Forums >Racing>What do you do for base training?
SMART Approach
So have you ever actually tried base building “the old school way” or do you just agree with whatever MikeyMike says? If you don’t have the time or inclination to run more miles with everything easy then fine. I’m no coach and just go by my own experiences....I ran my half PR after 6 weeks of high mileage all easy 8+min/miles and then raced at 6:15 pace. I get fed up hearing people say they can’t increase mileage because they’re injury prone....it’s because their training paces are too fast.
If old fashioned base works for you go for it but it isn't the main stream anymore and pretty darn boring for most. I agree with much of what you say regarding people training way too fast all the time and being injury prone. The biggest mistake made is focusing on hitting times or certain training paces on normal comfortable training runs. To be honest, most runners simply do not know how to train effectively. I am on board with all of us running more miles or most miles slower. I just personally feel you are less likely to be injured and a bit ahead of game with a touch of faster work year round. I just believe this is smarter base training.
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Mmmm Bop
I think old fashioned base training would pretty much work for everyone, that’s why I posted the Hadd link previously which is about HR training and not hitting a certain pace...and explains how you get faster without the speedwork. Like others have said, build the mileage up in base training (nothing wrong with adding some strides) and then start hitting the structured workouts once you begin a training cycle. As for injury risk, keep up a strength training routine all year round!
5k - 17:53 (4/19) 10k - 37:53 (11/18) Half - 1:23:18 (4/19) Full - 2:50:43 (4/19)
I wouldn't necessarily call Hadd training "old fashioned" since it relies on heart rate monitors. The O.G. of base training, Arthur Lydiard, had his guys running a fartlek and a medium paced 10 miler each week of base phase so it wasn't *all* jogging.
As always though I think we all mostly agree. The key to base building is to run a lot, mostly easy.
Runners run