If you want to go longer, stop racing every run and quit thinking speedwork is the only key.

Are you doing long runs to build endurance to go longer?

I am doing long runs because I love long runs. It helps building endurance to go longer as well.

I'm thinking I could give you an interesting take on reasons to run. I'm a college XC/track athlete, so I run solely to race as fast as possible.

I'll keep my answers respective to June-November, which is cross country season. Track is too different, and entails much more complicated training that is unlike a lot of the running people that frequent this site do.

How often do you do speed work? Why?

In the summertime, only about once a week. But August-November, 2-3 times a week, depending on whether we have a meet that weekend or not. See below for why.

How often do you go without doing any speed work? Why?

3-4 days, at most. Mileage gives you your aerobic capacity and base leg strength, but speed work makes you mean and ready to race. We race 8K at the college level, and 10K at the National Qualifier. While 8K is long enough that most of the race is an aerobic effort, the runner needs to be familiar with the pain of complete oxygen debt, which is invariably how races are finished. Without good speed work to develop your body's ability to run in oxygen debt, you'll pretty much just be running at tempo pace when racing.

What type of speed work? Why?

Pretty varied, actually. Anything from 400's to 12 mile tempo runs. Any 'speed' workout we do is at the very least 5 miles in length, since that's the distance we're training to race. Some examples are 2x12x400m 45 sec between reps 2 min between sets, 9x1000m 45 sec rest between reps, 10-12 mile tempo runs...

Do you have any particular pattern? why? taking few weeks off, doing some base training, doing particular races,….

We have mandatory practice 6 days a week, and usually do doubles for 3 or 4 of those days. This stays constant throughout the summer and the fall season, although not quite as many doubles at the beginning of the summer and the end of the season when target mileage is low.

Running regularly is the most important part. My coach had a graph posted outside of his office for a while, and on the x-axis was number of days your haven't run, and on the y-axis was number of days of training that you "lose." One day off was basically nothing lost. 2 days off amounted to 1 day lost. From there it grew exponentially, and taking a week off running would lose you 2 weeks worth of training. They found the data for this graph by studying the progress of vo2 max levels of runners as they progressively took more days between running.

How much do you run?

During my freshman year, I was in one of the lowest mileage group, and we probably averaged 70 miles a week the whole season. Our first week of running at the college after summer was 72 miles. Keep in mind, I'm at a Division II school, so those numbers are pretty much the low end of being a competitive collegiate runner. I'm entering my junior year this fall, with a goal of running 1000 miles in 12 weeks this summer. We have 4 weeks at 100 miles planned.

How far have you ran? Why?

The farthest race I've ran is 8K, and the longest training run I've done is 14.5 miles. But we have some 17-18 mile runs (not days) planned for this summer.

How fast can you run? 

PR's include 1:57 for 800m, 4:27 for 1600m, 52.3 for 400m, 15:24 for 3 miles. All of those times are from high school, I've been battling a torn groin muscle my entire sophomore year. 4:10 for 1500m last spring as a sophomore in college, and the goal is 25:00 for 8K this fall.

No, I was doing some high speed 150's during spring break my freshman year when it was really cold... Didn't warm up or stretch enough and pulled a muscle in my groin because of it. I'd never pulled a muscle before, so I just assumed it was normal tightness and kept running, which eventually partially tore the muscle. Put me out of racing for almost an entire year.