My quest for sub 1:50 in the 800m

For tempos how long wete them and how fast? Did you do tempo s in the spring and summer too?

In the fall could you share some example long rep workouts?

Did you do long run?

How many hard days did you have, whit what overal mileage?

pipedre wrote:

For tempos how long wete them and how fast? Did you do tempo s in the spring and summer too?

In the fall could you share some example long rep workouts?

Did you do long run?

How many hard days did you have, whit what overal mileage?

I felt i was just as fast when I was a 1:50-1:53 guy as when I was running 1:46-1:47. In college, I ran more 4x4s and open 400s and less 1500s.

So to answer your question I made my biggest improvements from the summer and fall Training but you cannot neglect doing speed work. You will not plateau or burn out. Burn out is when you try to train at a level too high than what you’re ready for. So say I’m suppose to do 200s at 800 race pace. Sure I could probably bang them out in 24/25s cuz that’s not all out effort, but I never was a 1:41/42 guy. So I stuck with 26s I just wanted to be super efficient at this pace and it feel easy and that came from doing the short sprints in the fall. Then... I could later do 300s and 400s at that pace and it not feel so hard, as anyone can run a 26 if they’re a decent sub 2 min guy but can they run 400s at 52, nope.

In the fall. Workouts looked like this..: 8x1k w/ 90 sec JOG rest... 4x Mile w/ 1 min standing rest. 30 min tempo w/ 6x150m after. I liked doing a big reverse ladder like 2 mile, 2400, 2k, 1600, 1200, 800, 400. I also would do a road 5k towards the end of the fall and shoot for a sub 15, I think my best was a 14:41. Then a week later I would do a 600TT and look for something sub 1:20 and I think my best there was a 1:17. Few years later that turned into a 1200 TT and my goal was sub 3:00 and I think a 2:55 Pb was me best.

In the summer I ran double runs of 5 miles 3x a week. I would do Fartleks twice a week, it was too hot for tempos I wanted to still feel fast and would rather save the real strength stuff for the fall to work the end of that spectrum since i knew on the flip side my coach would have me also doing fast speed development. Burning out is also working two different energy systems that relate too closely together. Like I would have never done raw speed development training and then 2 days later do an 800m speed endurance workouts that would have probably set me back a week or two and I would have felt like rubbish.

Long run was upwards to 14 milers in the fall. But early post college probably 11-12. I also would alternate weeks or having a progression at the end like last 4 miles would go from my LR pace of 7:00 down to 6:00-5:50,5:40,5:30. I did this but it never felt hard just that I was letting myself open up. There’s another thread about Clayton murphy and his Run pace, and I can attest as I wasn’t half the runner he is, that if I were running 6:10-6:00 pace unless I had previously done a hard session.. this pace was easy.

Thanks for all the cool information '1:46 pb'. Just like the sub 1:50 thread, it's cool to hear some of the stuff people did to get to where they were.

I can tell you that i'm someone that typically needs to go slow for easy runs. I can't sustain that low 6 pace for most of my runs like some other low to mid 1:50 800m guys can.

Week Ending in 1/4/20

Sunday Off

Monday 8x150m @ avg mid 19s. ~2.5-3min rest.

Tuesday 7.5 miles easy

Wednesday 8.2 miles easy

Thursday 3 miles @ 5:55 pace, 3min rest, 5x1k @ 3:22, 3:21, 3:19, 3:18, 3:18. 1min rest. Lifted after.

Friday 5 miles recovery

Saturday 7.2 miles easy with 6x10s pickups during the last 2 miles.

Mileage: 42 miles

Not a big week with the day off. Was out of town, lacking sleep, and hadn't taken a day off in a few weeks, so it worked out. I felt like trash on the 150s. Had someone to work out with for once which was nice. I'm guessing my legs just felt heavy from the long run saturday, day off sunday, and doing the workout 90min after waking up. Oh well, it was needed. I'll try to keep touching on 400m ish pace throughout the winter. May occasionally substitute for short hills, but that'll depend on the weather, road conditions etc. I actually felt quite good on the big aerobic workout. Those Ks felt like a jog. Fitness is slowly coming around.

No serious races for a few weeks. I'm doing an all-comers meet on the 12th that I've done the past few years as a glorified practice/fun. The track is a gymnasium surface (not allowed spikes) and the track is basically 75% in a small tunnel. It's trash for running fast times but it's the only available meet that weekend for me and since I've run it so often I have a good frame of reference. For example, two years ago I ran a 2:01 solo 800m there and followed that up with a 4:20, 1:23 mile/600m double 2 weeks later. I ran 2:06 and 55 flat last year and ran 4:26 2 weeks later.

Good week bro. Good placement for the 150s. But I would do them in the afternoon if possible when awake. Use the morning for a shakeout like 2-3 miles.

The workout was solid, but this close to track season i would have kept it at just the 1ks no need for the 3 miler, give yourself a lil more rest and go quicker. 6-8k w/ 90 sec rest and shoot for 5k pace, I would think you could go 15:30-16:00, so 3:10-3:15 per k would have been more suitable. I would do 8 with 90 and avg around 2:58-3:00, but one time down from altitude and did the same workout with only 60 seconds rest and crushed 2:56-58 and like you said felt like a jog. Transition your workouts every 4 weeks and make them progress to race pace efforts. The real test of endurance for an 800m is by far a cutdown session like I mentioned before. The 5-6x800 with 2:30 rest. I coached a guy who ran 3:50 for 1500 last year he did 2:20/18/16/15/13/10. Try this before outdoor season starts!

I think the purpose of his aerobic workout was to work on LT, so doing it at 5k pace and more rest isn’t really gonna do the same thing for him.

OP - I feel like the thing you’ve been missing the past couple years is mileage, which I’m sure you know, so how come you aren’t building back up? I feel like that’s how you got there in the first place and right now you’re sorta just maintaining fitness. Anyways, I enjoy reading this, so keep up the good work!

NWA runner, i am well aware that is LT work, I specifically said at this time of the year it’s a little late for that kind of work. If he were a 5k/10k guys sure. But he will get more out of the 5k work. Besides, LT could be a secondary workout if he wants it n his week but that should come earlier in the week like a Tuesday with his primary(faster) session on Friday.

NWA runner I ran a lot more mileage when I was in school mostly because I had time to double and whatnot. I’m working 12 hour shifts/have a weird schedule so it’s tough for me to double most days of the week without sacrificing sleep. I would prefer to have my mileage a little higher, at least mid to high 50s for a while. Probably a little late to try to get back to my old 70mpw ways.

1:46pb I’m not really planning on having a killer indoor season, and have always found I get a lot of benefit from tempos and higher volume quality aerobic work. The Ks were meant to be at CV pace (~10k). I do plan on working in 3k-5k pace starting this week.

Funny that you mention 5-6x800m cut downs because my senior year maybe half way through outdoor we did 800s with equal rest and I ran 2:22, 2:18, 2:14. Us 800 guys then did 200s and the milers did a few more 800s. But I felt GREAT. It’s the one time I wish I would have stayed with the milers and done the 800s because I was just floating along. Hopefully I can get back to that

You did t do threshold type stuff in season? Just a race specific session and a cutdown from 5k pace?

You mentioned you did fartleks in the summer could you give examples?

Also how many workout days did you have in the fall and in the summer, 2 workouts plus a long run?

And lastly how fast 400m speed did you have, and what kind of mile type produced this training?

thanks

pipedre wrote:

You didn’t do threshold type stuff in season? Just a race specific session and a cutdown from 5k pace?

You mentioned you did fartleks in the summer could you give examples?

Also how many workout days did you have in the fall and in the summer, 2 workouts plus a long run?

And lastly how fast 400m speed did you have, and what kind of mile type produced this training?

thanks

Yes early fall I did lots of threshold or CV as it’s called now. Paces don’t Have to be super specific because for one my fitness from cycle to cycle would change so my training paces always had a range so things blended smoothly. I always found myself progressing during workouts naturally but coach just stressed that LT/CV has a feel that you don’t want to change that feeling meaning don’t go too hard just go off feel.

Speed development early in the week, threshold towards the end of the week. I also did some short tempo intervals in the early cycles something like 300s or 400s with 30 seconds rest at like 3k pace, this was pretty easy. Summer was more easy mileage but less total volume and heaps of striders or hills. I would run 40-50 miles per week in the summers and upwards of 60-65 in the fall. This was post college, in college I never went over 50. To me, speed determines the range of potential. If you can only run a 50 second 400 you’re kinda limited in what your range of potential can be. You can run sub 1:50 for sure with a 50 second pb, but you’ll also need to be pretty good over 1500m.

I was at my peak a 47 mid guy in the open 400, did run a lil faster on a relay but don’t really count that. Didn’t race mile too often but ran 4:04 but did run more 1500s and had a 3:41 Pb. IMO never ran too well over 1500 when trying to be aggressive. My Pb came from a string of 60s and last 400 well under 60 I believe a 55 or 56, soemthing of that sort. But that mostly came from a fast last 250. If your goal is a fast 800, don’t do too many things that traditional distance runners do, you have to balance your training with speed, power, hip/elastic strength(plyos, jumps, hurdles). Spend more time doing those things than jus plodding away mile, it really becomes a vast diminishing return.

Summer Fartleks: I ran the based on minutes at a perceived effort. Maybe like 20 minutes of total hard effort and instead of like during the season where training transitions from slow to fast I went from fast to slow to transition to the fall. 20x 1 min on 1 min off —-> on to 10x 2 on 1 off is an example of that progression. I would top out around 30 min of work by end of summer. Very simple stuff

For the workout, I was just saying to 1:46 you intended it to be LT/Tempo work which is why you'd have that 3 miler. As for your mileage, that makes a lot of sense, sometimes I forget not everyone is in college / has a lot of time to train.

Also, isn't it a little strange that your other thread got deleted?

NWARunner wrote:

Also, isn't it a little strange that your other thread got deleted?

Which thread?

1:46Pb wrote:

If your goal is a fast 800, don’t do too many things that traditional distance runners do, you have to balance your training with speed, power, hip/elastic strength(plyos, jumps, hurdles).

What did you do or recommend for elastic strength?

I had different strength plans throughout my running career. I found what worked best for me was a mix of Olympic lifts focusing on moving the bar fast, different series of box jumps and depth jumps, and core/hip stability exercises. I remember when I got stronger and proficient in the weight room i got a lot better at sprinting and was more durable in a sense my body wouldn’t break down as much from hard Interval sessions. First you want to learn the movement patterns of a proper squat, deadlift etc. once you’ve achieved that you want to get stronger first before you achieve moving the bar fast. I got up to 325 on back squat, 245 on front squat, 425 on deadlift, and 235 on bench press, tho bench press is kinda irrelevant in hindsight. Then moving the bar on back squat @255 which was 100 lbs over my race weight, was easy enough so that i could move it fast. Same with the other exercises.

But man lots of plyos, bounding drills, split squats, lunge jumps. I would so much of this during the summer that I didn’t have to worry about running too fast for my Fartleks because my legs were always so sore. The short sprints in conjunction also contributed to the speed gains.

thank you!

Im gonna jump in to this thread as well

Some workouts from the last 3 weeks

8k tempo first 7 at 3,40-30 pace last km in 2,53 full rec 2*150 250 walk in 17,6 and 17,5 in trainers outside

4*400 min rest 5min rest 9*200 75 rest at 62-1 and 30-28-26 *3 last one at 23,9

3*800 min and half rest 5 min 5*400 min rest 2.19-2.14.-2,08 and 64-63-62-61-58

600-500-300 with 8min at 1.34 -65.8- 38,7

10*400 200jog in 75s 67 down to 63 last one 30+26 in trainers

Firt indoor eight in two weeks

Want to run 1:47 in 2years , pb is 1:49 high /49,5/3,50 low fifteen and 8:30 3 k

Plan for the upcoming spring is like this

6*1k with 400jog at 2,5 ish min first 5 in 3 min low 2,5x high last one at or under 2,50

10*400 with 200jog and 3-6*200 jog across fild in 68down to 60 prob averaging 66-5 and 200s at 32-28/9 and 27/6

And lastly 7,5k progression tempo from 6min pace down to 5.25 last 1,25km at or under 3 min km pace and after full rec 2*20sec hill sprints

Other days 7km jog at 8-10min pace

The hard workouts before race season are 600-500-300 with 8mim at mile faster than eight and all out

Other is 5*600 200jog in 1,45ish 15 min and 3*300 m with 40s rst under 40 ave

Some 400 and 200 like 3*400 min rst at 60s and 9-12*200 jog across rest at 30-28-26*3-4 last one all out

1:46 pb do you got any advices? I dont do gym or plyos , tried them and they didint help

Some of these workouts are decent, but seems like you start out too slow then progress to decent splits right at the end so they can’t be too challenging for you. 800m training needs to have specific rest periods so that way you can measure it and progress over time. Jog recovery is fine if you’re still timing it and not going past a certain time limit. Let’s say you’re doing 12x 400 @ 60 seconds. You may struggle to do all 12 w/ 60 seconds rest. So do them in groups. 4x3x400 w/ 60 seconds rest but 2-3 min rest between sets. As get stronger challenge yourself to do the same workout in less sets: 3x4x400...2x6x400.... etc