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1500m Training For Masters European Champs 2010
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2 x 4 x 300s off 2 mins tonight.
We deliberately ran in the snow and decided just to do hard efforts. Perspective for you. Deep snow first rep and a 65 - near the end I was running 56 when the track was more packed. I would usually expect to run these about 6 - 8 seconds faster for the same effort.
Also did 5.2kms warm up and cool down.
Gobi
Great minds think alike.
Today for me was 10m with drills, strides and 2 * (4 * 300m) at 1500m pace but with equal time standing rest (50 seconds). Tough workout aerobically but felt comfortable on legs. Managed to find a track to do it on which was relatively clear.
I averaged just over 51 and am not yet at the point where I can rationalise that pace or faster for 1500m without breaks! It will come soon enough...
In two weeks time the session will be 2 * (3 * 400m) at 1500m pace with equal standing rest.
whats your opinions on these progressions for 1500m
percentages is at goal time for the season:
1) 6 x 1000 (rec. 3 min) @85-8%
2) (about 10 days later) 5 x 1000 (rec. 4 min)@88-90%
3) (about 10 days later) 4 x 1000 (rec. 5 min) @92-95%
4) (about 10 days later) 3 x 1000 (rec. 6 min) @96-98%
The next workout (before PEAK) will be 2 x 1000 (rec. 8 min) @100%
This could also be ~6 wks. out from the 800 peak, so they can work concurrently together and make it easier to blend from aerobic to anaerobic power.
Hi staffs
Depends on what you want from the workouts. For me this isn't a progression of 1500m paced training - but that may not be its intention. This is a progression of workout intensity that ends in a goal pace workout and they are two very different things.
The above basically looks like moving from vo2 max intervals into something that morphs into 1500m practice. With these you're getting very little goal pace practice in until very late in the day. If you are training in the few weeks before peak I would say you should be getting increasingly intense workouts at goal pace.
By all means have progressive vo2 max training as well - but perhaps as a different training thread (i.e. tues days is progressive 1500m paced training, fridays progressive vo2 max training.) Although I would expect VO2 max to be on maintenance only mode fairly close to peak.
An example of what I would call 1500m progressive training would be (all at 1500m pace):
3 * (2 * 400m) w / 100 jog, 400 jog.
4 * (2 * 400m) w / 100 jog, 400 jog.
6 * 400m w / equal time standing recovery.
4 * 600m w / 2 * rep time standing recovery.
3 * 800m w / 2 * rep time standing recovery.
End with your 1000m workout (v. tough!).
The difference with this is that your body gets lots of manageable training at goal pace but it is progressive in nature. There's no sudden shock when suddenly you are asked to do both longer reps and faster speed. (Sure, maybe some of the earlier sessions in the above progression only have final rep at goal pace with the rest building up to that from date pace).
This is all prior to peak. In peak I might do some sort of 1500m tolerance session with short workbouts and very short recoveries. I think the final icing on the cake is 1500m pace work with very short recoveries which would probably come after the above progression.
Any thoughts? Maybe you could let us in on your other quality sessions amongst these - that might pull it all together somehow.
thank you. excellent post- i totally agree with you.
i did this progression last year and improved by 8 secs with this progression. as you said i am going to incoparate the two type of progresions because of what you have advised for this season. i will be looking for a good time rather than championships this year as i am first yr under 20. however i need to improve to 4:00 to get in english schools.
i would like to say i do a mono fartlek every 2 weeks in the track season which consists of as another quality session:
2 times 2 mins
2 times 90 secs
4 times 60 secs
4 times 30 secs
with equal rec-
this looks easy on paper but i gaurentee you this is not. great for speed endurance and i is a motavating session as the time running decreases throughout the season however the rests also decrease.
i would also dabble in the 3k and 800m early season. i have also been know to help my club out in steeple for some points!
i would also do a 3k session of 6 800m with 1m30 rec or 5 1000 with 2 mins early season. in the peaking stage i would usually of do 1-2 3k session over the 6-8 weeks. this is because i feel that i have a lot stronger endurance than speed.
thanks again
staffs - no problem
I think you can get the 4:00 if you work on your speed. You have a very good 1500m time based on your 400m best.
I assume you mean the fartlek made famous by Steve Moneghetti (I think it's mona not mono)?
I thought the progression of that was to increase the speed of the recoveries rather than reducing the time spent on the recoveries? Benson / Ray would call that an aerobic power type workout and it looks anything but easy!
How many 800's and 3k's are you planning on racing and how many 1500's?
The 5 * 1000m @ 3k pace sounds unpleasant!
i do mono fartlek all yr round and just keep the workout the same throughout the yr. i would argue with being some type of speed endurance as i have always been told rec the same as your effort is speed endurance although you are probaly right.
start with 3k then 800m then 1500m then another 3k in april/ start ofmay.
then probaly a more tactical league race in may over 1500m and then midlands/county schools again in may/june over 1500m
then another 800m and then if havent got entry standard i will look to do a couple of BMC races. if i get entry standard there will be 1500m race at english schools and aaas.
if not i will be looking to improve times over 3k and 800m for the season. looking more to help club out in league matches. i will also put myself forward for relays to improve my 400m which needs improving.
There's a guy name of Metoikos who's just started posting on the sub 3hr thread - first post page 2897 (Thurs 14th Jan). He has just come back to running after a three year lay off with patella tendinitis. He references treatment using needles in the knee and galvanic currents which seems to have been totally successful.
You may be aware of this already, but if not, it may be worth following up.
Tom
Thanks Tom - I had a look at his posts.
I will definitely bring the treatment up at my feb 1 appointment. It's nice to think there could be a treatment that would make it go in 3 visits but maybe I'm too old and cynical to believe in miracles!
I'm almost completely cynical about the sports "professionals" as it is to be honest. If this guy doesn't make sense I will forget about it and carry on gritting my teeth.
One of the links referred to the eccentric exercises - basically one legged mini-squats done on an incline. These did seem to help me but I stopped doing them when I hurt myself above the knee during the exercises. Perhaps this is just part of getting old or some kind of sick sods law.
I've restarted them and am being extra careful.
My start point with all this stuff is to be open minded but to recognise that in the end there is often less than meets the eye. With regard to the knee issues I just wanted to point you towards it, in the knowledge that you are intelligent enough to evaluate what you see.
Like yourself, I pride myself on the effort I put in understanding the relationship of all the variables that come together to produce a good running performance. However the errant variable is always injury. Runners tread a narrow path, on one side of which is controllable injury - ie easily identified and controlled, those injuries that are part of biomechanics, almost like old friends that have to be respected and understood, and on the other side those injures that come from nowhere and of which you have no understanding.
These are the worst. These are the one's on which you can't rely on your own knowledge and experience. These are the ones for which you have to rely on "expert" diagnosis and treatment. Like yourself my experience of this is variable. I've had occasions when I've had a "miracle cure" on the physio's bench and occasions where I've spent months of declining fitness and expenditure looking for an accurate diagnosis.
Based on that I know two things. Firstly if you're prepared to spend enough (which I can't) you can get the instant diagnosis and treatment of a premiere league footballer. Secondly, you can't rely on self diagnosis. In particular is the health and injury section of the FW forum. As best its a waste of time, at worst it's downright dangerous - the blind leading the blind.
The only good thing to come out of this is that every new injury once encountered and eventually treated will never pose the same problem ever again - unfortunately there's loads more waiting out there waiting to do for us.
Injury, or the risk of it underpins all our running endeavours. Five years ago, when training hard and getting success I often wrote that "the risk of injury was an acceptable price to pay for high level athletic performance". Now that time is running out for me, I'm not so sure.......
Very well put - all of it!
It's funny - there's a fair degree of latitude with regards to training strategy and it goes without saying that an athlete will be willing to work his nuts off. Most runners will succeed based on consistency no matter how they try and cock it up. But a true skill or ability that will often make or break an athlete is how they manage to avoid, or respond to, injury.
I always think this: "the risk of injury was an acceptable price to pay for high level athletic performance" ........until I get bloody injured!
Hi James - thanks for the post.
I'm doing a proper core session 3 / 4 times a week and a short set of deep core on the other days. I always run into the same dilemna with regards to leg weight training. Weight training will probably reduce the knee pain, but how am I to do the weight training when my knees hurt?!! I can't find any weight based exercise which doesn't hurt my knees.
If I'd known what I do now I would have hit the gym for 6 months before taking up tennis again which has caused most of these problems!
If I tried to do a lunge at the moment I'd never get up again! I have a balance board and keep thinking about starting to use it again. Hasn't got any further than that yet though!
Biggest week so far, legs are fried today. A.m. runs now up to 3m and starting to do some 1500m pace work. No speed or freshness in the legs at the moment.
M: a.m. 3.01m easy
p.m. 6.06 easy.
T: a.m. 3m easy
p.m. 10m easy w / drills, strides and 2 * (4 * 300M) @ 1500m pace with 50 second standing recovery
W: a.m. 3m easy.
p.m. 8.67m easy.
T: OFF.
F: a.m. 3.01m easy
p.m. 11.52m w / drills, strides and 5 * 1200m @ 5k pace w / 400m recovery.
S: a.m. 3m easy
p.m. 6:07m easy
S: a.m. 14.01m easy.
Total Mileage: 71.35m.
All this off winter base training with NO maximal or specific 1500 speedwork.
With that in mind last night we did this
5 x 4 x 100 off 45second recoveries with 2 mins between sets.
What this gets everyone is running faster than 800 pace but without the stress or strain of longer reps. Almost a this is faster running intro :¬)
I think most of us were running about 1 to 2 seconds a rep slower than 400 pace.
That's great news Gobi - the old man obviously has some tricks left!
What times did the older chap run?
I bet they can't wait until the outdoor track season now.
they both seemed rather chipper at training last night
Not me mate I'm too OLD and TOOOOOOO SLOW :¬)
7 x 400 off 2 mins recovery
ideally I'd want to run 70 - 75 for 6 reps with a slow first rep(I always waste the first one just to fully loosen off the old body)
My own target for 1500 is to get it under 4.30.
end result was 6 reps between 74-77 and 79 to start :¬)
I wore sprint spikes and frankly needed something a little longer.
Close enough to the low end of target to make me content and looking forward to better conditions.
I think that I’ve just about reached the end of my foundation/basic conditioning phase, and am looking to introduce a bit of faster running. The purpose of this is firstly to improve economy and develop a comfortable relaxed running style at (relative!) speed. Secondly I want to lay a low key foundation on which to build some race specific faster running and protect me against unwanted (is there any other kind?) injury. I suppose you could describe this as the “build up phaseâ€, and I anticipate that it will extend through February and March.
I’ve more or less reached my maximum target mileage, though I hope it will get to be run a bit quicker. My current program has reached:
Day 1: 9 miles upper aerobic – 6:55-7:00 pace
Day 2: 7 miles easy running – 7:20-7:25 pace
Day 3: 12 miles accelerating to upper aerobic – 6:55-7:00 pace
Day 4: 7 miles recovery – 7:35-7:45 pace
Day 5: 9 miles aerobic – 7:00-7:10 pace
Day 6: 16 miles LSR – 7:20-7:25 pace
Day 7: Rest – Friday as in TFIF
The first element for running economy would be strides: What would you suggest, number, length, pace, frequency per week and on what days to be run. One possibility might be to do this as a second session – though I’m not sure if it’s worth the extra trouble.
The second element is the low key foundation on which to build. My current state of fitness suggests a VO2max pace of 6:00-6:05 and a LT pace of 6:25-6:30. I don’t want to be running LT paced sessions until well into March and race specific (10K) VO2 sessions until early April. What would you suggest that could pave the way to these “proper†10k sessions, which will most likely be based around interval 1ks and miles. In particular frequency per week and which of my current sessions I need to sacrifice to include this, in particular could I introduce it at a very low level just replacing (say) Day 2’s easy running session?
Finally, over the last three months by concentrating on base building (the easy stuff) I’ve rather neglected the core stability and strength work somewhat. As the right knee’s starting to tremble a bit, I need to get this sorted. I’ve got a pretty good idea of what needs to be done, but I’m not sure about the best way to integrate this non running stuff into the above running only schedule. Any thoughts you may have will be greatly appreciated.
I look forward to your helpful, as always, advice but if you either suggest fast speed work or ask for more info I shall personally come round and throw donuts at you
Gobi - more snow?? Well done on the session - I think you'll be pleasantly surprised given a clear track. We can compare notes - next tues I have a 2 * (3 * 400) with 70 second rest at 1500m pace.
Tom - you need to provide more info. Have you tried all out sprints? (will reply properly later!)
Tom.
These are my thoughts on the various questions. I’ll leave the integration into schedule suggestions to the end.
Build-Up Phase:
The strides are a good idea for the reasons you mentioned, although I think you should only attempt them on a soft, even surface to start with. Pace is simply relaxed while being conscious of an increase in stride length and good mechanics. Given your goal is a gentle introduction to turnover I would do 4 - 6 * 100m within an easy run taking as much recovery as necessary. I’d approach it as a mini-fartlek in that somewhere in your run you’ll include a stride when you feel like it. I would avoid bunching at the start as you’ll do them too quick or at the end when you run the risk of doing them when too fatigued. I wouldn’t do these as a second session – just add them into one of your other runs (but not recovery run).
I think one of your priorities of this phase should be taking care of the range of movement you are likely to need to employ in any of your races. Strides will do most of this but they don’t always address the complete range (I’m thinking of downhill sections in road races). A simple and safe method would be to incorporate some drills into one of your runs. Again, done on grass, you don’t have to do too many just the basics and never pushing hard: skips, high skips, high knee marching, high knee runs, heel flickers. One set of each up to a maximum of 50m. I do them as 50m skips, jog back, 50m strides, 50m walk back – on to next drill. Again, no special sessions, just add them to an easy run (but not recovery run) and you get a bit more striding in your schedule for free!
Build-Up / Race Pace Transition:
I would approach this in 2 ways –
Hills: I think you would benefit from some hill reps. This will again help with your range of movement, in particular the ankle and leg extension and relaxed effort characteristic of faster paced work, but without the accompanying pounding. I would pick a gradual incline of about 300m and then do slow reps to the top and potter back down. Given the circumstances I would do these at a very slow pace and easy effort. The feeling should be more like after a set of weight reps rather than intervals – no heavy breathing but a bit heavy in the legs. I’d do about 6 with full recovery. Don’t try and get quicker or longer or faster recovery – any progression would be an increase in the number of reps. I can show you a hill on a map at Grafham Water which is ideal with a good 2.5m warm-up from the car park if you’re ever in that area.
Strides to Fartlek – if you’re interested in the suggestion around the strides you can gradually extend the session to become more like a fartlek. Again, fairly low intensity but include some slightly longer portions of LT / 10k / 5k pace and strides. An example would be 120 secs at LT / jog / 90 seconds at 10k / jog / 60 seconds at 5k / jog / 20 second stride / jog, repeat. Err on the side of caution and this could, over time, morph from an easy session with strides to a multipace fartlek and finally your race pace VO2 max or LT session. The total intensity of this type of session can be easily mamipulated.
Core / Strength
The core can be fit in whenever you can get it done and I like to do mine seperate to the running sessions (after whenever possible). With regards to strength training I’d be tempted to stick with the running for this season to be honest. (Perhaps the hills would be sufficient instead of weights.)
If not, I would start to introduce it now during the easy running phase and, once established, start to add the quality running around it – particularly if its purpose is injury proofing. I’m wary to say any more because it’s not clear whether the purpose is to build strength and / or injury proof and what your weight history is.
Schedule
As it stands I think it best to include the strides on day 1 and the drills on day 5. I don’t think it necessary to change the speed of any of those runs as these are still easy sessions – just don’t worry about the overall average pace on these runs as they will be different.
If you chose to keep the upper aerobic every weekon day 3 and alternate the hills / fartlek session on a weekly basis on day 1 with drills + strides on day 5.
Eventually I could see a point where you might do an LT on day 1 with the race pace session on day 4. You would then do the strides and drills (if you kept them) as part of the race pace session. With your experience and background you could still do the upper aerobic running as and when you feel like it as long as it doesn’t compromise your quality sessions. Unplanned would probably be best and only when you feel good – that way there’s no pressure and you listen to your body. But that’s getting ahead of ourselves.
One other thing. For 2010 I would suggest not limiting yourself to set time periods or setting race targets. Take as long as you need for each phase – your body will tell you when it’s ready to move on. This is how you’ve done it so far and it’s worked really well (but we always need a reminder don’t we)!
Any thoughts on this? Apart from its longwindedness!
Kindest regards
Tom