Everything Counts

That's one of the best workouts I've seen recorded on here. The 2:53's are excellent in their own right, but off 90 secs - wow.

Not that you need me to tell you, but If I were in your super fast shoes I'd look at either of these options:

1. Cut the recoveries

2. Extend the efforts eg. 6x1 mile/ 5x2000m.

As you are training for the marathon, I'd suggest extending the reps.

Brilliant session, Riley.

You need to see if you can get into the 5K Rupp is running at Tyson, or one of the Washington meets... you gotta think you could take a serious stab at this PR, right?

5000 Meters 14:20 (Track-Stanford)

Bam: Thanks for the compliment and the advice. I like to switch up my hard workouts, and mile/2k repeats may be on the horizon, but for the next few weeks anyway most of the hard workouts will be more tempo types until after the marathon. I usually do this workout with 60 seconds rest, but I wanted a fast pace and wasn't sure I could do it off 60, hence the 90. It was a great workout, but keep in mind it was on a treadmill and I think this would've been maybe 2:56 average outside (not to mention it's mentally easier on a treadmill since you don't have to worry about if you're hitting the pace or not).

Jake: That's funny you mention my 5k PR may be in play. I actually told Ken on Tuesday that for the first time in years I thought my college PRs were almost in play, especially the 10k (29:57). But, I don't know if I will have a good opportunity to attempt it (it would need to be sea level and preferably on a track). When it comes to wanting to break PRs, it sucks living at altitude.

I'd love to have a real track season, but its just logistically difficult to make that happen here. There are only a couple of decent local college meets in April, so if you want to run fast, you have to fly to California / Oregon, which gets very, very expensive if you are doing that multiple times.

That being said, doesn't Weber have a twilight meet sometime in the spring? We should try to get all the local fast guys to run it.

Also, I am really good at repeats! That may sound weird. But, I could be extremely competitive in a competition to see who could run the fastest reps at any distance 1 mile and under. Mentally, I can just handle short reps and pain very very well.

Unfortunately, I am not as good at racing with the same mental toughness. I get fatigued mentally, if that makes sense. I can handle pain very well for about 5 minutes and then I mentally have a harder time taking the pain.

It's something I am working on, but still have a ways to go. It's why I was so good at 1500 meters and not quite on the same level with my 5k or 10k times. It's also probably why I'm not the best marathoner...yet ;-)

Weber does have a twilight meet, but honestly Weber is not a fast track. It is up on the mountain and it's often windy there (almost always to a little extent). If the meet fell on a calm night, the track surface is really nice. The fastest I ever ran at Weber was 3:50 I think for 1500 meters, although I did manage a 1:50 800 there.

BYU's track is usually faster due to less wind.

That's good to know... the only thing I hate more than uphill tracks is windy tracks

Yeah, I'm not saying it's always a hurricane there. But it's rare to get "ideal" conditions. I'd say a typical summer night at Weber's track has 4-5 MPH winds, usually from the North.

Crazy workout, Riley. I had to look twice at that V02 max total.

Very impressive workout, Riley. Nicely done! I know what you mean about Weber's track. However, I have fond memories of that track because of a good race I had there at the twilight meet in college. Conditions were decent that evening and wind was minimal (which it sounds like is rare). I won a stacked 5k that evening in ~ 14:35, which I felt decent about for a 5k in Utah.

14:35 is smoking at altitude! It's funny how we love tracks where we've run fast. Stanford's track is like heaven for me! I've never stepped on that track and not had a PR.

Riley, if you're up feeding the baby and you need some interesting stuff to read, try googling British Milers Club. It's a great site and they do booklets every quarter or so - they go back to the Coe era! They're a great read and have some fantastic training sessions in them, along with great interviews. It's mad to see some of the old stuff.

I was just reading an old volume where a guy (2:13 marathon runner and only started running when he was 23 - played soccer before running) said his favourite session was 10x1km off 60 secs! His easy runs were done at 6 min pace - 7min pace. But that wasn't at altitude. Worth a look.

Dude. That is a beast workout!! Love the report. Always motivating to see what you're doing. Keep it up WC!

Bam, that is a sweet website. That's for the tip. I will check that more often when I'm bored!

Spencer, thanks man. It was a great workout. Your progess is coming right along as well. Keep it rolling.

Also, Bam I thought it was called football, not soccer.

You're correct, it's football. I thought it might confuse you if I said football: you guys play a mamby-pamby game called football, which is like rugby, only with loads of padding and helmets and breaks every two seconds:)

Good point Riley. It's easy to have fond memories of tracks and courses where we've run well. And I totally agree -- Stanford's track is a PR factory (that's been my experience there as well).