How to race one 8k per week

are you going to Mount Union. b/c if you are your screwed. not only do you race 1 time per week but the training is just terrible. transfer now.

just run hard at important meets... run the others as tempos... even if your coach doesn't approve. just pretend you are inconsistent.

Any other advice?

That's a tough racing schedule, because you just spend all your time recovering. Might have to go with the "inconsistent" strategy that was mentioned previously.

At my school we have a race scheduled just about every week. Not everyone runs all of them, and the best people aren't allowed to try hard until the last one before conference and from then on.

Other races we are given a set pace which is easy as hell for the top five and see how many more can stay together the whole way.

sc runner wrote:

At the college I will be attending, we have only two off weeks the entire season (from the first week of September through early November). Is there a way for me to race one 8k a week without burning out?

what in the world are you worried about? We had a X-C meet every week from Sept 10th (or so) to late Nov. (nationals); and nobody worried about being burned out. We typically improved week by week and when the weather cooled in mid to late October, our times would drop quite a bit compared to Sept. We would run around 100 mpw and would not really rest up for any meets until Conference, Regionals and Nationals. (and many of us would still maintain that 100 mpw up until Nationals week, where it would drop to around 60, to be really rested and ready to go all out). From then we would transition to Indoor track and training, leading right to outdoor season. For God's sake man, get ahold of yourself. Man up.

Instead of sand-bagging it, just take easy days more often. Some people will do a long run every 9 or 10 days during the racing season and the day after a race, they will just jog 4 or 5 miles easy. It's not the continual racing that burns people out; it's the failure to recover from one race to the next.

A smart coach won't race his athletes for a lot of consecutive weekends. I'm looking at my schedule for next season and we have seven races spread through late August to November 15. We have only two races that are on back-to-back weekends.

My advice would be what others have suggested. Try to restrain yourself a bit in the meets that don't really matter. That way you aren't running yourself into the ground with a hard race effort every week.

Also, are you sure that you'll be running every meet? If it's a big team your coach may not be running everyone at every meet.

Take the meets and put them in order of importance, take the top 3 and RACE them, then use the other runs as workouts. Low key racing is likely some of the best training you can get for any event as you are stressing your body and it’s systems just the way that is required for your race itself. In these go out relaxed, and run hard and relaxed at what feels like 90%. Look at the races as your key workout for the week the hardest of your hard days. I am sure your coach will have you do 1 or 2 hard days each week and then a race. In these workouts hold back!, and let the other guys hammer there body’s into the ground. Any coach who has runner race each week has not got a very good understanding of training and like will have you doing a good deal more hard stuff then is wise. Most important thing you can do is take your easy days EASY. 7-8 min pace or a heart of (130 to 155). If you don’t do too much hard running each week allow for recovery from your workouts and look at the season as have 2-3 races and then a weekly time trial you should be just fine.

solrichards wrote:

I am sure your coach will have you do 1 or 2 hard days each week and then a race. In these workouts hold back!, and let the other guys hammer there body’s into the ground. Any coach who has runner race each week has not got a very good understanding of training and like will have you doing a good deal more hard stuff then is wise. Most important thing you can do is take your easy days EASY. 7-8 min pace or a heart of (130 to 155). If you don’t do too much hard running each week allow for recovery from your workouts and look at the season as have 2-3 races and then a weekly time trial you should be just fine.

this is the schedule of a loser.

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