should start sentences with a capital letter.

I read recently how important the use of capital letters is for clarity in writing. They make the difference between a sentence like, "I helped my Uncle Jack off a horse," and "I helped my uncle jack off a horse."

Just another helpful language hint from your OldXCguy!

I did this exact thing a few years ago in college.

PR was exactly 16:30 for 5k and 9:45 for 2 miles coming into freshman year of college. I spent freshman/sophomore year doing 90 to 100 miles every week focusing on doing well in my tempo runs.

Ended up becoming the best runner of my division 1 team by my junior year earning all conference, all east, all region awards.

Ran low 14 minutes for 5k and 30:XX for 10k on the XC course.

Unless you are already on the national stage in high school you will need to spend the first two years raising and building mileage.

This is an honest post and a true story. This worked for me.

The hardest part is not really putting in the work, but was listening to teammates like tell me it wasn't going to work or I'd get injured.

It was comical to see many of my teammates 'get serious' their junior and senior years when they had blown the first two years of their college running experience logging low mileage and drinking.

Also, it is necessary to do lots of tempo runs, not just slow mileage.

During the season I would do a workout, and a tempo run. My long run would also include the last few miles at tempo pace.

During the winter and summer months, I would do 3 tempo runs a week.

Ogamiitto, thanks for sharing. It's great to see success stories on here.

Just give him this short quiz:

1) Which of the following runners averaged 100 miles/week to run their personal best marks?

A Rupp

B Moorcroft

C Auoita

D Wholhuter

E Marsh

F Bannister

G none of the above

2) The last American distance runner to win a gold medal in international championship athletics ran closer to

A 0 miles/week

B 55 miles/week

C 110 miles/week

D 165 miles/week

3) Congratulations you have qualified for the US Olympic team in a long distance track event. At the Olympics you manage to run stride for stride with the best Ethiopian and Kenyan runners in your final. It seems you are peaking perfectly. The bell sounds to indicate just one lap to go. About how fast will you need to kick to win a gold medal?

A 400m at world record 5000m pace

B 400m at world record 3000m pace

C 400m at world record 2000m pace

D 400m at world record 1000m pace

Why would you want to "jack" off a horse?

Oh, sorry. Lost my train of thought.

Ed Whitlock runs a great many slow miles and he is the best in the world in his age group.

Also read "Long Slow Distance" by Joe Henderson. Written in the late 1960's but still pertinent. You can find ti at Joe's website.

So, let's see, you picked maybe the only 6 exceptions with low mileage?

And how many world records were set by needing to outkick someone the last 400? (3000 - nope, 2 mile - nope, 5000 - nope, 10000 - nope, half marathon - nope, marathon - heck nope). If I'm wrong here, please link me to the video. This is of course in a race where the last lap isn't a significant portion of the race distance.

hey thanks for the input!

I am still weary about his decision to train through seasons, it is going to be tough to train through seasons and run slower times during fresh/soph seasons rather than dropping the mileage and running better early on. especially if traveling spots are on the line

How many miles a week does Anton Krupicka run? Do you think that he can break 26:00 for 8K?

u dont lose any speed by running "high" mileage. Its not an either you can run fast and improve now or run high mileage and improve later on thing. To see consistent marked improvement, you have to do both.

Sir, thank you for sharing this. Allow me to say it for you:

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