Taking one low-mileage recovery day a week. Mileage?

I personally find it easier to keep the lower mileage day and just add a mile to doubles here and there.

yeah I'd say its very important to actually recover on your recovery days. If you're doing 12 miles on your recovery day, and not recovering, you'll just grind youself into the ground.

Dont run to have the prettiest log book but, run to race well.

Just run slower and you won't need a short day.

When I was running 100 miles a week I would take a very easy day, 7 miles at most and usually 6.

Here is a sample of my weekly schedule:

Monday AM-6 miles

PM-12 miles

Tuesday PM-11 miles (Workout so miles varied)

Wednesday AM-6 miles

PM-13 miles

Thursday PM-11 miles (Workout so miles varied)

Friday PM-6 miles

Saturday AM-11 to 14 (Workout)

PM-6 miles

Sunday AM-17 miles

Total 100 miles (give or take due to workout)

That was my experiment with high mileage, and it worked out for the short term as I got in great shape, but then was injured for the good part of a year. I think that I personally run best when I am only running around 80 miles a week.

your body needs rest

How tired or wore-out do you feel? If, by the 7th day, you feel VERY fatigued you might stay with the 6 miler, or lower. If you feel OK run an easy 8 or 9.

Also, you can try alternating between 6 and 8, week to week. You don't have to run the same thing week in and week out. Play with it and figure it out.

If you think you need more time to recover, run an easy 10 one morning, then don't run again until a workout the following afternoon. This gives you 36 hours to rest, yet doesn't really hamper your training for the week. Example:

M - AM easy 5-6, PM tempo run (16-17 for the day)

T - AM easy 10 (long rest period between this run and Wednesday's workout), PM no run.

W - AM no run, PM intervals on the track (12 miles with WU and CD)

Th - AM easy 5-6, PM easy 10-12 (16)

F - AM easy 5-6, PM easy 10-12 (16)

S - long - 16-18

S - AM easy 10-12, PM easy 5-6 (16)

This type of rhythm gives you 100-105 miles for the week, two quality workouts, a long run, and a nice recovery period from Tuesday morning to Wednesday afternoon. It's worked really well for me.

trying to be safe wrote:

I'm currently running around 100mpw. In the past, I've always taken one low-mileage recovery day of 3-6 miles, but that was back when I was running 75mpw. Now that I'm running more though, I'm not sure if I should keep the low mileage recovery day at 3-6 miles or up it to 8 or so, since 8 would still only be slightly more than half of what I normally do. I know some guys don't even take low-mileage recovery days at all.

Thoughts? I've never run this much before so I'm interested in how others schedule their 100+ mile weeks. Thanks.

I almost always had a low mileage day when I was running 100+. I figured it was like running even higher mileage, because I'd average 16 or 17 a day for most of the week, but then do an easy 5 and 5 or just an easy 6-7 and that's it. It's a very good idea to keep a low mileage day if that's worked for you in the past.

I take one short day a week. And every 4th or 5th week is 15-30% shorter than the average of the preceding 3. It helps you get faster if you recover, even if 7 days a month or so you feel like you've barely done anything.

That's a pretty tough way to run 100 mpw, thisiswhatidid. You've got a lot of higher mileage days, which tend to wear you down more than when you mix in more doubles.

Here's a pretty standard week from a time when I was running 90-100 consistently and had no injury problems:

Monday AM: 7 miles

PM: 8 miles

Tuesday: AM: 7 miles

PM: 11 miles (workout)

Wednesday: AM: 5 miles

PM: 9 miles

Thursday: AM: 7 miles

PM: 8 miles

Friday: AM: 8 miles easy (recovery day)

Saturday: AM: 7 miles (workout. started too late so I cut it short)

PM: 7 miles (second workout since the first one went poorly)

Sunday: 15

This was fairly early on in my base. Later on I built up to doing longer main runs, but you've got to be careful because in my mind runs over 10 miles tend to wear on your body. I like Malmo's posts about having a 'magneto loop' and would do most of my morning runs that way.

I like to frontload as much as possible and then just have the runs get shorter as the week goes on and I get sicker and sicker of work

Su 18

M 14

T 13

W 13

Th 13

F 12

S 10

Saturday's run seems really short without needing to be