We are in High school. To clarify the coach had the entire team from new Freshman to Seniors run the full Michigan in its original form on a Monday. We had planned races for us that Wednesday and Saturday. We've been racing here in the South since March, 1st so we are not early season. Many of us are already going for PRs and some are coming off of injury from previous XC and indoor requirements.
When you say the 'entire team", was it just the girls team who ran it or did the boys also run it? Asking as I am wondering if any male runner complained as well, or if this is just a teenage girl complaining kind of thing.
What were your splits for the track portions? what was your pace for the 1.5 mile loop portions? how long were any rest periods and when did they occur?
regardless of all that, as I said above, I don’t think it makes much sense for 800m - 3200m runners to do that workout in high school unless the purpose was to make future workouts and races seem easier. Even then, it could take a huge toll mentally and physically unless you’ve built up to that kind of workout in advance.
I would say that the Michigan is a lot of volume for a workout during race week. There are however many ways to modify this workout to change its intensity. The pace for the first 1600m could be done at 10K pace vs 5K pace. The tempo in between could be done at marathon pace as opposed to LT. Similarly the length of tempo could also be changed and you can take a walk/jog rest in between the tempos and intervals. An "easy" version of the Michigan could be this:
I'm interested to hear what everyone's Michigan looked like when they ran them. Or even if you ran multiple versions.
We used to do one that was warm up - hard mile - 3 miles steady - hard 1200 - 3 miles steady - hard 800 - cool down. For a total of 10+ miles. Once the warm up started, we never stopped moving. Off/early season.
2k @ 10k pace, 1 mile marathon pace + 10 seconds, 1600 @ 8k pace, 1 mile marathon pace + 10 seconds, 1200 @ 5k pace, 1 mile marathon pace + 10 seconds, 800 @ 3k pace, 1 mile marathon pace + 10 seconds, 400 @ mile pace. No jog during the transitions, just continuing the whole time. So if you're a 2:11 marathon/28:20 10k/13:32 5k/3:59 mile guy you'd run 5:10 mile for your recovery, and run 68 second pace for the 2k, 67 pace for the 1600, 65 pace for the 1200, 63 pace for the 800, and sub 60 for the 400. That would be the gold standard, but if you're not in tip top shape slow the recovery mile down a little bit. This workout you want to the fast stuff really well, and then running the tempo part is the secondary focus.
Not sure why the Michigan has some mythic status but it is a solid workout. It's a variation of a Kenyan fartlek or Canova alternations - hard intervals with a float recovery. Probably less work overall than the fartlek and Canova workouts.
That said, it's a lot of work for a race week. I wouldn't do more than 3-4 miles of hard efforts during a race week
OP - your instinct is right. Having high schoolers who are racing multiple times per week do a Michigan is a terrible idea. If it were only for older long distance types it might be fine, but how Michigan being applied here is likely to get kids hurt.
what’s the consensus on the team - how did every feel afterward, next day, whilst racing that week?
Pretty possible! I was #8 in cross the year I graduated in 11/12.
I was #8 the two previous years. It sucks being the alternate at state.
Over the top for a high school. And too much volume for a tapering workout (you can just run a simpler and shorter ladder). Plus how many times workouts are given because they look good on paper like in an elegant mathematical formula.... the one and only relevant question is what you are trying to achieve today. The session comes last
I'm assuming that I was on those state championship teams in high school if I am guessing correctly. Hi from a fellow alum. To comment on the continuation of the Michigan workout there, I would say that it was not really an integral part of training, as I only remember doing it during track season. The modification was that it was an 0.5mi tempo in between reps. I remember being ahead of that said state champ one of those workouts (he had too large of a gyro before the workout).
16,12,8,4 ladder with 1k loop threshold in high school for this. Roughly 60 seconds after the threshold to recover walking to track. 16/12 at 5k, 8 at 2 mile pace and 400 all out to end it.
The full one has a hilly 1.2 mile loop and the ladder goes back up.
As others have said, the Michigan can be a collegiate cross country 10k workout or it can be an easier workout. For what it's worth, I ran occasional Michigan variations in high school (with a great coach who never overtrained us) and I never ran a Michigan in college when I was actually running cross country 10ks.
It's hard to answer if this workout is/was a bad idea without knowing more context. Does the Wednesday meet matter? How hard was the team directed to run during the workout? If your team is frequently racing multiple times a week, your coach might feel that it works into the schedule best to get a hard effort in on a Monday and sacrifice performance at the mid-week meet every now and again.
Nothing wrong with being critical of training, but you're going to perform your best if you can buy into what you're doing, so I would recommend asking your coach about the workout and seeing how that goes. I don't think Men's Health is out there publishing articles about the Michigan, and it's possible your coach has more of a clue what they're doing than you think.
Your running will go best if you believe in your training, so try to get there by talking and working with your coach. If you ultimately come to the conclusion that your coach doesn't know what they're doing, you can always modulate your effort on big workouts that seem too close to meets, but I think this should really be a worst case scenario.
We are in High school. To clarify the coach had the entire team from new Freshman to Seniors run the full Michigan in its original form on a Monday. We had planned races for us that Wednesday and Saturday. We've been racing here in the South since March, 1st so we are not early season. Many of us are already going for PRs and some are coming off of injury from previous XC and indoor requirements.
Okay, the problem here isn't the Michigan; it's the racing on Wednesdays and Saturdays in March! No workout makes sense in that context.
Your coach based the workout off of a headline from a magazine?
No. His coach is a decently knowledgeable guy who ran sub-16 in his late 30s and trained with a sub-elite team in Michigan for awhile. The OP doesn’t like him though because he lied about his PRs (admittedly lame) and then made them do a hard workout the same week that the OP really wanted to break 10 at some Wednesday dual meet or something silly. Typical HS stuff where a kid thinks they’re more knowledgeable than they are and has an axe to grind against a new coach.