As some others have clarified, I most certainly did not mean that you should replace your longer repeats or tempo runs with this type of short sprint work. However, I would postulate that it is almost as important. I was able to take my 1 mile time from 4:17 to 4:09 with the exact same training schedule from 1 year to the next only adding these sprints. I also ran pr's in the 400m and 800m. Now that may not be such a large effect for a 10k, but the oregon track club swears by them so im assuming there is some merit to taking an extra 15 minutes 1-2x per week to do 6-10 60m sprints at max effort with max recovery

Your "base" miles are whatever you can handle or are capable of. If you want to be the fastest you can be you will train as much as you can and the appropriate workouts for your current ability.

I have my opinions about how far you should be able to go in training for certain distances but they are only opinions:

10K You should be able to run a minimum of 8 miles at a time with a weekly volume of 15 miles. For a 10K in a tri you should be able to run 10 miles at a time with a weekly volume of at least 20 miles.

Certainly more running will make you a better runner and if you are performance oriented you should.

Now when you said speed work, what exactly did you mean? Did you mean running on a track very short intervals like the OP said to build foot speed?

Or maybe you meant running intervals of 2 to 5 minutes to work on your VO2max running speed?
Or even still, did you mean intervals of 8 to 20 minutes to work on threshold speed and endurance?

Each one of those can be called speed work but do different things for people. The most bang for your buck is the threshold intervals, they build endurance and speed. If your threshold speed is close to your VO2max speed then maybe VO2 intervals are in order.

So again, what speed work did you do and when?

jaretj

By "speed work" I usually mean anything under 1200m, typically repeats of 400s and 800s on the track (Jack Daniels: I and R paces). I've lately been training for sprints (5K run) and conservatively average around 30-35 mpw. I follow the Jack Daniels plan so speed workouts usually begin about 18 weeks before the A race (build phase). However....the past few years I don't think I've spent enough time doing the easy & threshold stuff. So I'm wondering if there is a "test" to see if the base is adequate (like maybe, HR should stay below a certain bpm during threshold runs, or something like that). Long story short: I wonder if I'm hitting the speed work too soon.

Thanks for this intel. It may change my track regiment for the better!
M

I just recently did Daniels Blue plan, is that the one you did? There is a lot of fast stuff in there balanced with some longer stuff.

I really think it helped me this year.

jaretj

I've been using the 5/10K plan but made the mistake of not modifying it for tri training. I recently sent an email to JD and he said to scale down from 3 Quality days to two if using the plan along with cycling/swimming. No wonder I crashed and burned this season -- too much intensity! I recall seeing the Red, White & Blue plans in the back so I'll check them out too, thanks.

There's probably a much smaller difference in base mile from 5k through the marathon than you'd think if you're trying to prepare optimally. You're really not training for any of those distances on less than 40mpw. Of course, it can be done for less, but you're leaving time on the table. For an AGer, just training for road running, I'd say 40mpw for 5k/10k, 50mpw for 1/2 marathon and +60mpw for marathon. Really the biggest difference will be the long runs. YMMV.

I've also loosely followed the Marathon A plan capping my run volume at 45 mpw. There is a lot of threshold in that plan to build endurance for HIM's.

As with any cookie cutter plan you should follow the jist of the plan. 3 Quality workous is a lot while swimming and biking mainly cuz you will have 1 or 2 quality workouts for each of those sports too.

I've never looked at the 5 and 10K plans in JD's book. Recently I've read 5K and 10K Training by Brian Clarke . He talks a lot about having the energy to do certain workouts, if you don't have the energy you make adjustments. I thought it was an interesting idea. I didn't use his plans but took note of the concepts.

jaretj