How To Train For Distance Running
This blog is an except from my free ebook, titled “Get Set: Foundational Knowledge For Recreational Distance Runners”. If you’d like a copy, see the footer of this website to grab one! You could also email me at hello@extensionfitness.com.au
How To Train
A remarkable discovery has emerged from the field of endurance sports and sports science in recent decades. In any endurance sport (where the event lasts for more than a few minutes), the top performers always train in roughly the same way. This holds true for running, swimming, rowing, cross country skiing etc.
The best athletes have this in common:
⁃ They put in a lot of training relative to their limits
⁃ Most of this training is done at relatively low intensities (for them) - around 80 percent of total time
⁃ Some of their training is done at high intensities (for them) - around 20 percent of total time
What’s more, field-based research has uncovered the same phenomenon for recreational athletes – people just like you and me! This is great news because it means you do not have to run hard every training session. In fact, doing so will probably undermine your progress.
How do you implement this sort of training as a recreational athlete or fitness runner? Well, at the very least you need to be doing some hard running and lots of relatively easy or steady running.
Here’s what it might look like if you could run twice per week and spare ~70 minutes for each session (in addition to a weekly strength session).
Session 1
- Warm up
- 5 x 4 minutes at 5K race pace with 60s walk then 60s jog in-between each hard interval
- 10 minutes steady running at conversational pace
Session 2
- Warm up
- 65 minutes easy running using a run walk pattern - 4 minutes run then 1 minute walk
Session 3
Strength training - major movement patterns (squat, hinge, push, pull, trunk/spine & hip exion) plus single leg strength and some plyometric training (jumping exercises) for intermediate to advanced strength trainers.
Easy Running
Learning to keep your easy runs easy is a critical part of “succeeding” as a runner, from the once-a-week fitness runner to the serious marathoner. Easy runs help you to build aerobic fitness with the least possible fatigue cost and stress on your joints, muscles and tendons.
Many, many runners fall into what has been called a “moderate intensity rut” where they spend too much time at medium intensities. This yields not much fitness for a high fatigue cost. Successful runners run easy a lot, but they also run hard. Finding the balance is key – about 80 percent of your total running time should be ‘easy’. Some medium paced running is certainly needed, especially those preparing for marathon or half marathon distances as their race pace will most likely fall into this intensity band. The issue with too much moderate intensity running is that the ROI is relatively low – you pay a high price in fatigue per unit of tness gain at this intensity.
So, what do I mean by ‘easy’? Technically, this means that your effort level is below your aerobic threshold; the point at which your body starts to draw down on your short-term energy supplies and re up your fast-twitch muscle fibres.
How do you know whether you’re running beneath this threshold? An accurate low tech, low cost method you can use is “the talk test”.
Here’s how to do the talk test:
1. Set out at what feels like an easy pace (for you). After 5 minutes or so, say a 50 syllable statement, like,
“One hundred twenty one, one hundred twenty two, one hundred twenty three, one hundred twenty four, one hundred twenty five, one hundred twenty six, one hundred twenty seven”
2. Ask yourself, “Was my breathing comfortable?”. If yes, you’re in your aerobic zone, doing easy running. If no (or, if you’re in doubt), it’s very likely you’re over your threshold.
3. If you’re under threshold, increase your pace and hold it for a couple of minutes, then ask the question again. Once you say, “my breathing is NOT comfortable”, chances are you’re over your threshold.
There are other, more reliable ways to determine your threshold pace. A true determination can only be done in a lab, where blood samples can be taken or gas analysis can be performed. (And where you may need to run with an air tight seal over your mouth so that CO2 concentration in your exhalation can be measured accurately!)
But there are cheap and reliable methods which don’t require a lab and can approximate the information you’re seeking with a reasonably high degree of reliability. One example is a 30-minute time trial, where you ran as far as you can in a 30-minute time period. Your average heart rate over this period (measured by a GPS enabled running watch) can be used to provide a good estimate of your lactate threshold heart rate. For further information on this topic, have a look at this great article from Phil Mosley (founder of MyProCoach – who’s running training plans I use personally):
For the vast majority of recreational runners, the sort of tests described by Phil will adequately do the job.
An important point for new runners to note is that you may be over this threshold when you run at any pace! Running is a lot more demanding than walking, and at the start of your journey you may not yet have the capability to run continuously without drawing down on your short-term, anaerobic (without oxygen) energy supplies.
If this is you, don’t fret. What you’ll need to do first is employ a run/jog and walk strategy when you go out for training sessions. For example, you may set out for a 20-minute session, where you’ll run twenty seconds out of each minute, and walk forty seconds. As you go on and your fitness increases, you’ll be able to decrease the duration of the walking periods until you can do continuous running under your aerobic threshold.
Hard Running
A key aspect of distance running training is clocking up lots of distance at a relatively easy pace, so you build up a good engine – your aerobic energy system.
But, to get the best out of yourself, you need to do a judicious amount of hard running, too.
By “hard” I mean above your aerobic threshold (the point at which you begin to draw down on short-term / without-oxygen energy). And by “judicious” I mean around 20 percent of the total time you spend running.
Let’s focus in on that 20 percent, now.
There are many ways you could spend that time, and there are different gears, speeds, or intensity levels which all fall under the umbrella of “hard” – or high intensity.
The way you slice up your 20 percent of hard running really depends on what your goal is – whether you want to improve over 1500m, 5K, 10K, half- marathon, marathon, or ultra-marathon!
The training base or foundation of a competent 5K runner looks like a lot like that of a competent marathoner: lots of easy-ish running. Even though the race distances are very different! Indeed, professional 5K track athletes run A LOT of Ks – it is highly probable that it would be normal for a professional 5K runner to log over 100Ks per week.
If the base is similar, the finishing touches are different, with runners tailoring their hard running to the specific requirements of their specialty or target race. In general terms, if you have a shorter target race, like 1500m or 5K, you’ll do less total distance at a higher speed relative to your top speed. If your goal race is a half or full marathon, you’ll run further at a lower speed relative to your top speed.
These sample hard running sessions illustrate the contrasts between the hard running that can prepare you for a 5K race vs a marathon race.
5K Hard Training Session
Warm up and running drills ~1500m
8 x 400m at 5K race pace with 60 seconds rest between reps
1600m at 10K race pace
Cool down & stretch ~1000m
Total distance = 7.3K
Marathon Hard Training Session
Warm up and running drills ~2000m
4 x 2000m at half marathon pace
5 x 400m at 10K race pace
Cool down and stretch ~1000m
Total distance = 13K
So, to recap, your hard running needs to be;
1. At the right speed and intensity to support performance in your goal distance, and
2. Of sufficient duration and frequency to support performance in your goal distance
3. Not so hard, or for so long that it smashes you up – causing excessive fatigue and tiredness. It’s normal to feel weary the morning after a hard training session. But if that feeling stretches further than 36-48 hours after the session, you may be over-extending yourself. Let the fitness come and don’t force it.
Other Training Considerations
Different runners have different capabilities to absorb and adapt to hard running. Some runners can easily soak up the harder training sessions and they get a lot of benefit from pushing their limits. Others can become injured, sick, or really, really tired if they’re not very careful with how hard they push themselves in harder workouts (the author falls into this category!!). Each runner needs to experiment over time to find their own sweet spot within the general boundaries of an 80/20 easy-hard split.
Lifestyle factors such as sleep, work stress and family commitments have a bearing on how much hard running you can tolerate. Generally speaking, the more recovery time you can access, the more you can push yourself in hard sessions. But if for some reason you nd yourself in a situation where you have little to do but run and rest, bear in mind that it can still be counterproductive to push too hard with high-speed running. After all, the name of the game is distance running and the physical property you’re developing is speed endurance, or stamina. You’re cultivating the ability to maintain a high aerobic work rate, to be able to run fast for a (relatively) long time. You don’t need to be a sprinter! Indeed, if you spend too many resources on near-sprinting, you may undermine your speed-endurance.
Get To Know Your Gears
One of the things which can help you to do your hard running well is to develop a sense for the different “gears” available to you; the different paces you can run at. I’m making an analogy to the gears on a bike or car – with a limited number of harder/faster gears.
Why? Because you begin to develop an accurate sense of what’s fast for you, as well as an appreciation for how your different fast gears feel. With this sense for the differentiation of your faster paces, you can develop your ability to “run by feel”, which is an important part of doing hard training well. It’s also a critical aspect of racing, where how you pace a race matters a great deal. Learning how hard to push; what gears to use for how long; is critical to getting the most from yourself in a race. This skill is referred to as pacing.
The table below gives you an idea of what I’m talking about.
Know Thy Gears