Saturday Race followed by Sunday Race

I guess a lot would depend on your recent mileage. If you've been doing a fair amount of training, this could go well for you. You've probably at least heard of, or maybe even experienced, feeling pretty good the day after a race. I'm in my mid-30s, and I tried this (sort of) last year. I did a 12k on Saturday, and then doubled on Sunday: 2-mile and a 5-miler an hour apart.

After the 12k (which I ran very well in), I just did a very easy 2.5m cooldown, and was sure to rehydrate and refuel immediately after the race to speed the recovery process. The next day, I did a easy 2+ miles to warm up for the 2-miler. Then I ran it and felt completely lifeless. I had no energy. I jogged easy for about 15 minutes between the races and feared the worst for the upcoming 5-miler. Then about 2 minutes into that race I realized I felt great. I ended up only about 30 seconds off a PR, despite no competition, a steady rain, and a challenging course.

I don't know what you can take from this, but I think refueling/rehydrating after the first race is key. Also, you probably don't need to rest up or be as easy with your warm-up as you think on Sunday. Maybe even add in a few minutes of hard stuff to wake up your legs.

Good luck.

Since you have some time to prepare, try to alter your training to get you used to running hard on back to back days. For example, if you usually do a tempo run on tuesday and repeats on thursday with an easy run in between, try doing the tempo on tuesday and the repeats on wednesday a few times.

As far as the race weekend goes, be sure to get a real good cool down run in after the first race and stay hydrated.

I used to do this all the time. In fact, around July 4 my college coach and I would see how many races we could do. I think the most was 4; a 5k on July 3rd at 6pm, a 5k on July 4 at 9am, a 5k on July 4 at 10am, and then a 1 mile on July 4 at noon. All 4 were in different towns within about a 20 minute drive. If July 3/4 that year had been a Fri/Sat I'm sure we would have tried to find 1 or 2 Sunday races just to see...

Another time I did Olympic distance tri's back to back on a Sat/Sun. Had decent races both days.

If you're getting quality training in this is not that big a deal to pull off. To do something that resembles the demand on your body go for a hard run the day after a race. Back when I did the back-to-backs I was doing a lot of quality multisport training. Mon was a practice tri, Tues a bike crit plus a run, Weds a track workout plus a swim, Thurs a bike time trial, Fri an easy run plus a swim, Sat or Sun a race (tri, running, cycling, whatever) and the other weekend day was a long run or ride. If you're doing enough quality back to back rces won't hit you too hard. If this is your first 2 races of the year it's hard to be ready for the demands.

d2xccoach wrote:

If you're getting quality training in this is not that big a deal to pull off. To do something that resembles the demand on your body go for a hard run the day after a race. Back when I did the back-to-backs I was doing a lot of quality multisport training. Mon was a practice tri, Tues a bike crit plus a run, Weds a track workout plus a swim, Thurs a bike time trial, Fri an easy run plus a swim, Sat or Sun a race (tri, running, cycling, whatever) and the other weekend day was a long run or ride. If you're doing enough quality back to back rces won't hit you too hard. If this is your first 2 races of the year it's hard to be ready for the demands.

Thanks. These will be my 5th and 6th races this year, following a Half Marathon, 10K and a couple of 5Ks so far. I like the idea of following up a race with a hard run, which is what I did after my last 5K. The hard run went so well, that I ran a solid 10-mile run at a little over 7:00 miles on the 3rd night. THAT one hurt. There are a few weekday 5Ks going on in my area now, I think I'll run a couple with a followup harder training run the next day.