Sooo a few weeks back I was emailing with the erstwhile Faster Bunny about 5K training plans and how most of the ones on the internet are of the Couch-to-5K or otherwise rank beginner variety, for good reason; when most people are just getting started with running or coming back after a break, 5K is the logical place to start and a kind and gentle plan is called for. Hence lots of nice, mellow 5K plans that are light on workouts and low on mileage.
But, sometimes, people with lots of experience and a reasonable amount of fitness and tolerance for discomfort also want to run a 5K, not just to finish but to utterly destroy it, and those folks also need a solid training plan that meets their particular needs and goals. That's part of what I've really liked about RunCoach--you tell the system what and when your goal race is and how you want to organize your week, and it takes into account your entire history (particularly training volume and performance) and uses the algorithm to generate a plan that in my experience has been pretty darn solid. (I give RunCoach a lot of the credit for going from a 3:47 marathon to a 3:36 and then 3:31.)
Before these last couple of 5K-focused cycles, I had personally never seen a 5K training program aimed at a more experienced, competitive-but-still-recreational runner vs. a more beginner plan. (I'd seen excerpts from a few pro 5K runners' training logs but those were hardly relevant to me either.) It's been cool to see 10-12 mile speed-focused workouts on the plan regularly, though, as I told Faster Bunny, it also kind of scares the shit out of me a bit.
Though, if we're honest, I have yet to follow it consistently in 2019. Which I guess makes it both less and more scary.
Which is all a roundabout way of saying I've been meaning to train my butt off for a wicked fast 5K in April, but the universe and my body have just not been very cooperative over the last couple of months, which is frustrating when you're PAYING for that sweet-but-utterly-terriying training plan. There's not really been enough to make it worth (in my opinion) writing entire weekly logs, but here's a quick overview:
Grand Total: 32.65 miles
Monday 1/14: a.m. strength / p.m. karate
Tuesday 1/15: Fly to LA; abandoned threshold workout, 4.5 total (ie, the run that inspired this post)
Wednesday 1/16: 8 easy
Thursday 1/17: Fly home
Friday 1/18: 2 warm up, 2 x 2 @ HMP / 1:30 jog, 2 cool down = 8.15
Saturday 1/19: Rest
Sunday 1/20: 12 long
Grand Total: 10 miles, lots of skiing
Monday 1/21: Fly to Vancouver
Tuesday 1/22: 10 easy in the snow & ice
One of those days when I was really happy for the Ice Bugs!
Wednesday 1/23: Skiing
Thursday 1/24: Rest
Friday 1/25: Skiing
Yes the running suffered but I do love me some mountaintops.
Saturday 1/26: Skiing
Sunday 1/27: Fly home
Grand Total: ~27 miles
Monday 1/28: Strength + aborted speed work -- 2 warm up, 2 x 1K @ 10K pace, 4 1 x 1K @ 5K pace, 2 x 1K @ 10K pace, 2 cool down (5.15 total)
- I attempted this track workout on Monday because we'd been invited to another dojo on Tuesday so I wouldn't be able to do it on my normal track day. I don't know what it was but I really struggled with hitting these paces. I hit the paces in the first set of intervals, but just barely and it was SUPER hard, like way harder than 10K pace should be when you haven't been training much, and even hit 5K pace for the first 1K but only at an absolute all-out, about-to-pass-out-and-puke sprint.
And hey, I even would have been game to just *TRY* the last ones and see what happened, but my body felt like I'd been in a car wreck (I suspect due to all the skiing) and what's worse I felt like I was riiiiight on the edge of blowing out my right calf/Achilles (a thing that seems to happen a couple times a year), even just jogging. So I decided it was smarter to bag it so that I could still run the Kaiser workout on Sunday.
Tuesday 1/29: Karate
Wednesday 1/30: Karate
Thursday 1/31: 8 easy, felt terrible
Friday 2/1: 6 easy, felt terrible
Saturday 2/2: Rest
Sunday 2/3: Kaiser Permanente 10K. This was supposed to be a hard workout rather than a race but I couldn't even come close to hitting the workout paces we'd talked about, which sucked. 1.6 warm up + 6.2 race = 7.8 total
Grand Total: 30 miles
Monday 2/4: Strength + karate
Tuesday 2/5: 2 warm up, 6 x 200m / 200m jog, 2 @ MP, 6 x 200m / 200m jog, 2 cool down = 9 total
The track is pretty sometimes.
Wednesday 2/6: Strength + karate
Thursday 2/7: 8 easy
Friday 2/8: 2 warm up, 3 x 2 miles @ HMP / 2:30 jog, 2 cool down
- I don't know what it was, but after Thursday's run, I had a very painful spot in my right tibia that ached every time I put weight on it. It didn't feel like a stress reaction (came on too suddenly, and passed the tap test), but it was still painful & I was afraid to try to run on it, so I skipped the threshold run hoping it would be better for my Sunday long run.
Saturday 2/9: Rest
Sunday 2/10: 13 long. Longest run of 2019 thus far and felt great!
Golden Gate Park. Any time I'm about to get down on myself for running not going well, I remind myself that I live here and it reeeeaaalllly does not suck.
So, yeah. There has technically been SOME running, but not much, and MANY of those terrifying workouts on my plan have gone unfinished (or unstarted). My body has also clearly just been grumpy so I'm trying to pay attention to it & not overdo anything as a build mileage back up while still pushing it a little & not copping out of workouts just because. Hopefully a better report this next week!
I'm also wondering how competitive people train for a 5k?! The 5k and 10k are so hard for me!
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