why are my training times way slower than my race times?

What type of rest are you getting for these repeats. It's possible your teammates are workout heroes, who are leaving some of their best workouts in races. Also probable that you are not too aerobically developed based on your PRs. I was the same way and I sucked at tempo workouts and was OK in 8Ks despite that because of pretty good speed and such.

Killer humblebragging, bro

mikey wrote:

So my PRs are 9:11 3k, and 4:28 mile. Training for XC this past season I was running about 26:30 for 8k on race day which is a little under 5:20 per mile. However when we do mile repeats in practice, I'm working very hard but only hitting 5:35-5:40.

It's like once I put the lighter shoes with spikes and get in that race mentality, my fitness somehow improves drastically lol. Other guys on our team running 25:00 - 25:30 are cranking out like 4:50 - 5:10 for their mile repeats, which makes sense considering their PRs. it just seems weird that I'm like 20 seconds slower per mile in workouts. I mean, I'm not going all out in the workout, like I do on race day, but my effort level is always about 85%-90%.

Anyone else have experience like this?

You are tired during training and tapered/well-rested for racing. Also, on race-day you must take into account all of the several things that make you run faster than in training:

(1) People are watching. When you have spectators cheering and watching, this naturally makes you want to run harder. You can hold a harder pace. You want to subconsciously (if not consciously) impress them and perform well.

(2) Competition. When you want that first place, and hundreds of other racers want first place as well, competition becomes a thing and you have to try even harder to outrun the other guys who have similar fitness levels/goal times to you.

(3) Race day adrenaline. You are anticipating what is about to happen at the pre-race expo, the week leading up etc, & especially as you are on the start line, and the whole "sacred" race day experience makes you excited to perform. And to perform well.

(4) You are well rested. You have tapered, you have put in the work. So come race day, you don't have any soreness or pains or fatigue. Just feeling fresh and ready to dominate.

Forgot to mention a fifth point:

(5) There are medics available. Sometimes in training you can't push as hard as you physically are capable of due to all of the 4 points I said before, but also in case something happens health wise. The nice thing at races is there are medics available on hand. So you can and should (in my opinion) push as hard as you possibly can, try to push so hard (in my opinion) that you collapse at the end.

We get about 90 seconds. The longer distances have always been my weaker events, although I am not very good at any event lol (still haven't gone under 2 in the 800)

Oh for sure bro, bragging about me getting 125th in my XC invites. I'm a stud

Thanks, I agree with all of your points for sure. But should my workouts really be this much slower? And I also agree about the well rested based off our training schedule.

Saturday: race

sunday: rest / short run

monday: hard workout

tuesday: run

wednesday: hard workout

thursday: run

friday: run

saturday: race again

It's like 2 hard workouts and a race all in 5 days. Some of our top guys do long runs on Sundays which I think is the dumbest thing ever but they are also the fastest guys on the team (and also rarely PR)

Oh I'm familiar with this college type schedule. You should do a long run but don't worry about speed and probably be modest on the ones coming right after races (hope you're not racing each week).

My best guess is you're like I was and are a bit aerobically-challenged. Mile repeats with 90 seconds are ideal for guys whose best races are the 5K and above. While you're struggling to feel comfortable at 5:30 pace in the workout and the rest isn't getting you back to feeling fresh, those guys can cruise at 5:05 pace and feel almost nearly full in the tank for each rep. I'd work on endurance when you can (with long runs/more mileage) and not sweat your training times.

If you think doing a long run the day after a race is stupid you have not done a lick of research about training and you are merely speculating on BS conjecture.

The other thing to consider is when your teammates who’ve been doing harder efforts and long runs do a taper they might increase the gap on you. Still I wouldn’t freak out about your paces but rather increase your mileage on Sundays and build your endurance

Don't stress about this one, bro. A great many people have the opposite problem, so you can be grateful that you don't.

This is not even a problem. You're doing it right. You WANT your race times to be way faster than your workout times.

thanks everyone