why can't I break 60 in the 400?

The problem you are NOT doing speed work.

Step 1: build up so you can run 15X100 @14

Step 2: build up to 15X20 @29

Step 3: build up to 10@300 @45

Repeat Step 1 @13, Step 2 @28, Step3 @44.

If you can't do this, then maybe you may never break 60.

But something tells me you are a troll.

You were born slow. Deal with it. I have very similar times, and also never broke 60. But I'm not puzzled by it. I know that everybody has a mixture of fast- and slow-twitch fibers, and my distribution is almost exclusively slow-twitch. You are likely in the same boat.

Take advice from someone who is / has been there:

Slopenguinrunner is half-right with that sentence. Your short-distance speed is close to being maxed out.

Slopenguinrunner has no idea what he is talking about here. His advice is true for the majority of pretty-good-for-a-high-schooler runners. However, a pure slow-twitch guy is someone he almost never sees because of selection bias -- pure slow-twitch guys rarely go out for track & field or other running-based sports, because they already know they will get beaten miserably is short-burst stuff, which is what almost all sports thrive on. Furthermore, even if a purely slow-twitch guy shows up in track & field, it will take so long for him to develop anything close to approaching the speeds of his teammates that he'll be out of high school by the time he gets there. So Slopenguinrunner has no idea what he is talking about here because he's never dealt with it. For reference, my 800m PR is 4 seconds total slower than 2x my 400m PR, not 10-14 like Slopenguinrunner is expecting.

This is excellent advice. As an almost exclusively slow-twitch guy, large numbers of max. or near-max. reps will kill you. So 3-5 really is right on. I can usually handle 4 of these with 5 minutes rest before I get a headache and pass out.

Everyone who said to the you, the OP, that you're not really doing speed workouts, is correct.

Lastly, everyone who said you should get into the weightroom, is also correct. This will help a bit, maybe 1-2 seconds per 400, but like I said earlier, you're very close to max. for 400m already.

This does seem like a matter of being born slow. Or you are a troll.

I'd also like to know your age. Go ahead a tell us! Did I miss it?

I was a bit faster over the mile at 17, and ran 55 off of my miler training. I thought that was pretty slow!

what you need to do is stop running with your lap top in lane 8 while telling anyone who's there what a badass you are. Then I see a 57 no issue, maybe even a 56.

randomxcguy wrote:

So I can run a 4:41 mile and a 2:09 800 as well as a 9:53 for the 2 mile and a 16:31 hilly course 5k. Wtf is going on?? I do speed workouts like 20x400 at 73 sec and 5x1200 at 4 mins. What gives??

if he's run a 2:09 that means at absolute minimum hes run 64.5 back to back where its much more likely he opened in ~63(maybe faster) and came back in 66

which would mean he would only have to run ~3 seconds faster than his opening 400 for his 800 pr to break 60... I highly doubt that he can't do that. Unless hes some how running at essentially his max speed the entire first 400 and then has the aerobic ability to come back for the 2nd half of the 800.

Also youre not doing speedwork thats just normal workouts.

I'm 21, and I've never trained before in my life, until running XC in college. Just always ran for fun. All my times are almost exactly OP's, with a half of 1:23:33. Honestly, should I just quit track and XC and focus entirely on the marathon?

randomxcguy wrote:

So I can run a 4:41 mile and a 2:09 800 as well as a 9:53 for the 2 mile and a 16:31 hilly course 5k. Wtf is going on?? I do speed workouts like 20x400 at 73 sec and 5x1200 at 4 mins. What gives??

It looks like you are going to be more competitive as the distance goes up. Eventually, as your fitness improves, so will your speed. However, then you will be complaining that you can't break 55 with a 4:20 mile.

1:23:33 for a half and your 21????.....Stick to the shorter stuff, short stuff....

If and ONLY if the following is true, then you=>60

A) You are able to complete 8x200 in under 29 seconds with only 50 second recovery or 200m jog between

Lack of steroids

randomxcguy wrote:

So I can run a 4:41 mile and a 2:09 800 as well as a 9:53 for the 2 mile and a 16:31 hilly course 5k. Wtf is going on?? I do speed workouts like 20x400 at 73 sec and 5x1200 at 4 mins. What gives??

I promise you with those PR's although your 800 blows, you could easily break 60 with a baton in your hand. Everyone has a story about some 4 x 400 the coach throw together at the at the end of meet and how everyone split 2 or 3 seconds fast than their previous best. I say you would be a 57.8r type guy

JakeStateFarm, I've had all kinds of experiences from being a fairly competitive runner to quitting to starting up again and making all the mistakes you can name like going at it with an approach that was way too aggressive rather than gradual and so on and so forth...

At the current moment, I've been doing things in a very gradual manner, watching how I eat and sleep and feel better and more fit than I did 2 years ago. At my age now I know I'm past my prime so I wouldn't bother going all out competitive but I still want to prepare myself for the 800m for the joy of running and to stay healthy and fit. I don't believe in the old: "Oh, am I good enough to try it?". Fact is, if you quit completely, you might start again years from now wanting to be fit like you are today and wondering why in the world you quit.

randomxcguy wrote:

So I can run a 4:41 mile and a 2:09 800 as well as a 9:53 for the 2 mile and a 16:31 hilly course 5k. Wtf is going on?? I do speed workouts like 20x400 at 73 sec and 5x1200 at 4 mins. What gives??

Funny, we are the opposite. I do 56 / 2:06 / 4:41 / 16:50 :)

Your lack of natural talent for speed is as egregious as my aerobic development. We can both improve, though. But you probably have serious limits if you can't go sub-60.

This is not a troll post. Thanks for all the answers I didn't realize my workouts weren't speed workouts.

Also the 800 was truly balls to the wall and I ran really hard. Not sure what the splits were. My second best is 2:12

genetics, man wrote:

For reference, my 800m PR is 4 seconds total slower than 2x my 400m PR, not 10-14 like Slopenguinrunner is expecting.

What are you trying to "reference"?

A guy without the mental strength to actually run HARD?

redirect wrote:

Funny, we are the opposite. I do 56 / 2:06 / 4:41 / 16:50 :)

Your lack of natural talent for speed is as egregious as my aerobic development. We can both improve, though. But you probably have serious limits if you can't go sub-60.

Sorry, I meant limits at mid-d. You could be the next Ritz with that strength, though!

The reason you can't break 60 in the 400m is because you're genetically slow. My times in the 800m/1600m are about the same as yours and my lifetime PB in the 400m is 59.x. I also probably know more about training for speed than anyone on the planet. The fact is that speed is nearly 100% genetic and if you aren't born fast, you will never be fast.

As usual, no-one has actually recommended anything that has any chance of improving this guy's (assuming not troll) actual speed. No matter how slow-twitch you think you are, if you want to maximise speed, you must train it specifically.

That means learning to sprint, or, at least, go as fast as you can over up to 7-8 seconds (alactic), with full rest in between efforts. Only when you have optimised that skill, and done all the other cool stuff like movement screening, body weight exercise and circuits, form improvement, etc, is there any point doing (increasingly lactic) reps that go any longer.

Go to a coach competent in sprints, and tell him you want to develop that aspect of your running as much as possible.