Running Around 7•1•12

Week 6 • Summer Base 2012

I hope everyone is enjoying the Olympic Trials this week. Lots of compelling stories and great performances!! Great to see the Knoxville-bases athletes performing at a high level too!!

We're continuing with our Summer base training period, but we're also going to start adding some unstructured intensity into the mix with progression runs. A progression run simply means that you're starting easy and then picking up the pace part way through the run. My suggestion is for 6-10 miles on Tuesdays during base mileage. 60 to 75 minutes is a good guideline if you're going by time. Let's make the progression run 30 minutes of easy running followed by 30 minutes at a faster pace. Notice that I didn't give you a specific pace (e.g. T, R, I). Just go by feel. The only real requirement is that the second half is faster than the first half. If you need something more specific, try dropping the pace by about 30 sec/mile. So if you start at 8 min/mile, do the second half at 7:30/mile.

If you're feeling good after the run, you can also add 4-6 striders on the track.

If you like turning left instead of road runs, here is the official off-season base track training plan:
http://trackworkouts.blogspot.com/2008/06/summer-track-workout-progression.html

Finally, this is a time of year when many of us are taking time off or are going on vacation, etc. The Facebook group page is a good resource to check in with each other to see who is going to be at the track or if anyone is doing a particular workout.