Forums >Racing>Goal of sub 20 5k
That's in excess of his 10k race pace if you go by McMillan's calculator. That's a tall order for 5-6 miles.
Some general comments after reading your posts: IMHO, your tempo pace seems slow here. Sounds more like steady state. I'd expect ~6:40 mpm t-pace. Do that for 5 to 6 miles. Also, get your long run around 12 miles with fast finishes. For intervals, 8-12 * 400 starting at 90 secs and move to 86s. Throw in some 82s with longer recoveries. With your mileage build up, I'd expect you to peak in May. You must have seriously crappy crappy shoes if you cadence varies that much. For a given pace, I run about the same no matter the shoe. Finally, I think you should train for a 10k, and dovetail in a 5k or two. You need to switch it up a little.
Someone who is a 20:30 5k runner should have a Tempo pace of around 7:02/mile. This is for 20-minute Tempos (3 miles) for 5-6 miles. Tempo pace should be around 7:15/mile...
2014 - Get 5k back under 20:00. Stay healthy!
Right on Hereford...
Agree my 9 mile long run should be lengthened. I always run around 168 cadence on the treadmill unless I am racing something hard. I just cannot get the legs turnover going.
MichiganFlyer, I was pretty active on the Sub-20 5k thread at Coolrunning.com last year around this time. I'm certainly no expert, but here's what worked for me... 1. Long run of around 12-13 miles 2. Taking days off (I ran a max of 4 days per week) 3. Cadence of 190-192 at all times 4. Tempos, Intervals, and Reps (Daniels' Running Formula) It looks like you're doing #4, but not the first three. Long Run - I can't think of any reason not to increase the length of your long run. Just do it! Days Off - It looks like you're running 7 days a week, every week. You could easily decrease that to 5 days and still get in around 40 miles by doing the following, for example: 13 long, 9 with some striders thrown in somewhere, 7 with 3-4 at tempo, 6 easy, 5 with 5x1000 at I-pace. This would give you 2 days off each week for recovery. Cadence - I increased my cadence to 190 by counting my steps for 30 seconds several times on each run. It felt like I was taking short, choppy steps at first, but then I got used to it. Now it feels normal. After a while I was only counting once per run. Now I only check my cadence on a rare occasion just to make sure I'm still where I want to be. I feel like I've improved my running economy significantly since increasing my turnover. !
The Limping Jogger
Agree--6:40 is much too fast for tempo based on 20:17 5k.
"Only a few more laps to go and then the action will begin, unless this is the action, which it is."
I don't know that I could hit 192 for cadence. That seems fast. 180 I can do that.
Thanks guys. Michigan- that's a picture of Ryan Hall in my profile. Must have got set to that while trying to update my avatar. But I do have bird-legs if that counts.
MichiganFlyer, I was pretty active on the Sub-20 5k thread at Coolrunning.com last year around this time. I'm certainly no expert, but here's what worked for me... 1. Long run of around 12-13 miles 2. Taking days off (I ran a max of 4 days per week) 3. Cadence of 190-192 at all times [edit: 180-182] 4. Tempos, Intervals, and Reps (Daniels' Running Formula) It looks like you're doing #4, but not the first three. Long Run - I can't think of any reason not to increase the length of your long run. Just do it! Days Off - It looks like you're running 7 days a week, every week. You could easily decrease that to 5 days and still get in around 40 miles by doing the following, for example: 13 long, 9 with some striders thrown in somewhere, 7 with 3-4 at tempo, 6 easy, 5 with 5x1000 at I-pace. This would give you 2 days off each week for recovery.
Hey Dakota, I remember you from the old sub-40 thread. You've done pretty well, but I'll never buy the argument that 4-5 days are better than 7. .
Supa Dupa Fly
Here is a question for fellow posters, however. I am 35 years old and wonder if it would be possible to run three hard 5k efforts over a 12 day period? In high school 2 races a week was doable but now that I am older I wonder if I could fully recover enough to hit all 3 races hard?