With the success of parkrun in Mildura, Id like to give a few tips to assist you with reaching your full potential. Mixing up some of your training runs to work towards getting your personal goals is easy and can be a really fun journey. Whether your goal is to break 40 minutes or 20 minutes a few simple tips can help get you there.
Increasing weekly volume without causing injury- The main priority is to increase training load while avoiding injury. A general rule is no more than 10% weekly increase per month. So if you’re training 20km/week, every 4 weeks increase roughly 10%. This becomes very important when people are covering 100+km weekly. Another option is 3 week cycles. Being 2 weeks of hard training followed by 1 week of rest and recovery. Consistent running will equal those big rewards!
Thershold run- Thershold running is maintaining a uncomfortable pace for a set period of time or distance.
Speed work- Working on overall speed so you can hit at and above the pace you wanna run to break your pbs. Such session might include- 3x1km reps at current 5km pace. 5x200m sprints at your upper limit.
The Long run- once every week you should be aiming to include a long run. The important part here is its easy running! You don’t wanna go breaking your body covering the long run. Everyones long run will be different, some might be 30 minutes at 6min/km pace and others might be 2.5 hours at 4:30min/km pace.
Rest and maintaining yourself. Rest days are the most important part of your training! Also remember to get those massages/myotherapy to assist your body with recovery. Keeping on top of your well being is the most important part to being able to train consistently.
