5 min mile after 40 with no running experience. Attainable? How do I train?

It would be certainly attainable with your baseline talent in HS, but would require some solid training. I'd suggest building a base of just easy runs before even trying to attain your goal, since staying injury free is the key. Start with 30 mins of easy running each day for a month, then add in w/o's like the 20 min tempo run, going by feel.

Right now you need to build a general fitness base. Right now I would focus on if I was you to do easy runs, steady runs, hills(runs over a hilly course, short hill sprints and hill bounding), and strides. After you get pretty fit after a few of building up your fitness than start adding more structure workouts.

Is it possible to build a general fitness base by walking fast, say 5-5.2 mph with as much incline as I can handle? Or, if I need to move to running now, how do I choose the pace from the start?

At your age it usually takes over 2 years to go from a 6 minute mile to 5. That includes dedicated training. At least 6-9 hours a week. Get a bunch of books and see what works for you. Don't bother with these online coaches who charge a bunch of money to write you a generic schedule.

Walking tests are meaningless. Go run a mile time trial and report back here.

I'll run 800m all in this week if the weather permits. Scared to run a mile yet after pushing myself to 189 heart rate in less than 2 mins on a treadmill. I need to learn how to pace myself. I'll try easy 15-30 min daily runs for now like someone suggested.

Today I finished 15 min at 8.6mph on a treadmill, covering 3.46km in 15 mins. This was the first 15 mins of continuous running I've done in 20+ years. It felt great.

Also, I can now last 1:52 at 12.5mph, giving me 625m in 1:52.

Running more than 15 mins is not comfortable yet due to dry mouth. I'd prefer to train indoors during this winter.

Should I focus on 15 min runs, gradually increasing my speed, or 12.5mph runs, trying to last longer? Or both?

Forgot to mention - my first 12.5mph run happened 6 days ago. I started walking on a treadmill 9 days ago.

Alex356 wrote:

Today I finished 15 min at 8.6mph on a treadmill, covering 3.46km in 15 mins. This was the first 15 mins of continuous running I've done in 20+ years. It felt great.

Also, I can now last 1:52 at 12.5mph, giving me 625m in 1:52.

Running more than 15 mins is not comfortable yet due to dry mouth. I'd prefer to train indoors during this winter.

Should I focus on 15 min runs, gradually increasing my speed, or 12.5mph runs, trying to last longer? Or both?

Neither, run slower longer. You will get injured if you keep this up

When you (and the others here) refer to a '5 min mile', do you mean a sub-5 minute mile (i.e. 4:55), around 5 minutes (i.e. 5:10), or a sub 6 minute mile (i.e. 5:55)?

According to MastersRankings.com only two competing Masters athletes in the 45-49 age bracket ran under 5 minutes in the USA this year.

Coevett wrote:

According to MastersRankings.com only two competing Masters athletes in the 45-49 age bracket ran under 5 minutes in the USA this year.

I believe that site contains self-reported data, so I wouldn't rely too heavily on it.

The Fifth Avenue Mile this year had 13 men between 45 and 49 who cracked 5:00

5:00 is the aspirational goal, to keep me motivated. I never tried 5 min mile, but I feel I could have done it at 17 when I did 800m at 2:12 with no training other than some recreational soccer 1-2x/week.

So, in a way, 5min / mile is a marker of the "best shape of my life", LOL. I realize that I may not get there, and I wouldn't push myself to the point of body failure. But I hope I can improve substantially from where I am now, given that I had NO training whatsoever, other than eating somewhat healthy and maintaining stable weight all my life.

So, If I plateau at 5:30, no big deal. But I wanna see how far I can go.

darkwave wrote:

Coevett wrote:

According to MastersRankings.com only two competing Masters athletes in the 45-49 age bracket ran under 5 minutes in the USA this year.

I believe that site contains self-reported data, so I wouldn't rely too heavily on it.

The Fifth Avenue Mile this year had 13 men between 45 and 49 who cracked 5:00

https://results.nyrr.org/event/185THAVE/finishers?_ga=2.133315022.1799669599.1544542642-1761308833.1539803481#from=45&to=49&page=1&gender=M

Aha, I was thinking it a bit odd.

Still, to get to 5 flat or break it in two years essentially off the couch in your forties is a tough goal. I started in January at 47 and I'm a whisker away from breaking 6 minutes now. I don't know if I will get to 5 minutes flat next year, but I'm going to try. I would urge caution to the OP, however. You probably will pick up at least a minor injury if you try to push yourself too hard too quickly. And when you do, make sure you rest it properly before rushing back. You (OP) have a little more time on your side. I would have thought that at 43 y.o. you could continue to improve for quite a few more years. I'm thinking that I probably have to achieve my goals by 50 or 51 (so not much more than 2 years) so I'm rushing it a bit and already picked up some troublesome injuries.

But as someone, who has never trained before, never injured himself before, and only remembers himself running in teens 25 years ago, I can make many mistakes - therefore I am looking for an advice here. I don't believe my case is typical. I literally have never trained for endurance and I don't even know how to pace myself oudoors for any distance.

I follow an old friend on Strava who is almost 40, runs less than 10 miles/week, rarely goes on runs longer than 15 min, and just ran 4:47 at the Merrie Mile in Hawaii. He sure seems like an anomaly, but he is very fit and focuses on high intensity training. He does a lot of 200, 400, and 800 meter repeats at or just under his goal mile pace.

This is a bit harder on a treadmill, but you could try a workout such as: Warm up five minutes at 7 mph, then 30 sec at 12 mph, 30 sec to a min at 7 mph, repeated for 5 or 6 minutes, and then cool down at less then 7 mph for 5 min. Do this once or twice a week, and 15 min slow jogs 2 or 3 times a week. As the workout gets easier increase the time at 12 mph.

If the farthest you ever want to fun fast is a mile, this may work. Or you may get injured.

Interesting. I do want to peak around a mile distance, as it requires both aerobic and anaerobic fitness and I care about speed. I would say, I'd like to run reasonably well in the range of 800..5000m.

Ideally (when I am fit eventually), I would maintain my body by doing daily 20-30 min runs replacing with HS intervals 2x/week. I feel that this routine would give me the most satisfaction.

My composition is probably more on a fast twitch side, given that my "no-training" baseline was 100m/12.0s(no blocks) and 800m/2:12 but only 3000m/11:20 when I was 17.

Alex356 wrote:

I'd like to run reasonably well in the range of 800..5000m.

In that case listen to the previous comments

Iz you lyin?

Basic question: is it better to run 30 mins X 6 days/week or 60 mins/3 days a week with the same speed?

Any difference in fitness gains and injury risk?

I'm 41 and have been training for about 15 months more or less consistently (with various breaks for life reasons, work, feeling slightly injured, etc.) Recent results include a couple of 19:40ish 5ks and a 5:23 mile.

I had no running background aside from running a little bit of afterschool cross country in 7th grade and occasional jogging (although I did do general exercise and was not completely sedentary.) 5'9", 145 lbs.

More mileage is good. Increase gradually and back off if you start to feel an injury coming on. Run lots of different paces (I found that doing more easy running helped my body with recovery but didn't immediately transfer over to faster running at 5k-to-mile pace, perhaps because the running mechanics were too different.) But most of your running should be easy. I also did a lot of hilly trails.

In the past year my highest mileage in a week was 32. I was doing 25 consistently toward the end of the year. Earlier in the year I was much less consistent, probably averaging more like 15.

I actually like the treadmill. I found that for me it works best for long intervals where you're not changing the speed much (like 4-5 minutes at 5k pace with 2-3 min jogging rest, or cruise intervals, like 6-10 min at LT pace with 1-2 min jogging rest) and progression runs (I like to start embarrassingly slow, then bump pace and incline gradually so that it's hard by the end, about 6-7 miles.)