Hi, I’m a sophomore in HS and I have a championship meet tomorrow. I’m running the 3200 and 1600 and my coach wants me to score points for our team in the 3200 (it’s before the 1600). My PR is 11:57.55, but I think I’m probably in 11:40 shape as this was almost 6 weeks ago. I need to place top 5 to score, but I’m not sure if I can do this as there are 7 runners that I think can beat me. What should my strategy be if I don’t care about my time and only placing top 6?
Typo on the last line, meant to say I only care about placing 5th.
The only strategy you need in a mid pack 11:4x 3200m is that you will place better the faster you run. This isn’t a race where tactics will make or break you.
Sit and kick. How smart are your competitors about pacing? Start off chill, sit on #4-5 until late in the race, then do your thing.
hssoph wrote:
Hi, I’m a sophomore in HS and I have a championship meet tomorrow. I’m running the 3200 and 1600 and my coach wants me to score points for our team in the 3200 (it’s before the 1600). My PR is 11:57.55, but I think I’m probably in 11:40 shape as this was almost 6 weeks ago. I need to place top 5 to score, but I’m not sure if I can do this as there are 7 runners that I think can beat me. What should my strategy be if I don’t care about my time and only placing top 6?
High school runners are notorious for going out too fast which usually leads to fading late. Don't you do it. Find a comfortable pace in the first mile and pay no attention at all to where you're placed. That could be last place. Don't worry about it and don't make any "extra" effort to pass anyone at that stage of the race. There's a very good chance some will have fallen away from the pack. It's fine to pass them but not if you're going to push your own pace up. Let them fall to you.
Once you're about at the start of the second mile start going after people who are ahead of you. By then lots of them will be starting to feel the effects of starting too fast. A friend of mine who has an Olympic medal will tell you that every second you spend running too fast in the first half of the race will cost you two seconds in the last half. You'll likely be stepping over bodies and I'd bet heavily that several of those bodies will belong to some of that group that have faster times than yours.
This is not a great strategy for winning the race. But you're not interested in doing that and just want to finish in the top five. Some years back one of my sons was in a college 10,000 meter track race. There were something like 30 guys in the race and only two of them had slower times going in than he did. I got him to use the approach I'm suggesting here. He came seventh. We were thrilled. But we knew that this wasn't a strategy that would win that race and we were fine with that because we knew there was no way he would win.
re seed times, if you can run 11:57 and their best is 11:52 i'd call that a wash on paper. in other words, you're basically as good as them. and i would never say "can't beat" til the race is over, any given sunday, but i'd plan on tactics against the guys within about 10-15 seconds of what i know i can do, then go hunting end of the race.
long term, i like the pacing idea. short term i don't know if you'd know your pace to execute it. that's something you have to train for. you have to learn that by feel. work on it in XC next year. go with someone top 5, sit on their shoulder, let them do the work, and fight like heck at the end.
alternative is do the pace thing, take it out easy first mile, then hunt down people mile 2 but if you concede a bunch of places early laps and have not discussed this with the coach, your coach will be irate and screaming at you. you then better catch a bunch of people and run a huge PR.