No Track. Where do I do my speedwork?

800 On Pure Hate wrote:

Even though I live in a city with more than 5 high schools and two colleges with tracks, none of the tracks are accessible.

Where am I supposed to do my speedwork?

What have you done in this situation?

What other options are there besides using a measuring wheel to measure out distances at a park or something?

Just go by time, e.g., 3 minutes hard, two minutes easy.

I know it has been touched on here before. But across the country we are paying taxes to schools (big bucks!) yet the nice new state of the art tracks are off limits and locked up. I understand schools concern for vandalism (because kids are idiots) but there has to be a middle ground.

Track expert wrote:

I know it has been touched on here before. But across the country we are paying taxes to schools (big bucks!) yet the nice new state of the art tracks are off limits and locked up. I understand schools concern for vandalism (because kids are idiots) but there has to be a middle ground.

Talk to the AD about scheduling open hours to the public. For ex, maybe 6am-9am or 6pm-8pm.

Drop the tax argument. It doesn't make sense. You pay taxes for the school. That doesn't mean you get to hang out at the school to take classes or pick up chicks.

To the OP, just go by time. Your body doesn't know the difference. 10-30 seconds for hard sprints. 1-2 minutes for mile or 5k effort.

Podunk middle school in my little town is getting a synthetic track to go around the new artificial turf football field. Nobody plays football there and nobody runs either. By podunk , I mean two classes per grade level in a rural area, no track team or even a track club. If they make one it might be 10 kids a few months a year.

Two U-12 soccer teams use it part of the year, because we only have two teams. There are perfectly good grass fields that were used in years past when there were many more kids playing in our leagues.

Treadmill is the best. I haven't been on a track in years.

Use hills. You don't need a specific distance, just time what feels like the distance you want once and run to that spot each time.

The only way to go... wrote:

Treadmill is the best. I haven't been on a track in years.

This. Most only go to 5:00 miles, which is plentry for me, right now. I suspect it wouldn't work for most on here for doing like 400 repeats but add a 6% grade to it and it would.

Get yourself a Timex Ironman watch.

Set the function to countdown to 60 seconds, repeating, with alarm/chime.

Head out for a run. Once you're warmed up, set off the watch, it'll give you one minute repeats with one minute recoveries.

Adjust to suit your needs.

What's wrong with straight flat road & GPS?

There MAY be some confusion on what speedwork means.

30 m with flying start --> GPS on roads???

You could measure the length with GPS and THEN do the speedwork?

Best option is to find an unused soccer field. Look in city parks and Rec league athletic complexes. Measure it with gps and do speed work there. 2nd best option is xc style workouts on a course or in a park.

Kvothe wrote:

Best option is to find an unused soccer field. Look in city parks and Rec league athletic complexes. Measure it with gps and do speed work there. 2nd best option is xc style workouts on a course or in a park.

This. The parks' paths around here are in open street map too, so it's easy to measure distances and run the workouts in loops. I do this all the time. 400 hard / 200 easy ... 1000 hard / 300 easy, any combination you need.

Also talk to schools to maybe get access to a track.

And read up on Igloi, for inspiration on workouts.

oxodk wrote:

Drop the tax argument. It doesn't make sense. You pay taxes for the school. That doesn't mean you get to hang out at the school to take classes or pick up chicks.

But it does mean that town residents typically have access to the indoor pool, gym, and weight room during assigned hours. And in our town the track and football field renovation required a tax override. Thus one of the conditions of the deal was open access when not used by high school athletes.

Try contacting the Athletic Director or the coach of the XC/Track team and see if you can work something out.

rkghfkxpdo wrote:

Try contacting the Athletic Director or the coach of the XC/Track team and see if you can work something out.

+1 our local tracks are locked up, but local running groups have worked out agreements to use the track for speedworkouts.

i live next to a prestigious private high school. the track is locked, but i jump the fence. security will come by, but when they see me running quarters at 5:30a they realize i'm there for a purpose and not to cause trouble and leave me alone.

rkghfkxpdo wrote:

Try contacting the Athletic Director or the coach of the XC/Track team and see if you can work something out.

800 On Pure Hate wrote:

Even though I live in a city with more than 5 high schools and two colleges with tracks, none of the tracks are accessible.

Where am I supposed to do my speedwork?

What have you done in this situation?

What other options are there besides using a measuring wheel to measure out distances at a park or something?

Kids today, I used to climb the fence at my local track (Larry rawson told me to, was my excuse).

Can you join a local club with access to one of those many tracks? Beg or plead with one of those college coaches to get a peak at their track once a week?

NO? OK, run on roads with less traffic. Try repeats of 3 - 4 phonepoles (300 meters), 8 - 10 repeats. Maybe two minutes between. Go out for a 6 - 7 mile run and stick these intervals into that run. MIx up the number of repeats and number of phonepoles at will. In the heat of the season, you can do this workout 3 times a week.

You'll run 10 minutes warm up before the first interval. Start slow and get to about 6 minute mile pace before the first interval. And, ease into the intervals, take it easy on the first repeat.

I used this type of workout to build to a 1500 indoor PR in a cold-ass Massachusetts winter during the 6 week semester break. Triple layers over the unit to keep it from freezing off.

And, I have a question. When you are running the 800 on pure hate, are you remembering to run relaxed???

If you mean actual speed work (like, top-end speed work), then do hill sprints and fast strides down a GENTLE decline (so it isn't jarring). Downhill work is underrated I think in terms of being able to really get things moving ("free speed", if you will).

If you mean like 1000m repeats kind of speed work, then just do it by time and do it wherever the hell you want.