Hey All
I’ve been a ‘follower’ of ET for a long time not and have had my input on things a few times here but only every in other athlete’s threats and never thought about making my own about my “800m Pursuit”. Im always researching about T&F;wheather it be information about technique etc or just grazing through other logs (from sprinters to distance runners) to see what others are up to and I feel that i’ve learnt alot of this site through-out the years and havn’t contributed all that much so i thought that i’d just make a journal of my own training for others to look at for ideas or maybe just to see things differently.
A little about myself:
I’m a 20 yr old male from Australia who’s been running since i was 10yrs old. I was always into ANY sport i could get my hands on ever since i could walk- i just love competition and just seeing how far i can push my bodies limits. it all started when i was running the school XC in yr 5, not intending to win or anything but just to see what i could do (mind you i ran it in long track pants, jacket and one of those hats with the safty flap on the back to protect the neck – Dam mum made me look like the biggest nerd back then :D) turns out i got out sprinted to come 2nd by the kid that used to win everything. After the race the other boys dad came up to me and offered for me to join his son and train me for XC (his son had been training for yrs) and thats where it all started. Although i started out as a XC running because i was never a fast sprinter at all, as i grew up and began to run Track i found my love for the 800m.
When i went onto highschool i gave up running until i was 15 where i restarted my training with another coach with a big squad but i wasn’t very serious about it- it was just a fun thing to do. I continued to train with this coach until my first year out of school where he left Australia to go live in NYC. When he left he didn’t say anything to the squad or anyone it was just one day he was there and the next he was gone. This left the squad in a bit of a pickle- with the majority of them still young they all had no idea what to do about training so i began to put sessions together just to get them all by. Turned out 2 of the girls made it to the National Champions for the first time with 1 of them picking up medals(they both were still in Primary School so they had to run up an age). Since then- 2 yrs on im still coaching most of those same kids with alot of new ones joining and i’ve completed my level II coaching course for Middle Distance and Steeple.
Current Pb’s
200m: 23.3
400m: 49.8
800m: 1.55
My focus is on the 800m which all my training is towards but i also dabble in the 400m when im preparing for a race. The 200m is just a comedy race for me where i get to have fun against the sprinters although its always good to run a sprint Pb with only 800m training 🙂
Anyway this log will only include my own training and not the training of the squads as they do different sessions. Im currently preparing for a meet in July where some USA and NZ schools come over to Australia to compete and then i will turn my focus on Nov-Jan QLD Champs. The Schedual I’ve set is just a rough one that i was using to experiment with to see whats good and whats not- from there i will change it accordingly for the squads training for the track season
This is the rough layout of my Training Plan that ive been following:
? Weeks Base Training
4 Weeks Hills Training
4 Weeks Lactate Training
6 Weeks Co-ordination [includes 7-10day taper before comp]
Because I’m the majority through the program so far I’ll only recall so far back (from the sessions I’ve recorded)
Base Training:
My base training consisted of only logging km’s and not about how fast I was running. Each day was either a 30-45 min cruisey run or like 2km reps on the track or something like that
Hills:
Mon: Hills
Tues: 30min run
Wed: Hills
Thurs: 20-30 min Recovery jog
Fri: Hills
Sat: Rest
Sun: Longer Track work (like 1km-2kms I think)
With the hills running I wasn’t just running up them normally I was using a sort of ‘bouncing or springing’ action- focusing on getting as much height as possible with each bound. The hill was quite steep but its hard to say how steep
Lactate Training:
Sun: 3x Sets of 4x 150m @800m race pace with 20sec & 5min Recovery
Mon: 6x600m with 2min Recovery
Tues: 30-45min easy Run
Wed: 2x Sets of 4x 300m @close to 800m pace as possible with 45sec & 5min Recovery
Thurs: Rest
Fri: 2 Sets of 6x200m @2sec faster than 800m pace with 90sec & 5min Rec (although 2nd set continued until I was unable to continue running under that pace- so it could end up being 10reps for the last set [highly unlikely tho :P])
Sat: 30-45min easy Run
I will add in the new training phase when I get around to it because I cant remember it off the top of my head atm :). All of these training days are very subject to change if I don’t quite feel ‘strong’ enough to complete the session well- they are only a guide.
Any thoughts from everyone on my program and session results is greatly appreciated as all comments whether they are good or bad will help me when it comes time to assess and change the program so please, comment away even if its just a little comment 🙂