High School female winter training plan

The coach told her to rest for 10 weeks? Wow, that's insanely long. She will lose a ton of fitness in that time.

Most kids take a week or two off, then start back with some running (maybe a couple times a week) and strength training. They call this "active rest", where there isn't a whole lot of running, but staying active in other ways. Enjoying life--play pick up games of basketball, bike, swim whatever they like. They just need to do stuff that doesn't constitute "training".

Some kids will continue to run at a very low intensity and not really take a significant break; gotta go by how the body and mind feel. Easy miles and strides totally ok until training picks up again.

Forgot to add: between seasons is a great time to check out all health issues so she has a healthy track season. Ferritin/iron check is probably one of the most important tests to have run. This gives her time to get levels back up with supplements and a lower training load. Vitamin D is another big one to have checked.

Take one to two weeks off and then start building some weekly mileage. Start with something that would be considered "low" for her and add 3 to 5 miles per week each week until track starts. Really depends on her experience and her past training though.

Given her 2:35, dropping to two minutes flat for an 800m sounds ambitious.

Like others said, 1-2 weeks off, and then get to some easy running.

If she will have 10 weeks off after that, I would recommend taking the first 2 weeks back running to just build up to the kind of mileage she was doing during the fall. Maybe 3 weeks to build up if it was bigger miles, but given the coach's comments, my guess is this is not a high mileage program.

Then she will have 7 weeks to get a lot of steady runs in and slowly build more mileage on top of that. It's hard to make recommendations since we don't know what she has done in the past. But I would want her to be quite comfortable finishing an hour long run. Ideally a couple times a week. Strides twice a week would be excellent. Don't do too much or chase too much speed. Winter is the time to just get time on your feet and build the miles. But one day of flat strides and one day of short hills sprints would do a lot for her strength and speed.

Bold - Yes

- 2:35 to 2 flat, hilarious

- 2 weeks off then build to average 5MPW more than she has sustained for a 4-6 week period in the past

- some strength work is OK, I'd also add some light speed work (strides or 200s @ 3k-5k pace (ie slow)) once a week. Could do something like 3xmile at 5k pace+30s/mi once a week as well. Would skip even these workouts the first 2 weeks back into running

example: say she has averaged 35MPW for 4 weeks in the past. Take 2 weeks off, then run 18 25 33 40 40 40 40 until the season starts, take a down week if needed. start doing some easy workouts (above) during that 33 mile week(3rd week). those numbers are just estimates you don't have to be that specific.

Alternative, pick up a winter sport and run 3-4 times a week with strides once a week.

RF223 wrote:

My daughter 2:00 for the 800..

Are you serious? Start with a realistic goal.

Thank you everyone! I will let her know that 2 flat is unrealistic for the 800 (and maybe she already knows this) but her main goal is her cc time.

She said they were averaging about 35mpw in season so I will give her a plan to work up to a little more than that in easy runs. She’s tried some other sports/activities in the past during winters (basketball, gymnastics, snowboarding) but has her heart set on running.

Once she get into track season, if their coach has them running less then 40mpw, any advice if she should run some on her own to meet that 40? I’m guessing it may depend on what their workouts look like. Thanks again

RF223 wrote:

Thank you everyone! I will let her know that 2 flat is unrealistic for the 800 (and maybe she already knows this) but her main goal is her cc time.

She said they were averaging about 35mpw in season so I will give her a plan to work up to a little more than that in easy runs.

Once she get into track season, if their coach has them running less then 40mpw, any advice if she should run some on her own to meet that 40? I’m guessing it may depend on what their workouts look like. Thanks again

It depends on how the coach uses the first few weeks of practice. If he eases them into it without many hard workouts/races then she could stay at 40 for the first few weeks. Once the real training begins dropping down some is good since the workouts/races will wear on her and she has already built up that base before hand. I'd say 28-35mpw after

Hard to say a realistic 800 goal, maybe shoot for 2:25 this spring? That's a solid time.

I'd say 2:15 is a good D3 or low tier D1 school, 2:05-2:10 is good D1 or regionally competitive, 2-2:05 is nationally competitive and sub 2 is world class. (for perspective) Of course those numbers could be argued a few seconds but it's the basic ranges.

-RS

Thank you so much for the advice continuing into the spring. And thanks for the insight on 800 time ranges and expectations.

RF223 wrote:

Thank you so much for the advice continuing into the spring. And thanks for the insight on 800 time ranges and expectations.

Pretty solid suggestions on here. March is quite a few months away so putting in some solid miles between now and then will pay huge benefits come track season. Just increase the miles gradually and she'll be fine. I would also be careful not to run too many hard runs. I know that this may seem odd but building a base with easy to medium runs really allows your body to rest and recover. Too many hard runs can lead to injuries or getting sick or both. This is actually the same type of training that is good over the summer. I think she is going to just fine!

I wanted to come back on here to say thank you so much for that suggestion. I took her right away to get it checked and she was severely low! This along with base winter running, her continuing her to run during spring and summer shutdown helped improve her xc time and she just signed her NLI a couple months ago. So, thank you!

Thank you! I came back on here to thank everyone for their advice. Between getting her ferritin levels back to normal, following winter base training advice, and continuing her to run through the spring and summer shutdown, she realized her dream of running in college’

Thank you! I came back on here to thank everyone for their advice. Between getting her ferritin levels back to normal, following winter base training advice, and continuing her to run through the spring and summer shutdown, she realized her dream of running in college!

Thank you! I came back on here to thank everyone for their advice. Between getting her ferritin levels back to normal, following winter base training advice, and continuing to run through the spring and summer shutdown, she realized her dream of running in college!

1. 2 flat is the american record I think for the 800m for hs girls. 2:25 may be more realistic?

2. I did 45 mpw in hs and had PRs with 2:18 800, 5:02 mile, 11:00 2 mile, and 18:52 5k

Just wondering- did she mean 2:00 or maybe that was a typo? Seems inconsistent.

New to this thread...

Wonderful to hear success stories. Thanks for updating.