Does doing strides every day do any good?

Super Dumb Cletus wrote:

I run 55-65 miles per week. I'd like to know how to get faster but running strides does not seem to help me.

What should I be doing? Is it possible that I am doing too many?

(I generally do 4 x 60 before and after every practice.)

Add some short hills like the Ethiopians~!

Up hill and down hill. Bounding ala A. Lydiard.

Strides are dumb. They're the most overrated training method ever. Completely ridiculous to think that they contribute to speed. Do a real speed session and quit wasting time.

Strides are only useful in mentally weak hobby joggers who have to "feel fast" to convince themselves they're fit. Strides are only mechanically useful at the end of a warm up routine before speed work, that's it.

HobsJog wrote:

Strides are dumb. They're the most overrated training method ever. Completely ridiculous to think that they contribute to speed. Do a real speed session and quit wasting time.

Strides are only useful in mentally weak hobby joggers who have to "feel fast" to convince themselves they're fit. Strides are only mechanically useful at the end of a warm up routine before speed work, that's it.

I disagree. Its not a stretch at all to assume that throwing in some fast running on a regular basis on easy days would make one more comfortable at faster paces, especially when this is done when the body is already a bit fatigued. I guess ou could say I have a bias because I had a lot of success and saw improvement when I used to do this more often. Perhaps they don't 'build' speed, but I see no reason to not do it.

Every hobby jogger I know hates/doesn't do strides

2 x week

A few before races

Nuff’

Simple strides done at moderate effort are not going to make you faster. They serve other purposes as other posters have stated.

The best way to become faster is to do short, fast sprint efforts on the track. I agree with a previous poster that doing a sprint workout like that once a week is enough for distance runners. Mixing in plyometric/agility exercises with your training regularly is also an excellent way to become faster and more economical as well.

Haile Gebresslie did strides 3x a week after his easy runs. That's about the most I would do them per week.

The reason not to do them is because there are literally a million extra things you could do to improve your running and there's a finite amount of time. Squats, core, hell you could probably hop on a bike and ride with that time and improve more than doing strides. As the op said, do a real speed session to improve speed. Strides could be argued to improve neuromuscular coordination but you're going to get enough of that between a speed session and your normal track session.

Anyway, I've never heard a single person say strides improved them as a runner. Mileage, doubles, intervals, tempos, racing - yes. Strides - not a single person.

if you can run strides at the same pace an elite runs 400m repeats, the casual observer won't know the difference. They don't understand how much harder it is to run a 56s 400 than a 14s 100.

So always do a few strides now and then just to show off.

Can you give some concrete examples of what might overload the neural pathways/system?

even Jay Johnson says rev the engine everday..... run fast everyday.

Not sure say 6 by 60m sprints with full recovery, even if everyday, will overload neural pathways.....