My slowness is limiting my times

You say that you have no added weight, but at 160 for 5'9" you would need to be really muscular to not have body fat to lose. I'm roughly 5'9" and I feel incredibly sluggish when I'm at 160, I really need to dip to 140 before I feel like I have good speed.

Let me guess - you're probably 60 lbs. heavier than her. Her strength to weight ratio is much higher than yours. You probably have more total strength/explosiveness than her but with that much extra weight, it's meaningless. You're heavy. You need to lose weight. Cut down on drinking. Eat better.

HGfgh wrote:

JazzHandz wrote:

I had similar times for my first year of track, but after I stared doing XC I saw my times drop immensely.

XC? How does this improve speed?

Yeah. How does running all the time improve your running speed? What stupid logic we have. And all those circuits and core work and hills and strides. How will getting stronger and running all the time make you run faster?

Are you looking at improving your speed for the longer distances or shorter ones? The times you gave are all shorter distance events and they don't always translate well to longer events.

Most sprinters are absolutely jacked in comparison to distance runners. The body type is completely different. Not sure what you're trying to get out of the picture you posted.

A lot of imposters here. I'm a 46 year old woman. Ran the 200 freshman year in high school but quit for other interests. My daughter runs for a well known d1 and told me to post here.

Letsrun Dating Service wrote:

Are you looking at improving your speed for the longer distances or shorter ones? The times you gave are all shorter distance events and they don't always translate well to longer events.

Most sprinters are absolutely jacked in comparison to distance runners. The body type is completely different. Not sure what you're trying to get out of the picture you posted.

I’m looking to improve my long distance running times for 5k and 10k. I now run 5k in around 20 minuets and 10k around 42 minuets. However if I cannot run 400m in less than 72 minutes, how far could I go down in times for 5k and 10k? Not much obviously. So what’s limiting me is obviously speed. 160 on 5’9 is not heavy. It’s heavy compared with elite runners, but not with many semi amateur runners who can run sub 5 minuets mile (and I cannot even get close to that).

By the way Feyisa Lilesa is 5’9 150 pounds. So 160 is not that extra weight. And this logic of too much muscles weight is limiting only long distance times- not sprints.

Most sprinters around 5’9 (my height) are about 165-170 pounds. That’s 10-5 pounds more than me. So 140-150 on 5’9 would be very skinny even unhealthy underweight.

mikemike wrote:

You say that you have no added weight, but at 160 for 5'9" you would need to be really muscular to not have body fat to lose. I'm roughly 5'9" and I feel incredibly sluggish when I'm at 160, I really need to dip to 140 before I feel like I have good speed.

If I go down to 140 with 5’9 height, not only will I not have more speed, but I will be hospitalized unable to get up from my bec due to lack of any muscles in my body.

My youngest daughter's swim & dive coach in 9th & 10th grade would not allow any girls to swim varsity in any event until said girls were able to swim 50 yards freestyle sub-33 seconds. Running sub-33 seconds 200m is roughly the same. It would benefit all runners to learn how to sprint, then learn how to run middle-distance.

Your 200 and 400 times are actually better than your 5K and 10K times.

1:12 is plenty of speed to break 40 in the 10K. I wouldn't obsess over speed only.

As other have suggested, hills - short and long - are your friend.

Don't assume you're much stronger than her. Check out some of the videos of elite women(Jordan Hasay comes to mind) doing strength sessions before you decide that you have meaningfully more strength.

And then realize that these girls weigh nothing.

That woman is faster than you because she has developed her neuromuscular pathways. Speed is not all muscle. It’s a dance between your muscles and nervous system. The rate at which they fire, or contract, as well as the elasticity of those muscles from an energy return standpoint is the answer you are looking for.

Your 200 is better than your 400. I suggest running more distance and getting your body to look a bit more like the fast girl.

LImited slow man wrote:I’m looking to improve my long distance running times for 5k and 10k. I now run 5k in around 20 minuets and 10k around 42 minuets. However if I cannot run 400m in less than 72 minutes, how far could I go down in times for 5k and 10k?

I know of a middle aged guy who can run 5k under 17 min, His 100m is barely under 17 sec. So I think 60x your 100m time is the limit of your 5k.

OP, sounds like you have no fast twitch muscles and (hopefully) a lot of slow twitch muscle fibers. I am going to go counter to what most people have posted on this thread: abandon the fast stuff. Aerobic volume is your friend. Take your 5k pace, add about 2 minutes to that, and start running 60-90mpw at that pace, mixing in some hills and strides.

Your best bet is to become an aerobic monster.

Free advice, and worth every penny.