Minimum requirement mile time needed to break 20 for a 5k?

I’m 49 and I’ve run 2 sub 20 5ks and my mile Pr is 5:57. The 5k is my least favorite race. Be prepared to endure great pain. The way I broke 20 was to find 5k races I would be competitive in. I came in first male at one, and third in another. Knowing I would place kept me pushing in the last mile. I think my PR was 19:18 at a Florida race, and it was flat, and I won a hand painted coconut. These were last year, so it’s very doable. I’m not gifted fast, but fast enough. Good luck.

Unhelpful anecdotes wrote:

Nub wrote:

First time I broke 20mins I ran a 3:25 1k on about 10-15kms per week mainly doing just 2km runs. Took about 6 weeks to go from 26mins to 19:50.

Cool story, bro.

Sorry, I don’t have a mile time, bro

If you are looking to peak for a 5k, I don't know that mile time is the metric that you want to be chasing. I understand it as a checkpoint for confidence and a benchmark for comparison, but I'm not sure it should be a focus of your training. If you train hard for a 6:00 mile, then you're in shape for a 6:00 mile, but maybe not a 20:00 5k.

Compare your times to see how they line up with the equivalent times. For example, your 6:15 mile is 46.3 vdot*. For 10k, 44:00 is 46.5 vdot. For half, 1:40 is 45.1 vdot. So it looks to me like your mile and 10k are in the same ballpark. An equivalent 5k would be around 21:15. Why choose the mile time as a target rather than the 10k time? For predicting 5k time, I would pick 10k time over mile almost every time.

Note that a 20:00 5k is 49. 8 vdot, and the mile time is more like 5:52. So you have some work to do.

Honestly, it's probably not that complicated. At 50 mins/day, are running around 6 miles? Increasing miles and long run will probably help a bit. But I would just find a good 5k training program and go with that rather than focusing on the mile time.

*P.S. I know vdot is not perfect. It's just one set of data. Choose a different one if you have a favorite.

He isn't chasing a mile time, just wanting to know how slow of a person can break 20. I say it is about 6:20 for an old endurance athlete.

Idiot alert wrote:

High school kids are always going to have more speed so it would be more like 6 minutes for a minimum. Again, those are minimums. There are 5 minute milers who can't do it.

Agree with the first point, but surely the last claim can't be right?! Surely anybody could run 5km at over 22% slower than their mile pace?! The difference between 3:07 min/km and 4:00 min/km is huge! Even for a 'fast-twitch' runner who is just 'holding on' in the mile, they must surely have enough aerobic strength to run at 4:00 min/km for some time?! I mean you cannot run the mile on anaerobic strength alone, you need decent aerobic support.

Ever watch an NCAA triathlon? 190 pound guys running 10.4 in the 100, 47 in the 400, and only 4:40 in the 1500. They can't run 20 minutes in a 5k.

I'd agree with the guesses of around 6:00, probably a little over for an older guy with lots of miles under his belt. When I first broke 20 I could probably have ran a mile in around 5:45 I'd guess.

Once and Future wrote:

I'd agree with the guesses of around 6:00, probably a little over for an older guy with lots of miles under his belt. When I first broke 20 I could probably have ran a mile in around 5:45 I'd guess.

Yep -- 5:35-5:45 and you should be a lock, maybe even starting to threaten 19:00. 6:00ish gives you a chance with age/experience/mileage.

distracted teens wrote:

If you are in junior high or high school and can't break 20 while running 5:30 it means you are unable to focus for an entire 5k.

Sorry, but i ran 20 minutes as an 8th grader while being under 5ft tall as a male. By the time i could run 5:29, i could run low 19 minutes.

The posters commenting on how an old person can run 20 minutes with a slower mile time are spot on, but the 24 yo female is dead right, at young age running sub 20 usually means a a 5:45 mile but at age 50 might only mean a 6:06 mile. Speed dies, but endurance lasts a bit later in life.

This was one of the more insightful and level headed threads I've come across in a bit, and it got me thinking..

Football summer conditioning, our coaches had us do A LOT of running, especially in June and July, we hit hit the track hard after lifting. M-W-F consisted of all kinds of different intervals, 1/2 mile repeats followed by 200s, sets of 400s-100s, and our summer test before camp before my jr and senior year were 16 sets of 100s, with minimal rest. We did lots of various agility and route running obviously, but our coaches wanted us to be able to run. 15 years later, I thank them for that.

My 200 PR my senior track season was 24 flat. I ran the 110 hurdles in 15.7, but really blew off track in favor of football, smh. Thinking back to some of those times I ran, I can def see translation to being more fast twitch orientated when I throw down in intervals or in a 5k vs HM ish distance. Marathon training didn't really do it for me, and I favor the HM distance and below much more, I am guessing because of how many years I spent developing other systems.

Haven't raced a mile all out since I was 17, and I ran a 5:50 off zero aerobic training. My current 5k PR is 19:12. I definitely have to work more when it comes to aerobic training vs the shorter interval training, as that feels more natural, still to this day.

I am curious to see though next year what I can clip off in the mile.

Dude, I was similar to you. 48 yrs old. Best mile time is 5:52 (though it was mile 7 of a 10 mile run, when I decided to go for it).

When I did this, I was running about 55-65 miles per week though. No speedwork ever though. I just finish runs with fast miles, etc.

I ran a 19:45 5K. You can do it.

Based on that I think you have plenty of speed. 35 second 200m is much faster than 5:45 pace. I ran a 19:30 at age 51 a couple of months after a marathon training cycle. Point being... the miles made me faster, not any specific 5k speed work. Go to the track, start running at 5:45 pace, and see how far you can hold it. When you think you're shot, grit your teeth and keep going. You can do a mile. Like someone else said, you can probably break 20:00 now. Pick a nice flat 5k and scope out prior results to make sure you're likely to have people to pace you. Start fast, keep pushing, and imagine that guy just ahead of you is boning your wife while you're at work. sub 20:00... no problem!

Past my primee wrote:

Currently at a 6:15/mile for one single all out mile, seeing as sub 20 is 6:25/mile for 3 whole miles I think I’m going to need to get a faster mile time in order to improve much more now.

I am 49 years old, male and usually run around 50 min per day. My favourite distances are 10k and half marathon and in fact, those two distances are the only distances I have ran in the last 3 years, I usually run around 44/1:40.

I’m going to focus solely on my 800/mile times for a few months. What times should I aim for before I start to think about sub 20?

I have never, ever been super fast. I am not talented and cannot rip off 5 min miles or 12 sec 100s like most people here.

All you have to do is buy a pair of the next% you will have no problem breaking 20 mins. 6:15 mile would turn into about a 5:30 and that should do the trick. Best of luck!

10 minutes...provided you can run the other 2.1 miles in 9 minutes and 59 seconds.