im in a bit of a tricky situation here i've made a pretty big jump in mileage running 80-100 miles a week and its been going great and I feel great and i think I'm getting alot out of it but my track coach is a high intensity low volume type of guy for example he will often have four high intensity speed workouts in a 5 day period and the only easy days are before a race. how should i approach this come track season
Bump. I am also increasing my mileage this summer but have a coach who has us do very little miles and a lot of workouts.
It can work, if you do it right. The easy days need to be very easy to recover. You also need to be used to the higher mileage before trying to incorporate high intensity workouts into your training. Generally, having more hard workouts than recovery is not looked upon favorably, but I'm sure it has worked for people before.
What events do you run during track season?
I would suggest doing the speed workouts at not quite 100%, more like 90%, if that is possible ( not sure how strict your coach is about meeting certain times during practice) 80-100 miles with so much speed work will probably burn you out, but you could still make sure to get at least one really long run in at some point at a slow pace. I think you should drop down a bit from 80-100 during track season and do the remaining miles very slowly to balance out the large quantity of speed work and maximize miles without getting hurt. Maybe do 60 miles instead of 90 miles.
After track season, you could switch back to a higher mileage, lower intensity for the summer and would have plenty of time to increase your mileage again for cross country season.
You could also talk to your coach regarding switching out one of the 4 speed work sessions for a longer, slower run. Tell him you have experimented with higher mileage, lower intensity, and that it works well for you. If you have other teammates who feel the same way, have them also say something about it to give additional credibility to workout changes. Depending on your coach's personality, if a few different people are politely suggesting something, he may modify the workouts a bit.
Good luck!