Goal: break 18:00 on a legit 5K course.
Outcome: not quite there yet.
Coming off a good result in my first HM (mid-1:25) last fall, I had about 5 months until my next chance to race. I live in the far north with long, dark winters with life-threatening temperatures, so nearly all the nearby races are held between May and October except for one 5K, and the training conditions are treacherous from November through March. When it's too icy or dark or cold to run outside safely, I do have access to an indoor track with sharp turns.
For this buildup, I wanted to experiment a bit, so I added a few new things:
o Full hill sprint - flat sprint progression for speed development
o Kettle bell weight workout with swings and squats
o More long tempos but fewer long runs
o And, to get better at hitting my target 5K pace when fatigued, I tried a specific endurance progression that combined tempo and 5K pace running. With 4 miles of total volume split into 2 x 2, 3 x 1.25, or 4 x 1, I would do the first part of each rep at tempo pace and then end at 5K pace, with more at 5K and less at tempo each week. The goal was to avoid the sharp transition from recovery to 5K pace, which is always difficult for me (I'm in my mid 40s), and so my HR would be closer to the target when I started the 5K segment.
Challenges:
o I can't run as many miles indoors, so my average weekly mileage from November to January was just over 40.
o It's tough to do 5K work on a weirdly shaped indoor track with sharp turns.
o I picked up a nasty cold in February so I had to cut out workouts and never got to the peak workouts I had planned (4 x mils at 5K pace).
o The course ended up having more ice on it than I expected, so I slid and stutter-stepped a couple dozen times and then had to get back on pace.
Possible reasons it didn't work:
o The course was icy.
o I got a cold.
o I'm getting old, and it's all downhill from here.
But I don't think so. Even if the ice cost me some time, my race plan was already coming undone in the first mile, and the footing was mostly good for that section. The truth is, my goal pace didn't feel comfortable, even though I've gone out faster in 5Ks before. I kept myself right at pace, but my HR was skyrocketing and I was straining.
What went well: I didn't blow up. When I had to back off my goal, it went from 5:50 to 6:10 for the second mile and then back to 6:00 for the third mile. And the kettle bells definitely helped with the lower back pain I had noticed during my HM.
Next time: I don't regret experimenting a bit with a buildup to a low-key race. I learned some useful things. But for the next buildup, I'm going to try a more traditional approach with more volume spent at 5K pace.