Hey guys, so I am trying to find the info on a specific track workout that is part of the oregon track program. It’s a marker set that pretty much every runner can compare themselves to others, no matter what generation. I think as of a few years ago Rupp set the record and outlasted Pre’s mark.
I cant remember if it’s 200 all out, 200 recovery (at 70 secs per 400) for as long as you can go (I think Rupp went something like 24ish laps or something like that). It sounded like it was similiar to a K Pump type of set, where you max out your effort for a short distance and then get the same amount of recovery at 1/2 the distance.
Any help on the workout protocol would be arppeciated. I’m looking to look at the speed sessions of it and seeing what they were covering in m/s distance.
ETA: It’s likely done at other places, I know it became a famous tradition workout that runners could compare themselves to the past great ones.
I’ve done it several times before I knew it as the “Oregon” workout. It’s basically 12 X 200 hard with a 200 float (not really recovery, definitely not jogging). If you get the pacing right, the hard 200’s will be 10-15 seconds faster than the easier 200’s. When I was in around 15:00 5k shape, I would run the hard 200’s in 34 down to 32 and the easy 200’s in around 45 down to 43. It resembles a threshold workout more than an interval workout because if you go too hard on the hard 200’s you will have to slow down too much on the easy ones. Hope that helps.
You may be right. I always thought it was 3 miles of 200/200 but 30/40 for as long as you can handle it might be what they did. For most people that would be about 400-1200 meters total which wouldn’t be much of a workout.
I edditted my post, to clarify, it may not be originially an “oregon” track session (it probaly came from some coach in scandanvia for all I know), but I just remember it was a Oregon track marker set that all the big boys have done while at oregon.
Fartleker was right. It’s the 30/40 workout. When I saw your post I remembered this article from 2008 in the Oregonian about Galen’s attempt at it, I clipped it and saved it but can’t find it now. Did some google searching and found it in their archives. You might want to modify it to you/your athletes levels though.
. www.oregonlive.com/sports/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/sports/1224550533173210.xml&coll=7
The 30-40 consists of this: Run the first half of a 400-meter lap in 40 seconds, the second half in 30 seconds. And repeat, as often as you can stand to do it. It requires repeatedly pushing into anaerobic territory, recovering slightly and doing it again.
This is from the article. Do they have it backwards? It’s 1st 200 in 30 secs, recover 200 in 40 secs correct?
Every time I’ve seen it, it’s hard/easy so you’re right.
At CSU we did some dumbed down versions of this. 200 all out generally 27-29 seconds with 60 seconds to recover. Most of the really good guys did about 20 of these.
I think most programs do something similar. A lot of my old track workouts(pre-ken) I stole from flotrack. The michigan was always a super test of how good of shape I was in, that’s also a consistent workout you can see results from others about and in my opinion it’s more applicable to 5k/10k guys.
We did this workout in high school but applied it to everyone’s pace to make it more realistic. Take your 5k pr time and break it down to 400 pace. Subtract 5s for the fast 200 and add 5s for the slow 200. Run alternating fast/slow 200s for as long as you can. We were allowed three misses before we stopped to basically make it longer.
I have a copy of Dellinger’s book, ‘Winning Running’; the workout is detailed in there. It’s essentially 70 second laps, first 200 is “quick” and second is “float”. I’m pretty certain it was never done to exhaustion, but I’d have to look to be sure. He had Chapa and Salazar doing it.
I’m not sure it’s a “marker workout” per se and I wouldn’t never use it as one due to pace variation; in any case if you’re interested in these sorts of workouts check out Mikhail Igloi’s workouts, I was coached in the mid-late 90’s when I “just ran” by a woman who lived and breathed Igloi. Protocol involved repeats running at or faster then race pace for a given distance followed by a quick float “jog”, no rest and directly rolling into the next rep after the float.
We would usually do 5k total, the 5k was broken into “sets” of around 1k to 2k-ish w/a lap jog between the sets.
They weren’t effective for me but as with any protocol different strokes for different folks.
It’s definitely 200 meter fast in :30 and 200 meter float in :40. I think the author inadvertently worded that second sentence a certain way and it made it confusing.
I don’t think it matters after the first 400. Whether they start with the float or the fast, the point of the workout is to be continuous, not all out 200s in 27 seconds on :60 like somebody else mentioned. That’s a different workout altogether with a completely different stimulus. The over/under your 5k PR that iamaero mentioned is an good place to start I think, although for Galen’s relative paces it’s more like; slightly slower than mile pace in the fast and steady running in the recovery. Probably not a great idea to do THAT workout either. The over/under 5k pr is closer to the original workout’s intent for amateurs and less advanced runners.
Like Canova says on Lets Run; "And remember that, in any case, the plan for amateurs or young runners is not a miniature of the plan of great champions, such as a Toyota Yaris is not a miniature of a Formula One. "
Not really. You can’t see the difference in the 2 workouts? It’s 2 completely different workouts. Which my question was, I wanted to know this particular protocol.
Having a longer recovery than the “speed” part vs having “speed” set longer absolutely matters. You being a elite should know that.
Not really. You can’t see the difference in the 2 workouts? It’s 2 completely different workouts. Which my question was, I wanted to know this particular protocol.
Having a longer recovery than the “speed” part vs having “speed” set longer absolutely matters. You being a elite should know that.
Neither part is longer than the other – both are 200m. The “speed part” takes 30 seconds, and recovery takes 40 seconds, just as the article states. I believe the only part in question is which comes first, the faster 200 or the slower one. Assuming you can do more than two or three cycles of this, I really don’t think it matters much which one you start with (i.e., an extra 40 second 200 at the beginning of the workout is not going to be what breaks you).
I guess I was taken off by going slow/fast from the article vs fast/slow from how the others described it, and when I thought it was fast 200/slow 200.
I wanted to get an understanding of the actual protocol, so yeah maybe it is semantics, but being an coach, that’s what we do. So I’m sorry if I have an athlete say “coach can we do it backwards” well yeah that for me changes the workout. But that’s just me.
ETA: And here is how it changes the workout for me in a coaching standpoint. When I want to have a set that I can compare with, (if I wanted to say do this set ever 6 weeks or 3 months), I certainly want the same protocol to be followed. Thus, clarification on it. And you can do either or, just wondering the actual protocol of THIS particular workout that I asked about.
Either way do you coach any runners that this would be useful for as a guage. You have to be pretty good as an AGer to get in 2-3 laps let alone the 10 or more laps that the top oregon guys were doing.
I have guys that can get in probaly 6 laps of this that are working towards edr races (I dont need them to do 24 like Rupp or else I’d send them to college to run and not on a club level university tri team). Which I wont give them this exact set, what I do is a very similiar set, but stop it after 5 mins and then have them do several sets of it. It’s basically 30 secs hard, 30 secs normal x5 (5 mins of track work) with usually 5 sets overall. Then I see how far they covered in the 5 sets. ETA: 2 of the guys on the college team, wanted to know the workout and try it and really see what they could do, so they can compare themselves to the Rupp’s, and Pre’s of the running world. Thus, I wanted to know the exact protocol of this exact “oregon” running workout. I dont really think it matters how many laps they can do, to get the actual “official” standard of this workout does it? Whether someone cant make 1 lap or 6, I just wanted to know the same timing they were doing it on.
Eta: The top ITU pro I coach currently could probaly get to double digits, and I’d probaly say would die at about 11 (former D1 runner, so he has the run background) laps if we are doing it continuous, but I’ve never given any athlete the chance to do that (maybe he can only do 8, I am not sure, but he could handle himself more than a normal AG’er obviously). I just calculated it out to a 5k time and that is like a 14:20 5k. So I think 10 would be expected for him, 15 would be superb. I have them doing more sets than 1 continous, go until you fall over workout.