Hello everyone and greetings. I just thought you guy might be interested in my feedback. I have been following this thread since day 1 and almost tried change my training straight off. I stagnate at 5k real bad. I was stuck in mode others have said so I tear up everything and try this. My PB was 20:20 for long time. I always run close to this maybe a year the last 15 times. Before my training was moderate runs, long run with some speed play , Daniels tempo style and some classic vo2 stuff. Maybe 400s. Sometimes hills, whatever different coaches provide me. Maybe 45 miles up to 50.
Now for almost a month now I do what suggested on first page. 3x sub threshold. Feels so easy almost like it's a trick. Even easier than Daniels tempo for sure. So far I only do 9x1k around 15k pace and I do 5x7 mins at Hm pace or slower also feels quite easy and then I do maybe twice so far 3x3k somewhere between HM and M pace. Also feel easy. I think in total I have done maybe 11 sub T sessions now and not do anything else apart from easy runs including easy long. feel very slow. But I keep it up. Now last evening a big suprise, summer series 5k race. I did not feel good in warm up at all. Really bad in fact. But you know I was in total shock . I see my watch as I cross the line. 19:56. I thought must be big mistake. But I have run this race before it definitely true 5k course. Im very happy . Almost a year I have been trying with no success to get sub 20. I know not big for some people but for me I'm very happy 😊
Is this big suprise? Not even quite a month? I do not have training peaks or any other metrics but my Garmin is telling me training like this is increasing my overall train load. Before the line was flat.
Ok, so following are my two latest LT stage tests. They both took place on my personal treadmill under the same conditions (as far as I could).
I was fasted for multiple hours prior to the test. No caffeine on the day. Both tests took place in/after a deload week.
Same warm up for both tests (easy progressive 4 km). I wore the exact same kit on both tests.
I have run nothing but easy mileage, long runs and sub threshold workouts in between the tests. Most of the workouts were done on the treadmill, except a few shorter repeats which I have done outdoors.
Test Date: 25/06/2023
Temperature = 23.1 degrees Celsius
Relative Humidity = 39.1%
Baseline = 0.9 mmol/L
Stage / Avg Speed [km/h] / Lactate [mmol/L]
WU / 10.5 (10->12) / 0.9
1 / 13.9 / 1.8
2 / 14.4 / 1.6
3 / 15 / 2.1
4 / 15.6 / 2.2
5 / 16.3 / NA (Not Enough Blood)
6 / 16.3 / 4.8
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Test Date: 16/08/2023
Temperature = 21.9 degrees Celsius
Relative Humidity = 43 %
Baseline = 1.4 mmol/L
Stage / Avg Speed [km/h] / Lactate [mmol/L]
WU / 10.5 (10->12) / 0.4
1 / 13.9 / 1.0
2 / 14.4 / 1.0
3 / 15 / 1.5
4 / 15.6 / 2.0
5 / 16 / 2.4
6 / 16.3 / 3.8
*Notes:
1) Each stage lasted 7 minutes (except the warm up, of course).
2) The speed of the 5th stage is different between the tests by 0.3 km/h. I was not able to take a reading at 16.3 km/h in the first test so I repeated the same speed for the 6th stage. I've run a slower 5th stage during the second test to have more insight on the difference pace makes.
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This is the summary. I can attach an excel sheet with plots of the lactate curves, as well as the heart rate information if anyone is interested.
I have not even run three workouts per week, just two.
The system works.
4:00/km is exactly my HM average pace. 4:00/km is exactly my HM average pace.
Most of my workouts in the 7 weeks between the two tests were at this pace or slower. Rarely faster and definitely not for long durations. I did a few 400's sessions outdoors with 30 second rest in which I went faster than my HM pace (but also slower at times, due to the harsh humid summer I'm in).
Moreover, I went ahead and did my first VO2 Max work yesterday, after not having done any such work since March. I wanted to do so for two reasons:
1) Sharpen up for a local 5K that I might do next week.
2) Test the system and just introduce some variety to the stress stimulus I've been subjecting myself to.
So I set out to run a classic 5x1K in the evening. It is still very hot over here, but was not overly humid. It was 32.8 degrees Celsius with a relative humidity of 56% yielding a real feel of only 38.3 degrees Celsius (I say only because we can get days with a real feel of 50-55 degrees Celsius, so yeah).
Having woken up with a somehow tight chest and given the conditions, I thought I'd be satisfied with hitting 3:30/km pace, or anything around that.
I split the first rep in 3:20.3, and just started laughing out loud just as I did when I watched Jakob waving to the crowd during the semi final the other day. That first rep felt incredibly easy that I thought there must be something wrong. After a 400m jog recovery, I continued. Well here are the splits for the second, third and fourth kilometers:
3:21.5
3:22.1
3:23.9
Things did get tough for the last reps, and I mentally quit on the fifth last rep after 0.5 km which was also at 3:21/km pace. HR maxed out at 198 bpm which is 98% of Max HR for me.
It was hot, I was solo, I had done weight training and 4 km easy in the morning before work, and I still managed to run faster than I used to during the winter when I had company for some of the workouts.
Sure, I have been running more mileage lately, but that can't be the sole reason behind this. There's something to running these controlled sub threshold efforts.
On we go.
Thought I would share some success with this approach. I am coaching an athlete that I implemented 2 sub T + 1 medium long run per week about 2 months ago. His threshold pace has dropped from 10:29/mile to 8:20/mile in that time span. Granted he was relatively undertrained so that in part accounts for the huge jump but he says he feels fresh and better than he ever has with this system. Very excited to see how he continues to progress but this system seems to work excellent at least from this one example!
Checking in with a status update… tl;dr It’s working for me. YMMV
Results: 2 months in and VO2max is up three ticks to the highest I’ve recorded since getting this watch in April 2020. I don't race much, so this is the best way I have to gauge progress
YMMV: I take beta blockers so VO2max workouts are difficult. I’m naturally endurance inclined (which is magnified by the meds), so high mileage/low intensity rarely moves the needle. The Norwegian porridge seems just right given those constraints.
Workouts: Using Hobbyjogger Ingebrigtsen workouts as inspiration. No doubles and only running four days a week so far. Going to keep doing this until I either stall out or need to up mileage for a long race or something. First month did about 30 min of work per session. Second month shot for 31. Next month I’ll do 32. And so on. Hobbyjogger Ingebrigtsen seems to be topping off at around 45 min of work per session.
Effort: Lactate testing is logistically too complicated where I train (and not to mention pricey) so doing educated guesses on pacing using heart rate, Whoop strain, and perceived effort. This thread was very helpful in discerning where I need to be despite not doing lactate testing.
Shoes: Wear regular shoes for warmups, cooldowns and easy runs; Carbon trainers for work intervals to improve recovery on my old lady legs
Lifting: Lifting sessions of 0-60min daily based on fatigue and recommendations from my lifting app. Lifting to improve some imbalances and for vanity.
Advice: This type of training requires a constrained ego. You will finish the workouts feeling less than satisfied. If you grew up like me in the era of “if you didn’t see god, you weren’t running hard enough in the workout”, it’s a big mind shift. When in doubt, run slower than you want to.
Schedule:
Mon: workout + lift lower
Tues: lift upper
Wed: workout + lift lower
Thurs: lift upper
Fri: workout + lift lower
Sat: easy + lift full body
Sun: lift upper
I haven't been keeping up with this thread since around p. 30. I thought I'd share my experience with a version of this training method, though.
I started on June 27th after 3 years of injury issues. 2022 was the worst running year of my life and I made a commitment to run at least a mile a day this year regardless of health issues. All that to say that I jumped in with very little base.
I live in a very hilly area and refuse to drive the 15 miles to the nearest track, so I run hilly intervals.
I have no data on threshold levels, Max HR etc, so I ran a couple of hard solo 5kms (17:30/17:20) two weeks apart and based my interval paces/HR zones off of them (I know, very unscientific, but I'm 40 and had nothing to lose if this didn't work). I run more by feel and check data post workout to make sure perception is close to reality. I have averaged about 42km/ week these past two months + a 30-50km cycle biweekly.
The last two weeks of July I didn't run intervals due to time constraints.
I just ran a rainy track 10km in 34:45!
This training works for me.
The difficult part for me is holding back at the beginning of intervals and slowing down between reps.
If you're stuck in your training, not recovering between workouts, unable to stay healthy doing fast intervals, ... I would recommend trying this type of training.
I'm going to go for low 34 with super shoes in a few weeks.
*sub 32 10km pb is 16 years old
Strava stalker again 9/23/2023:
For anyone interested, sirpoc just ran around 16:5x I believe it must be on one of the worst or slowest designed courses I've ever seen , based on what I can see on Strava. Looking back, he's dropped over 2 minutes via this approach and his account is as fascinating to follow at this point as KI. Anyway I don't see him post here much now, so thought some of you might be interested in the fact he's still progressing. Still enjoying the thread, even the stuff Hard2find is posting. Find it really interesting. Thanks all.
Good morning everyone. I just thought as this thread dies down I would add my contribution. I have been doing this since maybe the first page and have had real breakthroughs and PB at 5k and 10k. I've finally broken 19 for the 5k and it just has suddenly clicked into place. It took maybe 4 weeks for me to feel a bit fresher doing three lots of sub t a week, but now I'm doing no vo2 or speedwork my old legs feel so much better. On top of that, PBs to boot! I was shocked to be honest, things all started feeling easier after that 4 weeks and then around another 3-4 weeks after that I was suddenly up a level. One big shout of to sirpoc. Top guy, I reached out to him for some help and he was more than happy to help. In fact, has given me my next 4 weeks training to help me slowly push my training up. I even know what CTL is now! Can't thank him enough. I think in some ways he's too modest here, to really lay this approach out for us all. And congrats to him on the PB, he is now really not too far off KI in the for the king of Norwegian singles hobby jogger approach lol
I would like to chime in on this great thread both as encouragement to you guys to continue and to add another data point.
I used this "Time crunched, low mileage, Norwegian-Inspired" method in 2021-22 to run a 4:40.4 mile (track) and 17min 5k (road) at age 40 after taking 20 years off from competitive racing and dedicated running.
Those were the only two races I ran--the 5k in November 2021 and the track mile April 2022. After becoming fascinated reading about the Ingebrigsten and Bakken method, and how radically it differed from my HS and college "All-out, all the time" training, I decided to try it out myself and target a mile race at age 40 as a personal experiment/ curiosity project.
Background fitness: last college track season 2003. Racing weight 160 lbs. College coach system:
Vo2 max intervals on Tuesday (Huffing and puffing after each rep, long rests, basically as fast as you can complete each rep) example: 5x mile.
Shorter, faster reps on Thursday with long rests. Again, each rep as fast as possible. Example 10x 300m.
"Tempo" run on Saturday. 4 miles. AKA a 4 mile race for all but the top guys.
"Easy" runs Mon, Wed, Fri. 8-9 miles, getting to 6:00 pace and staying there.
Long run Sunday, 15 miles, 6:00 pace.
Minimal exercise 2004 to 2015--work, wife, kids, etc. = 200 lbs dad bod. Recreational cycling 2015-2020 (three to five times per week with fellow middle aged dads). Not competitive cycling like Sirpoc, but spirited MAMIL riding. No power meter, intervals, etc. Annual cycling mileage during these years: 2400, 4800, 2900, 3600, 1800, 4100. This got me down to 185-190 lbs and much better cardio fitness than the previous decade. During these years I would run 0-2 times per month, usually three miles progressing from 8:00 at the start to 6:00 by the end.
Decided to start the running project in earnest November 2020. Treadmill 3-4 nights per week. 4 miles at 8:00 pace. December 2020 increased to 5 times per week. Kept the same 20 mpw at 8:00 pace on the treadmill through March 2021. Bought a GPS watch with wrist HR March 2021 with the idea the point of this device is to LIMIT my pace and HR. Total mindset switch from my youth. By watching food intake, got under 180 lbs.
First outdoor run with watch late March 25, 2021: 4 miles, avg 7:47, HR under 150 bpm always. April was spent gradually increasing average run to 6 miles. The word "threshold" shows up in log for the first time April 27, 2021--4 x 2:00 with 1 minute rest at what I felt was "comfortably hard", around 6:00 pace. At this time I decided I had better define my paces better, so I ran an all out 1 mile time trial on May 3 in flats on a hardpacked dirt road--5:15. I then used the online Tinman calculator and plugged in 5:10 mile as the reference, figuring a race on a track in spikes was worth 5 seconds. Spent May to October 2021 trying to build gradually and avoid injury, eventually finding the regimen that fit my work/kids schedule:
Mon: Threshold
Tuesday: easy
Wednesday: OFF
Thursday: Threshold
Friday: easy
Saturday: easy
Sunday: "long" aka usually 10 miles; minimum 8, max 12miles.
My threshold sessions were most often intervals of 3:00 (min 4 reps, max 8), 4 x5:00, or 2-3x 10:00. The rest was ALWAYS 59 seconds--to make sure I kept the intensity low enough that instead of panting and wishing for more recovery as in my youth, I was raring to go by 60 seconds.
My easy runs were NEVER allowed to go faster than 7:00, usually above 8:00. I often did 10 x 6-8s hill sprints/bounds after these easy runs.
Long run usually averaged 7:00 pace.
The most important points about this training was how EASY it was, and the complete lack of DREAD. Unlike my youth, no need to get psyched up for the workouts, and no no need to dread the gut-busting next interval because there is no gut busting with this system.
old_man_running_update 10/08/2023:
Update:
Road 10km in super shoes today in 33:19. I'm extremely happy.
I've missed the past 3 workouts due to illness, so missed out on some planned sharpening work, but I don't think it would have been of any benefit in retrospect.
I will keep doing this type of work while (hopefully) gradually building volume from 40km/week to (again, hopefully) 80 by the spring.
I ran my pbs at around 150km/week back in the day. I don't think my body could handle anything close to that any longer.
This thread seems to have slowed, prob due to Strava group.
But for anyone interested, sirpoc just ran 56:12 for 10 miles to finish inside the top 100 overall in the Great South run in the Uk, I believe this is a big event, 25k+?. According to Strava, looks like he set his 10k and 5k pb in the process. Looking back through the last few weeks, looks like almost no taper other than back to back easy days in the last 48 hours. He posts on Strava group a lot but thought anyone not on there might find this interesting, seems he is still hugely progressing.
In terms of rate of improvement, he's not alone benefiting from threshold interval focus, this year my hobby jogger partner (female mid 30s) has gone from 39 down to mid 36 for 10k (on a hot day!) typically averaging ~45-50 mpw, by doing threshold sessions twice per week, long run, plus strides with rare top end sessions sprinkled in, which sex-adjusted is probably a similar leap over a similar time frame. She does vary it a bit (eg has 1 rest day per week, sometimes makes the long run a progression, adds/replaces with the elliptical) but the two threshold sessions are the weekly staple. Can't persuade her to do 3 until she stops improving!
jiggymeister wrote:
Cool story thanks and congrats to Sirpoc for his massive result, he has more ahead.
As for myself, I did a half marathon yesterday in 1:21:3X, which was about a 3 minute PB.
A bit more context:
Most of my quality sessions running was slower than my eventual race pace. Longest reps (on treadmill) were 3 km long. Longest reps outdoors were 1.6 km long. My sub threshold paces were closer to 4:00/km than they were to 3:50/km.
I still feel I have underperformed because I averaged 170 bpm which is <84% of Max HR for me.
The approach works.
Just seen Strava group, sirpoc runs 16:13 to destroy his PB. I do wonder what more needs to be done for people to take notice . When will the progress stop. He run nothing even near this pace in training. It remarkable.
I fear I may have discovered this thread too late! I too have been training with a modified version of Norwegian training. Not quite the same as Sirpoc’s, but similar enough. I too have been running PRs at an age where I would not have expected that such things would be possible (age 46). I’m not as fast in the 5k as I was many moons ago as a DIII college runner, but I’m close. And for distances over 8k, I’m better than I ever was.
Some comments and thoughts that perhaps add something to this very long thread.
-As background, I live at nearly 8000 ft. of elevation. I was more of a speed guy back in the day (4:07-1500) who was relatively weak in longer distances (16:07 5k, 27:28 8k) (dare I say, "fast twitch"). I can still run a 27-second 200 at 46. I used to be able to run a 52-second split on a 4x4.
-My marathon PR is 2:59, which I ran while training for the Leadville 100 (which I finished in 23 hours) with just jogging the mountains as training. I suspect I can knock 10 minutes off that if I dedicate myself to it, but just haven’t had time or motivation to do so. I just ran my first sub hour 10 mile three days ago. I ran my first sub 36 10k four days before that. I’m at low elevations while visiting the inlaws, so clustering in some time trials. Never did an interval longer than 6:15 in training. My quads are thrashed from back-to-back long time trials, so not sure I’d recommend that!
-I train with a HRM and test lactate after most of my workouts.
-I typically do 2-3 threshold sessions a week. I sometimes do a Bakken-style “x” element workout when I’m training for something shorter than 5k. I aim for 20-25% of my volume in thresholds. I do my easy days sub 70% of max HR, which ain’t easy at 8000 feet when nothing is flat. Plenty of hills in my neighborhood force my pace to slower than 10’ a mile. Sometimes I’m sub-7 sub 120 HR on the downs.
-I occasionally do a 20 x 300 off 1’ (jogging the remaining 100 of the 400) at 5k pace. As long as I stick to current (not goal) 5k pace, I find that my lactate stays below 3.5 mmol/l on those sessions. If I do these in 62.x, I’ll be around 3 mmol/l. That’s low 17s for 5k at 7000’. For folks that want to pursue this training, this is similar to the 20 x 400 session that the Ingebrigtens
(occasionally) do (Bakken wrote about it in the article published previously on this thread), except it takes me the same amount of time to do a 300 as it takes them to do a 400!
-I find that 20 x 200 at current mile pace (not goal mile pace) with a 200 super easy jog ends with my lactate around 3.5. Just putting that out there.
-I have not found the heart rate correlation to be quite as linear as others. Sometimes I can get my HR up to 170 and keep my lactate below 3.0. Other times that sends me up above threshold. I find, with a few exceptions, if I stay below 168, I’m safely below 3.5, but at the threshold, the results vary wildly (I appreciate that last sentence might seem inconsistent
with the ethos of this thread, but I play around with things for the sake of experimentation).
-For some reason, my lactate tends to go above 3.0 at 168 at low altitude and closer to 170 at 7000 and 8000 ft. No clue why.
-On a couple of occasions, I found out I was about to get sick through my lactate meter. On sessions when I felt fine and I kept my HR below the typical thresholds, my lactate was through the roof, totally unexpectedly (8-plus). One time I got bronchitis the next day. The other, a 24-hour flu.
-I find that a bad night’s sleep can also send the lactate through the roof. I check my body battery whenever I’m doing a thresh sesh and make sure it’s not atypically low. If it is, I drop the volume by 20% and HR by 5 beats a minute, and that usually works out ok for me. For me, the lactate meter is much more sensitive to life stress than HRM.
-I’m also a volunteer track coach, and I apply a version of these principals to the athletes I coach. Mostly high school kids, but I coach a couple of national-class masters athletes as well.
-I keep the X element for kids I coach, because three sessions of threshold is hard for most of them mentally, and I think it matters for distances under 5k.
-This training is not effective for the 800, in case anyone might have any illusions about that. It’s fine for athletes that are new to the sport that just need to strength to run two good laps, but for boys near 2 and girls near 2:20, this methodology is not effective by itself, though sometimes I do half a threshold session with some added intensity at the end, and that
has been fairly effective as a hybrid workout.
-For anyone training for the mile to the half marathon, I think this training is markedly superior to Daniels-style training, or Vo2 max training. After I ran ultras, I spent my late 30s doing countless iterations of intense-style training. Kept getting injured and barely got better.
-I’m on a 320-day running streak now. Most days I run at least an hour a day. Never felt better.
For anyone interested , sirpoc just ran 33:25 in a 10k, one of the biggest road 10ks in the south of England. Not sure on the position, but I would guess top 20. I only have seen the time on strava. So good to see him still progressing, this I would have down as a better performance than his recent HM or 5k.
CAA wrote:
Has any person here switched from some other training style to the Norwegian approach, whether singles or doubles, and been consistent with it for 3+ months? If so, please report your experience and results.
That should give something to go on.
Yes. An athlete I coach went from 39:28 to 37:02 10k after 4 months. No doubles.
I'll add my thoughts, for what weight it carries. I went from 39:31 to 36:33 from reading this thread back last summer when it really exploded. I was stuck around 39 for a long, long time. Maybe around 4-5 years. That was variation between different plans, coaches etc. In fact I probably have spent more on coaching and books than everyone in this thread combined! Not that I mind , I love my hobby.
I started off almost in real time of page 1 of this thread. I read a lot of LRC and thought why not, I seem to run around 39-40 no matter what. I just love 10ks. No idea why. Sucker for pain maybe. They hurt.
Anyway, I have stuck pretty much to sirpoc rules. No lactate meter. Just the paces. The only thing I have changed is when Hard2find came along I switched to his document he provided with those paces. It sounded like himself, sirpoc and a few others perhaps worked on this anyway, from reading between the lines and posts here. Yes I have read everything!
Not a lot happened. For at least 5-6 weeks. Then suddenly I noticed the 3x3ks I had been doing, suddenly got quite a bit faster. Then the same just kept happening, every second or third week. That was about it was as simple as that. Now I was very curious about as to how this on earth was possible. I am pretty much doing the same amount of hours , 6-7, as I was before.
Here is where reading the thread helped. A lot. Well reading it a second time. I plugged all my data into the recommended intervals icu from the past to check past training loads. My CTL or fitness, and this is why you should read the thread, has increased and kept increasing in this time. The overall load of training this way with regards to the way previous coaches had me running, by the metrics, is quite a bit more. This is covered quite a bit somewhere in the middle pages. This is why I think a podcast that has been mentioned would be a great idea, to really summarise it. Anyway, there seems to be a clear relation between increasing of load and then overall performance. I think it's as simple as that. The key is you are doing more, probably aerobically, but the way it is managed, is less taxing on the body. So you are effectively increasing your services capacity, which, at hobby jogger level for the majority of people will lead to better performance. The crazy thing is it feels like you are doing less.
I will say, I follow sirpoc on Strava like others. This dude is a machine. The will power he must have to run the same stuff, day in, day out is remarkable. Seeing it myself is really all that keeps me going, as I can see you will improve. But it really, really is not fun. But the feeling I got from such a huge PB made it all worthwhile. I would rather have that in my pocket than feel like a workout hero like before, then be disappointing on race day.
Anyway, I hope maybe that provides some insight. I am no expert! But I am a massive fan of the thread and absolutely thrilled I found it and it has totally, totally changed the way I think about running . It has been hard to adjust. I didn't even own a smart watch until 2 years ago, so I am very much of the old skool!!
Consider I just broke 20 for first time ever at my part run this morning here in Netherlands, [...] I have follow these methods and love this thread and Strava group. Without, I do not think I would have broke 20. I have been trying for long time now.
Since I started training like the “slow” Norwegian and random bicycling Brit, I’ve been able to run more total mileage, more quality mileage, and faster time trials with fewer injuries than at any other point in my decade+ since high school. If it looks stupid but it works, it’s not stupid
Personally, I’ve done every type of training over the past 30 years. I ran in the 2012 trials and I think this is the most fit I’ve been since that season.
I’ve never before done a type of training that leaves me without minor aches and pains. I’m able to compound week after week, which is the real secret sauce in my opinion. Not so much the magic blend of speed/hills/tempo that you see in other programs.
Find a performance program that doesn’t break athletes down. I’ve tried them all. This one is great.
cmon now wrote:
The people getting excited about this method are recreational athletes with:
Limited time and/or durability
Limited fundamental aerobic ability
Limited understanding of training methods or simply don't want to expend a lot of mental bandwidth on complicated training schemes
While those points may be true for some, they are definitely not universal.
I have a lot of time to train and I can easily run 100 mile weeks (not that I often do) without getting any sort of injuries.
I have averaged over 5000km/3200mi a year for almost 30 years so I believe my "fundamental aerobic ability" is doing fine.
I have been an avid student of the sport for almost 30 years. I have educated myself. I am continuously learning, I am not afraid to change what I think can be improved.
But the most important aspect, is that while not being competitive myself anymore, I coach athletes who are, or who are trying to be. And since I started implementing ideas from this method, I have observed two things in my runners:
1. Zero injuries.
2. Continuous progress, improved times and results against long-time opponents.
You talk about not wanting to "expend a lot of mental bandwidth on complicated training schemes".
I have expended a lot of mental bandwidth over the years on complicated training schemes.
But when it comes to middle and long-distance running, while I find it useful to have a deep understanding of how things work, I have come to the conclusion that the best training is actually pretty simple.
Didn't see it posted but KI ran sub-73 for a PB at the Barcelona half last Sunday.
[Sirpoc84] ran a 1:14 having 1. Never run a HM before and 2. Having never even run 13.1 miles before and he finished his HM like a monster. So there's no need to change anything in my humble opinion for the half.
I've been following this approach for about half a year. Seems weirdly unexciting and has none of the feeling of rapid progress that comes with more intense methods, but I haven't had more than a week off over that period (once for a minor injury that coincided with work travel, once for a cold). And despite not feeling especially fast, I recently achieved my first PB in about six years (nearly a minute off my 10k time) so something is clearly working. Still not particularly fast (35:0x) and I'm still not running especially long distances (40mpw) but for an injury-prone runner with a full-time job it's a nice balance.
Looking forward to seeing how the improved aerobic fitness translates to the shorter stuff on the track this summer.
sirpoc goes 15:54 to break the 16 min barrier. Very impressive. Just an update for those not on Strava but are fans of this thread.
I went under 80’ today (about a minute PR) despite a much harder course and extra distance run (.16) from last years PB. Threshold training works!
I'm a 64 year old retired runner (and current HS XC coach) with 2 total knee replacements, so I no longer run. But, I'm a devoted rower, and have been following an "age-adjusted" Norwegian Method plan for many months. I use a 10 day cycle that includes 2 LT sessions
(one longer reps & one shorter reps), one X-Factor day (what I'd call mile-specific for a runner), and plenty of easy rowing, elliptical, biking, walking on the other days.
The schedule looks like this:
1. Short LT Reps (30-90 seconds/30 sec rests. Kept @ LT effort/HR)
2. Easy Aerobic
3. Easy Aerobic: may insert a few really relaxed 15 second pick-ups
4. Long LT Reps (3-8 minutes kept @ LT effort/HR)
5. Easy Aerobic
6. Easy Aerobic: may insert a few really relaxed 15 second pick-ups
7. X-Factor Day: Generally 30-60 second intervals @ 4 minute race effort
8. Off Day or Easy Aerobic
9, Easy Aerobic
10.Easy Aerobic: may insert a few really relaxed 15 second pick-ups
Repeat....
I can honestly say that while following this schedule, I never have bad days. When I first started doing this kind of training about a year ago, I tried doing a quality session every other day, but found that this led to a lot of residual fatigue (probably due to age). As soon as I started buffering the LT days with 2 easy aerobic days, and followed the X-Factor day with 3 easy aerobic days, I started feeling really good all of the time.
What do you suggest that's better? Have done some 5x1600 intervals every few weeks as fitness checks and I'm slowly improving. 2 mins. rest between 1600m sets. Manual laps.
2/22 (36:26, 7:17/mi, not counting rest)
7:45
7:24
7:12
7:08
6:57
3/5 (35:44, 7:09/mi)
7:24
7:13
7:11
7:03
6:53
3/19 (35:26, 7:05/mi)
7:20
7:09
7:00
7:02
6:55
So, for a solid four months straight, I stuck to this training routine gearing up for a half marathon. Then, in the fifth month, I tweaked it a bit to prep for a full-on marathon. Like I mentioned earlier, I simplified things while keeping the core structure intact:
Monday: Easy jog for 8-11 km
Tuesday: Did 10 x 3min intervals, cruising at a pace between 10 km and half marathon pace
Wednesday: Another chill run, 8-11 km
Thursday: Hammered out 5 x 6min intervals at a half marathon pace
Friday: Took it easy again with 8-11 km
Saturday: 3 x 10min intervals, just a tad slower than half marathon pace
Sunday: 75-95 minutes long, a bit quicker than usual but still cruising in Zone 2.
For intervals days I had 3km warm up and only 1km chill down. Rest between intervals 60-90 sec.
Come February, I was all set for a half marathon, aiming for at least 1:18:xx. But man, did things go south after the halfway mark. Looking back at the data, it was clear I wasn't in top form that day. My heart rate was way too high from the get-go compared to my training days from a week ago, and I used chest strap for precise readings. Hit a 3:43 pace at the halfway mark, but the second half turned into a survival mode slog, finishing in 1:21.
After that disappointing half, I had a mere four weeks to gear up for a full-blown marathon in Rome. I decided to tweak the plan by easing up on the Saturday run and stretching out the long run to over 30 km, keeping it slightly below marathon effort for 15-20 km of it.
This was my third crack at a marathon, with my last one clocking in at 2:58:45 about a year and a half ago. My heart rate in those previous marathons averaged 162 bpm, so this time, I capped it at 160 bpm until the 30 km mark.
Crossed the finish line in 2:54:09, and boy, did I still have some gas left in the tank. Last 700 meters, I was flying at a 3:29 pace. And get this, all of this was done with just three long runs - 30 km, 35 km, and 32 km.
So, yeah, turns out this method isn't just good for up to half marathons - it works pretty well for the full marathons too. I was smashed after my first 2 marathons, but this one went butter smooth. I had no idea marathon could be that easy on the body. I was back at full training mode on Tuesday.
My advice? Stick to the base training, like I did for the first four months, then maybe start prepping specifically for the marathon about a month earlier than I did to get in more long runs. But hey, I was dead set on smashing that half marathon PR just two weeks before the full marathon, so there you go!
I got my next attempt at setting new half marathon PR in 3 weeks. I hope that it won't be too warm, since I am pretty temperature sensitive
Smashed my college PRs after ten months of this training (now 14:19 5k, 29:46 10k). Seems to work fine for me and other hobby joggers – times dropped so much quicker than they did when I did four years of race pace intervals.
I don't quite know how but I found myself in the last 9 months coaching in a HS, but I have and have been using the original method, almost to the letter laid out by sirpoc84 on page 1. It's obviously hard to coach everyone to stick to it, but some semi-talented boys in particular are suddenly making huge improvements and on my opinion running above what you might expect out of them, based on their talent. Well at least running above the level of usual rubbish coaching! People are now asking me how I've done this like I am some sort of coaching GURU, which is all rather amusing.
Excellent stuff 👍🏻 your summary is just how I feel having been doing your system for 4-5 months. I've made big improvements. I have been testing lactate as where I am pace isn't reliable, so I probably have it dialled in now though. But I also have found maybe i could squeeze in some extra work but at the end of the day you might just end up coloring outside the lines when you don't need to take that risk. 3x a week will get most of us improving. There is no glamour in this but as a masters athlete I am a step ahead of my rivals having dropped off a bit. Very grateful to the thread.
lets-run wrote:
How long does this training take to deliver results?
In January I did 5x1 mile and 8x1k each week (think I did 5 sessions in total) at 6:15-6:25 then did a parkrun in 18:32. Had chest pain in the final mile. Got totally demotivated and switched back to 12x400 and ran 17:56 in March. Maybe I was just going too slow?
It's been said by most people here, pretty much nothing happens for a month or so. You won't see any results. Sirpoc I think said even 6 weeks nothing happened. That's 18 sessions. Even that's not a lot, in my opinion. Give it 2+ months, that is where I had my lightbulb moment and was like OK, this shizzle is for real. But I will admit, I read this thread 6-7 months ago and after 4 weeks was like, this is all hot air. But it paid off, for real. I'm not fast by any stretch, but I went from 19:12 to 17:58 in 6 months, but that is the longest block I've ever committed to. But I was happy to just break 19, to break 18 I was in dreamland. These seems easy, but you really need to understand what you are doing before you do this. For real, make sure you actually understand it.
This is not a quick fix. I think most of the guys who have knowledge in this thread have ever said if you are looking for 6 weeks to get fit, go down the vo2 max route and just see what happens? I don't think I have misunderstood that.
Thanks for the great thread guys, congrats on 100 pages and counting.
I wanted to share some personal results of the method after few months of testing.
A bit of context, I am 57 yo and obviously I am not in a phase where I can progress much, but my objective would be to be under 40 min at 60 yo for 10k and under 1h30 on the half. 25 years ago I used a traditional method of training like Tuesday short intervals, Thursday long intervals, and weekend a medium long run, and was happy of the results with a low milage. After 50 yo and many years without any serious training I started again to train and improve up to about 41-42 min for 10k. Then I tried the Easy Interval Method, it was nice for the training but the results in competition were disappointing. I then went to a more Canova inspired method and went back to my level before starting EIM.
Then, I read this thread, and thought why not try it (unlike people critizing without trying) as there was enough time before my first competition in March. The advantage for the evaluation of a training method is that I do a serie of 10k races that are more or less the same every year, so beside the weather change I can really compare the results.
First race beginning of March: I finish more than 1 min faster than last year (at 57 , on 10K it is very significant). Very happy with the result, and the race went very well, I felt comfortable. The fact that I could run in a small group was an advantage compared to the previous year, so I think let's see what it will be on next race.
The next race was yesterday. But the conditions were very different than last year. Last year the temperature was 9C (48F) and yesterday 24C (75F).
Also yesterday it was the first day of the year that it was warm so no possible to get used to the warmth before. Because of this, I was not optimistic to do a good performance. Nevertheless, I finished 20 sec faster than last year when many people finished 1 min slower than last year.
So, that confirms IMO the result from the first race.
Conclusion: it seems that the method works well for me, even at an old age with many years of training behind.
My training: I use the 3 following workouts: 10 x 3 min rest 1 min, 5 x 6 min rest 1min30, 3 x 10 min rest 2 min. 1 rest day per week on average (sometimes 2 and sometimes more when on holidays...)
Usually I won't do 3 workouts every week, if optimal it will be more 5 workouts in 2 weeks.
Minor update after 8 months of the world's most boring training plan: last summer I ran 5000m in 17:05 on the track and I recently ran 16:30 on the roads, despite doing very little running at quicker than 5:45 mile pace. Still feels weird, but it seems to be working. Interested to see if it translates to middle-distance races.
not sure about that.... 4/27/2024:
For those who are interested , I've been following this thread and the progress on Strava of others in the group closely, the key take from this is that those who understand what is going on here under the hood, have made fantastic progress. The problems seem to be where people tweak it a bit or don't quite understand it in the first place, maybe they do but also over complicate it. I'm one of the many who have had fantastic success on singles doing this, I have just come down from 37 to a low 34 on my first 10k of the season. I am 42 now so I assumed by PB days were firmly in the past, considering I've been running 10 years and that PB was 8 years ago.
Just some data for the thread.
My partner has been doing subthreshold work for the past ~6 months, with zero speedwork and very little aerobic running, and has gone from a CP of 210 watts (3.4 w/kg) to about 260 (4.2 w/kg) with no plateau in sight.
He refuses to do ANY intervals, so he runs most runs at 0.9-0.95 IF (80-95% CP) and only runs slow when he's tired. Same route every day and we only adjust the time based on fatigue. If he's tired, he runs slower, if he feels good, he runs up to 95% CP.
Consistency and fatigue management are key. When I notice him napping more or having low energy, we know it's time to take a few days of easier running or cycling cross-training.
Some race data (same course, same time of year, similar temps):
2023 pace for 7.5 miles: 8:06min/mile (~20-25 miles a week)
2024 pace for 7.5 miles: 7:03 (~30-35 miles a week)
2025 goal pace: 6:30min/mile (~45-50 miles a week)
Small progress update - still going well, with some compromises... Fitness seems to be progressing nicely. It's track season! Regular races and club track workouts are just too much fun to skip for more sub-threshold running so I've opted to stop progressing the speed and distance of two out of three workouts for a while (getting gradually easier instead), with the third day being slightly harder than ideal. Recovery doesn't seem to be an issue at the moment and I'm not going all-out in any workout.
Anyway, still on 6 days a week, one longish run (9 miles), three quick runs and one day off per week, about 40mpw total. Most recent race was 3000m - a 10s PR and below 9:30 for the first time, which feels pretty consistent with my improvement over 5k and 10k. Now to have a go at the 1500m...
OK, well here's an interesting result. I did a 1500 over the weekend and went sub-4:20 for the first time in about 8 years. Slightly confusing that the improvement on last year (4:35 to 4:19) is even greater than over 3k and 5k despite the gap to training paces being much greater. I guess it makes sense given the original focus of the approach. But it's been much easier than before. A small handful of quick (but not 100% effort) track workouts seems to have been enough, if it was needed at all.
Thanks for all your posting over the last year and taking the time on Strava to help. I'm sure I'm not alone in being fascinated by this approach to training! I am one of the guys you were speaking of! got fully confused and obsessed in what I would call quite aggressive marathon plans!! By race day I was usually absolutely spent. My longest run this time a couple of weeks out was 30k easy. It's the slowest pace and shortest distance I've done as my big last run and I've ran 7 Ms now. Even with the long run I made sure my sub threshold didn't take a bit of backseat. I felt super strong even past 30k to go on race day. I assumed I would hit the wall at some point, it basically never came.
To add, my build didn't feel anything special until around 12 weeks in and I knew this time would be different. I have never felt fresh in a marathon plan at 3 months before. All I changed as you know was the long run was longer on a Sunday @usually 110-120 mijs and the Thursday session was longer at 5x9 mins , at M pace . Other two sub threshold were a mixture of the ones you have been doing. Standard 10*1k up to 3*3k.
I had no intention of going for a 5k. But happened as happy accident. My guess now with my new found understanding, in the past for 5k I was totally obsessed with speed!!! Speed , speed , speed and more speed workouts. When actually, I was just embarrassingly under developed in an aerobic sense. M was a PB hugely and a 45 second 5k PB as well. Two for the price of one!!
I see others have been asking about the M. I wouldn't change much. What I did worked well think and it easily replicated.
I, so far, have not. I have been running high volume for a few years now, this was the highest 'CTL' I have seen ever. Though it is the first time I have tracked it, I have backloaded the historical data.
I have a 5kPB of 16:45, I ran a shade over 17 5k 3 weeks out from the marathon on the same course, admittedly with slightly more worn 'super-shoes'
I ran a 1/2 marathon in a shade under 1:18, on the same course I have run a 1:16 low in tougher conditions a few years back
Marathon came in at 2:44, I have a pb on 2:40 and change.
However conceptually I am believer and I am going to actually reduce overall volume as I may well be running too much as I am well over 8-9 hours .
I am also getting old, so I may have tipped over the improvement point and am starting to naturally decline...
Age is definitely a factor for some. I just hit the tipping point a couple of years ago. An injury and birthday or two later and suddenly it's all over. Once it comes, you hit a brick wall. This method has flattened off my decline rather than sped me back up much. I'm good with that. It's frustrating, as I'm slightly faster than last year training with Daniels 4th edition plan, but my peak years are gone. My big regret is probably not having run a peak years season like this, to see what I can do.
For those still interested who maybe aren't on Strava but follow thread, sirpoc84 run 15:40 tonight. Thank goodness for all that 5k work he does he he . I wonder if he consider his national championship for road masters. I look online. Last year gold medal champion was 15:19 for British road master. I think it very realistic for him . I offer him congrats and hopefully more future progress.
I was in disbelief too but am seeing some success after struggling to learn how to implement this method through trial and error. It was a big mental shift for me, and my RPE was completely skewed because I was severely overtrained in college – hard 8k race pace intervals from 5:00 to 5:10 pace regularly with long tempos at 5:25-5:30 pace. I stagnated at around 26:00s for 8k and 15:10s for 5k, thinking I couldn't train hard enough. Since I was going hard so frequently, I think my body was anaerobically overtrained. I could get from hard interval to interval just fine (thinking that being able to finish was about 18 RPE), but sustained paces were much more challenging. As it turns out, I was a "Theo Quax" case. I got my lactate threshold tested in laboratory at the university, and I guess my true threshold corresponded to 5:50-6:00 pace, much slower than my previous workout paces. It also seems astonishingly low for a 15:10 guy, but that is where I started and am getting near 14:50s now after trying this method, recalibrating my own RPE, and literally crawling at 5:55-6:00 for a while (now more comfortable at 5:40-5:50). I do think my body benefited from previously having high muscular strength from quick intervals, but interesting that I am improving after slowing down my workouts so much (and that my threshold range is so slow for my PRs – slower than Kristoffer Ingebrigtsen despite having faster PRs!). Anyway, just thought I'd share how variable thresholds can be, with some outliers like Theo and myself needing to slow down more than most to find improvement. I don't fully get it either since I'm no scientist, but it was a hard lesson for me to learn and glad I didn't discount this approach to training.
Now seems like good time to post my experience. I found this thread via Google in September last year looking up Coggan . Used to race my bike so I had a fair understanding of the principles in this thread and was very pleased to see someone use a forumulatic approach to running as is normal in cycling.
For remarks. I was 19:20 for the 5k. I had been running roughly 2 years. I follow a few different plans, they usually result in the sense issue. Breakdown, injury, just after running somewhere in 19.
I reset in September my training to this. I would say until Santa Claus came, nothing and I was very disappointed. I felt strong on intervals, but not doing fast work felt silly, slow and honestly I almost throw this in the trash and come here to say how silly this is. But then a remarkable happened, I just decided to set off on a 5k solo TT at my local track here in the province. I thought I would set myself to pace around 19 flat, right from start. I expected to fail. But I didn't. I never had feel so strong a feeling and whilst my legs maybe didn't have training at that speed, my aerobic was so strong and I could just hold the pace I set out at. I even managed to kick at last lap and finish solo TT in 18:48. I couldn't believe.
Now more months on. I just broke 18 for 17:56 in my local race now weather is better. I never thought much like this was possible, at years of 37.
I just want to thank Strava group, here and sirpoc for everything he shared and how he helps if asked . If I ever in UK, we know this man likes beer I will buy him one! Also how it inspiring to see someone just struggle like the rest of us now run times at 40+ years that are in stratosphere.
Maybe trolls are here too, but I think this thread bring out the true spirit of community amateur running.
If you take anything from my post on the internet, please give this way a chance. But don't expect miracle. It does not work in an instant but you can maybe do things you didn't know you can do. I think the key here is the system and training expands the aerobic system beyond what strictly amateur runner can usually do.
Yeah, not convinced you need much mile/1500m pace work at all. I've done some slightly more intense 3k-10k pace workouts in recent week with the occasional mile pace rep of up to 300m, but very little volume at this pace compared to normal middle-distance training. I haven't done any hill reps and dropped the 300m reps in the spring once I started doing more club workouts and races. It has been much less intense than any previous attempt to run a fast 1500m. Certainly nothing like the traditional 8x400 @ mile pace with 60s recoveries type workout. I just took a couple of seconds off my high-school 1500m PB (I'm in my mid-30s now). Other than this season the quickest I've run in the past 5 years was 10s slower. Still only running 4:16 so quite firmly in hobby jogger land but the training definitely works.
I got outsprinted in the final 100m, but I finished quicker than I've ever done before so it doesn't really matter. Maybe you need Martin & Coe-style middle-distance training to win big races. I don't think you need it to run your best time.
For anyone still interested again who not on Strava, sirpoc ran 32:23 at Great Bristol 10k. It's an average course on slightly warmer conditions today that looks for most guys to run even unusually long by 10k road standards. Congratulations to him. Fantastic achievement. 8th place overall. This is a legit race on the UK road schedule, one of the bigger events. To whom predicted 10k faster than KI, seems they were correct.
I've been using this with some masters runners that I coach. It's been working very, very well. One thing I have noticed is that how consistent and lack of cardiac drift they are now getting on their easy runs. Even that now seems much more under control. They weren't receptive to these methods initially, I think it's very difficult to get into a runners mindset to train like this.
lost in the science 5/28/2024:
I was going to post my findings of this training a week ago, but I thought I might get into the middle of the science debate. I found that interesting to a point, however I got a bit lost - I doubt I am the only one.
I can't say why/how this works. I really can't. I simply decided to trust the rest of the testimonials in this magnificent thread and jump head first into the deep end with nothing more than a HR monitor , flat ground and sirpoc guide and help. I will do the obligatory shout-out to him, as he has answered every question I have thrown at him on Strava direct message, no matter how dumb it is. I am for sure that he is sometimes sitting there wishing he never got involved in this thread! I will add the help he has given me is better than any coach.
My expectations were not great, as I felt:
1. This goes against everything I was pre-conditioned to understand about running training. What does a guy someone who has only run for two years can teach me about running.
2. I was going to just do the basics. No lactate meter, no setting up my own guide based on paces and lactate curves. Just me, my Garmin, a HR strap I bought and the track/ flat ground.
3. I've seen better days. I'm in my 40s now and my last PB was 2015.
The appeal of this was also the limited time aspect. I'm sure I am like others, but simply I do not have time for doubling.
My first impressions were there is no way this can work. The sessions felt way, way too easy. Not just a bit, incredibly easy. I remember finishing the first session of 3*10 mins almost chuckling to myself. Then I saw my HR and it was actually not far off LTHR by the end. Just under. Then kind of a light bulb went off. It's meant to feel like that and actually I had a very , very good workout , but the fact I kept myself a decent amount under LTHR meant I didn't really feel beat up . Was it a full threshold workout? No. But as sirpoc says in the guide. Even if you get 90% of the benefit, can you do this three times a week? Absolutely! This is the key. It's that extra workout. I've never been able to do three quality days + a long run a week.
It was then difficult also to slow my easy pace down. That was also the key. That just means the day in between , the slower I brought that down the even easier it was to carry out the sub threshold workouts. I found the pace guides provided as well as the spreadsheet that was provided on Strava absolutely fantastic. I really didn't change much.
As others have also said, not a lot happened initially. On about week 8 I did a 5k. I was very worried. In the warmup I did 2*400m at just under race pace and i felt really, really bad. There was surely no way I could even race at the pace I had 2 months prior? What a stupid training idea!!! I have gotten worse!! I was cursing sirpoc, this thread, everything. Feeling quite annoyed on the start line. Then, something weird happened. I felt awful again in the first 1km. Like my legs didn't understand this pace. But then, it's very odd. I just kept getting faster per KM. I ended up finishing in 18:10. 23 seconds faster than 2 months before. Just 20 seconds off my PB set when I was 35.
Fast forward. Week 22. Almost two weeks ago now. I ran a HM. My PB was the aforementioned one from 2015, my last PB at any distance. I absolutely crushed it. Ran 1:19:34 to beat my PB by a huge margin and broke for my level, what I saw a mythical 80 mins mark.
Fast forward again to last weekend 10 days when I was going to post, I figured I must be in really good shape so entered a very small 5k event. Ran 17:17 to crush my 5k PB. I just can't thank this thread enough.
What does all this mean? Not a lot. I just thought I would share my thoughts and if anyone is skeptical like maybe I was, this I think really, really does work. Especially for older runners. But for everyone, it probably will provide the week by week, month by month consistency we probably mostly all lack. Do I understand the science behind it? Not sure I still fully do. Also not sure that matters.
Hopefully the thread will inspire someone else. Have a great summer season everyone!
This is interesting. I was a multi eventer back in my university days and definitely on the faster twitcher side (jumping events were my strongest point, nowadays my legs are still twice the size of most on the start line for distance races), in my older age (nearly 40), the past couple of years I've been trying to convert to distance (now 36min 10k PB - hobby jogger territory but improving). I've tried the sub threshold method for a couple of months last fall but found it more draining than it should (compared to traditional training weeks, ie one faster interval session, one tempo) and was going backwards whilst also dealing with niggles so gave up. Didn't really match many people's experience here. I wonder if this could be the reason, ie need to slow it down far more than specified by the spreadsheets. I was always conservative, but perhaps not enough.
For a faster twitch athlete should the easy/long runs be slower too? I guess sub 70% HR max is already very slow (8 min mile) though so maybe not. I guess lactate testing would probably be the only way of truly finding out for the ST intervals. Keen to give it another go but hesitant after the last attempt.
Thanks for bringing up the muscle fibre type point, one of my training partners who is definitely slow twitch has really thrived with a SubT approach using the same pace guide, whilst I struggled. Feels like this could be the reason why.
I’ve really enjoyed this thread, it’s made me think at length about the approach I’ve had to training over the decades. Before we even get to the details of lactate etc, the idea of doing sessions at non-maximal intensity is a novel one for me. I wish I’d known about it in my 20s!
It’s early days (I’ve been doing this style of training for just under two months) but it’s interesting that I ran a slight “old man” PB (I’m in my late 40s) in the 16:40s on the weekend, vs my previous of just under 17min. I’m currently doing about 80km/week (50mi/week), which is more than I’ve done for a few decades and keeping in mind it’s winter here in Australia. So perhaps it’s also possible my 5k result came from increased mileage. But of significance is that at no point during the last two months have I run to the point of being a crumpled heap at the end of a session – something that was unthinkable in my previous approach to training, at any mileage. I’d collapse 2-3 times a week previously after a session of hard intervals.
faat twitch 400 runner 6/11/2024:
I've been reading this thread with interest almost since the start. Kudos to sirpoc, the crew etc for this wonderful and I truly mean wonderful, dedication to help, explanations, free advice that is as good as anything currently on the internet or in print.
My experience, I am an ex 400 runner who is very very fast twitch orientated. Gave that up, had family etc. and got into hobby jogging around 4-5 years ago. The usual story, work events, charity runs, turkey trots etc. I was really slow, happy with 21-22.
I came across this thread like many others I am sure, simply by mistake. First few pages seemed interesting and I've had it pinned to my taskbar ever since.
I was already doing 5-6 days a week and 5+ hours , so I thought this method might work for me. Upped it to 7 and followed the normal schedule. Firstly, the paces were way too fast. Which I had suspected being A) slow and B) good knowledge of my fibre make up. In fact, I had to go super slow to make it work loosely using HR as a guide. I would say that maybe 10-12 weeks I felt terrible. Truly awful. In fact I was just about to give up because I just felt this wasn't made for me and back to shorter, harder stuff. But then I entered a 5k purely for fun to run with my wife and I actually PB'd by a good 30 seconds. From maybe a week or so after that, my body felt like it had changed. The grind feeling was gone and I could run the paces on the lower end of the spreadsheet someone shared on Strava. Now, another 3-4 months on and a bigger drop of my PB - sub 19, I can run actually nearer the faster end of thr guide paces. But took me a long, long time to get there. Whereas, seems like the real slow twitch runners, got there either straight away or adapted in a much shorter space of time.
My case study of one? Don't give up. I was pure speed and nothing else and as far away from a middle to long distance runner as you can get. Anyway, just my thoughts guys, hope it might provide some hope ot context to some.
My training is going well. 19 week into this method and I just PB. Very similar I see to another user in Strava group who just went from 21 to 19. I drop from mid 20 to 18:59 lifetime pb at 43 year old. Very lucky to get that second but want to thank all for help. I can die say I ran an 18. Forget the 59 seconds they do not matter he he.
Not a fan of this method 6/16/2024:
This method is good but does jot work for everyone. I tried it and went from a 16 min to an 18 min 5k.
Im not sure if I was meant with the 21 to 19 guy but on the day of the post I PRd from 21:35 to 19:45 and thought I could add my thoughts about this method im using for 8 months now.
(the PR was in a big parking lot so I take it with a grain of salt if maybe GPS tricked me. But either way, I definitely PRd with quite some margin)
-I’m 38, running for a bit over a year now while having a 10 hour job and a 18 month old daughter.
-running got really important for me but obviously ranked behind family and work which I need to feed my family 😂
-the 2 PRs had 5 months inbetween, I don’t know if that’s good or bad, just a fact
-it took some months to really feel the improvements where I also feel like I made a huge jump last 4 weeks out of nowhere (stuff like easy pace going down 20 seconds at same hr <70% within what felt like from one day to another)
So my thoughts are not about a random PR where most will laugh about the time, it’s more about a method which is suitable for time limited people like me who still want to be in shape and get their „best bang for the buck“ (it’s not like I wouldn’t care about progress, I really do care but only vs myself)
I just can say that I’m able to run 7 days a week (I do the exact plan laid out on page 1) with around 75-90km a week without needing a single rest day last 6 months cause of being tired. The only times i made a break was illness.
I also didn’t have any injury.
Another great thing for me is that I don’t need to think about what I „need“ to do the next day or if I’m able to hit my peak workout paces that day.
I just put my 3 pre set workouts (10*3min, 5*6min, or 3*10min) on my watch and press start.
With a lot of stuff around running I’m also not in the same shape every day (sometimes 5 hours of sleep-sometimes 8, sometimes bad hydrated and whatever else life brings) so I obviously have days where my paces feel super easy and others where it doesn’t. But on all days it’s „easy“ enough that I’m recovered enough to go again 2 days later. (1 misconception is often that it’s super easy, it’s still work to do 3 times a week)
That also leads to not overthinking things like I would tend to do (hitting a bad workout which was a „key one“ would make me overthink it, with this method I’m also not happy if I had a bad one but I just go again 2 days later)
Long story short:
i know that my personal progress can have different reasons (especially with only running for that short time) ,but I’ve learned that consistency is probably one of the main things to get better at running.
This method allows me to be as consistent as I probably could be (1.500km as per today for the year) without burning out or being injured.
This thread and especially the community on Strava helped me tremendously understanding a bit more what I do(sub 2:40 marathoners and sub 16 5k guys take time out of their day to help random Internet guys like me getting better)
I didn’t wanted to interrupt the conversation about different studies, stuff I don’t know any about or don’t want to follow exactly, but maybe I was able to help a person like me (hobby jogger who didn’t knew what to do exactly) to give this method a go.
shoutout to all the legends in this thread like sirpoc, hard2find, shirtboy, jiggy etc (I forgot names of some more guys so sorry for that) to help out other people like me with their enormous knowledge for free!!!
This winter I trained at about 40-45 mpw with about of those being threshold. (Less mileage at the start of winter, more towards the end) I did ~ 4xmile twice a week and ~ 16x400 once per week, everything else was just easy mileage at about 8:30 per mile and some strides. The mile threshold reps were done at around 6:20 - 6:10 (1:30 rest) and the 400s at around 1:30-1:25 (45s rest). I had no injuries and was super consistent with months of no weeks under 40 miles. I had barely any speed training going into my first 3200 of the year and I still dropped my pr from 10:5x to 10:20 in subpar conditions. This threshold stuff really works and I highly recommend it.
secret speed workouts 6/20/2024:
So I’ve been using this method since September. Previous PB was 20:40z Started out getting a 19:25 PB after 4 weeks and then a 18:30 8 weeks later. Around the end of December did I 18:05 and then sadly got injured. Jumped on the bike for 6 weeks and simply followed the same schedule and added some more volume. When my foot felt good again I started jogging and did a couple of small sessions before doing Paris half in 1:27 after 2 weeks of running. Started training seriously with this method again mid march. This time more conservative and without the need to push more volume around threshold and easy but just keep it at the same and see how I develop. I also started running everyday instead of squeezing it in to 6 days. My body feels better and I’m always ready to go. Averaging around 6 hours a week or 70-75k without missing a day the last 12 weeks. Did a Parkrun on a slower gravel course than my usual TT loop and ran 17:50 one month ago. Signed up for a 5000m on the track and did a 17:11 this Tuesday finishing with a 3:21/km last K! Very surprised and on my way to sub 17 which I never thought would be possible for me. This clearly is working. The nature of this approach is repetitive but I love that I know what I have to do on a given day and that I always can squeeze it in no matter my schedule. My body never gets shocked with a crazy workout or long run and therefore I can stay injury free. The 7 vs 6 days and the very slow progression of volume compared to my last attempt that ended up in injury seems to make all the difference.
For anyone interested schedule is now:
3x45 easy
3x10
4x6
10x3
80 easy
Rinse & repeat.
4 weeks ago I added 2 repeats to the 3 minute reps. 5 min to each easy over the course of 3 weeks. Very slow progression. I follow my CTL and update paces etc. using intervals.icu
tl;dr
Just do the same as sirpoc and get some pbs
While everyone has been arguing about the theoretical importance of easy running, spoc, who has barely missed a day of easy running since starting with this method, just ran a 32:01.
This will be a longer post, but I wanted to relay my experience using this method for a 9 week marathon build. For context I am 26m, 17:12 5k, 36:15 10k, and 1:20 half. I stagnated late last year and only improved my 5k from 17:27>17:12, but I know I have faster times in me. Races on the calendar this year for me are Grandmas Marathon (6/22) and The Bear 100M (9/27). Originally I was thinking 2:45ish should be possible for the marathon, and 22 hours for the Bear.
Fast forward to February where I got a stress fracture in one of my metatarsals on my left foot which left me unable to run until 4/24. I built from 10 miles to 64 in the last two weeks using the method outlined here. My weekly schedule looked like this M - easy, T - shorter reps (25x400, 10x1K), W - Easy, Th - MLR of 10-12 miles with longer reps (5x2k, 3x2mi), F- Easy, Sat - LR of 16-19 miles with 15-20K of work typically descending ladder of 2x5k, 3k, 2k or some version of that, sun - Easy bike. Things were starting to click and I was feeling so good in training that I almost didn't want to taper for the marathon given my half baked training leading in. I ended up running 2:55 and hitting a huge wall at mile 20. I was moderately happy with the result given the hiccups in the build, but at the same time it's hard for me not to think I have a lot more left in me. I am wondering whether people here think that I would have needed a more traditional buildup with more mileage to build the strength necessary for the marathon, or if what I was lacking was more straight MP runs like Pfitz or Daniels would prescribe?
Next, I am probably the first here to try and apply this training to a 100M ultramarathon where I will have a proper 16 week build. My plan here is going to be double subthreshold sessions on Tuesday and Thursday consisting of 10x1k, or 5x2k in the morning and a 30 minute uphill treadmill session at lunch (probably more like upper Z2 at 15% grade). I am wondering if anyone has thoughts here on how best to apply this to a mountain ultra. I do believe that I am getting very good results using this method and feel like I would be leaving something on the table training wise if I used the traditional ultra training that is exclusively slogging out long slow miles in the mountains (which I will do some of). Thanks in advance. Sirpoc84 you are my hero
Good to see others do well.
Did a 5k in 20:01, best I've done since 2008, 75'F heat, some humidity but not too bad, 8:30 am this morning. Felt strong and controlled throughout, probably could have pushed a little harder at the end. 6:36, 6:20, 6:25, 0:41. Started to slip to 7:12 pace in the last tenth of a mile before kicking. Closed the last 200m in 0:41. 10th of 323.
I've only been doing 1 workout at sub-threshold or threshold, 1 long run, and the rest very EZ. And it's something like 2x2 at 7:20-7:40 pace once a week, EZ runs between 9:10 and 10:00 every day.
Average HR (151), did this all by feel. First mile I just wanted to feel steady. Never got to the point where my legs were burning, but my lungs were close. I didn't get a side stitch though; that is sometimes a sign of dehydration.
HR never went over 162.
Sirpoc broke 32 for 10k this morning. He won the race, too, so he likely has more in the tank. I would not be surprised to see a sub-31 in six months or so.
I'll add to this and say the same. I've also stuck to a mixture of the spreadsheet and the paces Hard2find posted in this thread. Both of which pretty much get you to the same point and based off sirpoc's original posts.
I will say this, for the first 4-6 weeks I had varying trouble of reaching the paces shared. It was very up and down. I even got a lactate meter to check things. After around the end of the 6 weeks, everything settled into place as I guess my body became familiar with the system and I got fitter. I've tested ad-hoc since, the paces have always kept me almost exactly spot on where you would want to be having established a lactate baseline. I guess everyone is different, but for anyone not sure or doesn't have a lactate meter, I believe truly in general it's an amazing starting point.
Ultimately this thread and the amazing Strava group has changed my running life. I almost feel like I have stumbled on some old school cheat codes. I have been doing this since January and have absolutely crushed a PB at 5k and a half the other week, both of which go back almost a decade and a half. I'm well into masters category now. I absolutely wish this thread existed 15 years ago. Yes, these ideas are not totally new. But there's never been anything laid out like this, as accessible as this , as successful as this or without anyone trying to sell something for profit, in LRC history.
I see this thread has now had its anniversary. I suspect it will pop up and continue to pop up as long as LetsRun exists in whatever format.
Put in a 5 week block since my last post and retested my 5km (was 18:22). Ran this in a park run race, minimal wind, on concrete on a quick course with heaps of people around.
Been again hitting 4 sessions with 2 sub-Ts (mainly 8x1, 5x1.6, 4x2). Upped my paces as someone suggested on this thread and was hitting the 1kms in 4 flats now. Anything under just feels too hot.
This morning I ran 18:22 again (lol) but on an athletics track, no spikes just carbon plates, paced for the first 2km then solo, temperature was beautiful but wind was about 20km/h and a tad gusty.
Initially I was disappointed but i’ve gotten more positive. Thinking this may be worth an 18:10 in the same conditions as last time and I have gotten quicker. Still seems like a good response to 5 weeks of training but interested to hear other opinions?
I’m now going to step up to 5 days a week, then 6, and start building that 3rd SubT session very slowly and carefully. Very interested to see the response I get.
SloggingItOut wrote:
I'll weigh in on my experience. 41M (5'11", 150 lbs), ran in XC way back in high school (slow for the team, ~18:50 5k), decided to start running again 2 winters ago, don't really race, did a 10k in 44:00 last fall.
Was running 30-40 MPW with 1 Daniels Style hard session, a long run, and a bunch of random Z2-3 miles. Was making some progress (trying to build to 40-50 MPW) but was feeling sore quiet often after the hard stuff. Got sick in February and tried to run through it, burnt myself out and took a few weeks off.
After building back up in March/April to 40-50 MPW doing Z1-Z2 stuff, I stumbled on this thread and the idea of less hard stuff and more sub-T to stay on my feet seemed appealing so I decided to give it a go and stick to the plan for 10-12 weeks and see what happens. Weeks have all been the same. Last LTHR test was about 173, kept Max HR at the end of the subT workouts closer to 168-170.
M - Easy 6 Miles
Tu - 3x2k (~7:15/mile) w/ 1 minute recovery + WU/CU
W - Easy 6 Miles
Th - 7x1k (~7:00/mile) w/ 1 minute recovery + WU/CU
F - Easy 6 Miles
S - Easy 6 Miles
Sun - Long 10 Miles(3 Easy, 4 @ 7:30 pace, 3 Easy)
Basically, 50 Miles a week, 12 miles at sub-T (20%), All the rest done in upper Z1/lower Z2 (9-10 minute pace), repeated since May 1.
Did a 5k TT on February 15 just before getting sick:
36 deg F out - 20:57 (6:44 Pace), Avg HR 172, Max HR 179, Splits 6:35, 6:51, 6:48.
Finally ran another one yesterday:
82 deg F out - 20:56 (6:44 Pace), Avg HR 168, Max 175, Splits 6:29, 6:47, 6:57.
Needless to say, I'm pretty bummed. I was hoping for a strong signal that the work had some effect.
Thoughts:
- I feel like I'm generally fitter, I've jumped up and additional 15-20 MPW and I feel much stronger on the larger workload. Very rarely sore, fine to repeat sub-T workouts 3x a week. Way different experience than Jan/February.
- I feel like I'm really comfortable running in the 7-7:30/mile pace now.
- That 5k felt way different than the hard running from over the winter. Almost Like my body doesn't remember how pull hard and maintain it, I ended up falling back to my workout pace by the end of it.
- If I squint real hard I could say it was 40F hotter and way more humid out and I ran the same time (same course) at 4 BPM lower HR (even though I faded).
I don't know if it's just the heat or that I haven't really pressed myself in almost 3 months and I forgot what time trial/race pace effort feels like or if this type of work is just not the stimulus I respond to.
Was there any progress here? I don't know. I'm tempted to stick it out another few weeks and maybe run another 5k or two to see if it's just a matter of knocking the cobwebs out of my legs.
Heat and humidity is a pretty big impact. VDOT calculator puts your 82 degree performance as a 20:11 in ideal temps. That doesn’t account for humidity either
Someone else asked about this a few posts back. The first race/TT in awhile while doing this training feels like crap for me. 5k pace felt like a full on sprint most of the way, can’t deal with the lactate bath of the last mile well at all. Ran another TT same course a few weeks later, felt way better and ran 30 secs faster. There’s a lot to be said for “remembering how to hurt” at race pace. I think a race or at least a 3-5k TT every 3-5 weeks is very valuable with this training.
I’d at least keep at it until cooler weather hits in the fall. Between that and having some more TT efforts under your belt I bet you’ll see some notable time drops.
SloggingItOut wrote:
Did a 5k TT on February 15 just before getting sick:
36 deg F out - 20:57 (6:44 Pace), Avg HR 172, Max HR 179, Splits 6:35, 6:51, 6:48.
Finally ran another one yesterday:
82 deg F out - 20:56 (6:44 Pace), Avg HR 168, Max 175, Splits 6:29, 6:47, 6:57.
Needless to say, I'm pretty bummed. I was hoping for a strong signal that the work had some effect.
Going to chime in here as a silver lining...I had a very similar experience, several months of subT then did a terrible 10k (1.5 mins slower than my prior PB). Felt like I was stuck at threshold and just had absolutely nothing above that, given the volume of training and subT work I was so confident it'd go well, I was gutted.
The good news: I then did a month of conventional training and speed work and took 15s off my 5k PB. Whilst I performed embarrassingly badly off the subT work, I think it gave me the aerobic base to build on when I piled on some intensity. In future I plan to cycle between base phase (easy+speed), SubT, and then a conventional block.
I think if you race every 3 weeks like SP and have a similar morphology to him you can get away with it. This however isn't possible for me and I tend to have a few target races across a year.
I will add my 2 cents as people are posting their experience. Around 8 months ago I started this method, it was pretty hot still at that point and paces were difficult. I also changed the method from what sirpoc posted, did a so called x factor session. Honestly, I did too much and blamed the system. You have to be very, very careful adding in the x factor element and need to know what you are doing.
My results were very disappointing and all but abandoned the method over the dark months of winter. Stumbled back across the thread and saw the progress of sirpoc and decided to start back up. What stuck me as I am around the same age as him and likely way more talented, but he would beat me in a race. Just didn't seem right. For instance, I could probably run 15 miles a week from zero fitness and break 19 in a few months which he struggled to do for a long, long time.
Anyway, second version of trying this and have just run the schedule laid out almost as a carbon copy.
Things I have seen most people doing, myself included, getting wrong are:
1. Not adjusting for heat and hills
2. Too much x factor work or an obsessions with the 5k work still as your x factor. If you are going to do it, it should be a sprinkling and very , very hard. But, ultimately, if you use it, you are wasting a load increasing sub threshold session. It's all about accumulation of load again, again and again.
3. Seems to have been overlooked. But don't do too much . Get the balance right. I see some guys doing one session a week way too long and then saying it's not working, or 3 sessions a week as laid out but way too much in terms of the easy/sub threshold balance. This 75/25 rule sirpoc has said about seems very straightforward, I've heard others mention it but seems to really be that nice sweetspot.
4. People are expecting miracles. You don't over even 2-3 months. Maybe 6 you will really, really notice the difference.
5. It's very very hard for talented runners I think in particular to adapt to this. It flies in the face of everything fast guys and girls are told and have been coached. To do the same thing, week in, week out no matter what the time of HR year is very alien.
Well, it's been a month so I figured I'd check back in. Haven't run another time trial but based on the comments here I decided to stick with the plan until the fall to see the experiment through. Haven't changed anything except. Just tried to pay more attention and make sure the easy days are as easy as they can be in the heat.
Honestly, it was pretty much just more of the same slog. This week we finally got a cool front. For context, the last three months running conditions most mornings have been around 75-85F and dewpoints 65-75F. This week a cold front came through (isn't sticking around unfortunately) and I've been running around 65-70F with dewpoints in the 55-60F.
The week after the 5k TT I was disappointed in (same ~20:55 result as one I ran in February) I ran my normal Thursday 7x1k w/ 1 minute rest:
7/25/2024 - 80F (75F Dewpoint) - 1k splits: 4:24.8, 4:27.9, 4:27.9, 4:27.1, 4:28.9, 4:29.5, 4:30.4 - Avg Pace: 7:11/mile, Avg
Interval HR 155, Max 168
Last rep 5 seconds slow than first, generally disappointing, and felt pretty consistent compared to recent efforts.
Same workout today:
8/22/2024 - 65F (50F Dewpoint) - 1k splits: 4:20.6, 4:11.5, 4:05.0, 4:07.3, 4:06.2, 3:59.7, 3:58.8 - Avg Pace: 6:38/mile, Avg Interval HR 153, Max 168
I finished this morning's session out like a hummingbird. Felt like I could've run another 4 or 5 reps at the pace I finished interval 7 at (6:24/mile) or quicker. Breaths were easy and long, legs were light and quick, effort felt very moderate. Last rep 20 seconds faster than first and wasn't trying to press it at all, each one just kind ended up feeling looser than the last. My 3x2k on Tuesday was similarly strong.
It felt/feels like I'm inhabiting a completely different body.
I've looked at a few workouts from before I started on subT workout but it's hard to compare since I didn't really run anything at this effort, either above or below. At any rate, I don't think there's anyway I could've hacked todays paces on 1 minute rest at all, and certainly wouldn't have finished my cool down feeling like I could do it all over again.
Thanks to everyone who responded that my TT actually indicated improvement compared to when I started this all several month ago. I was quite concerned about the only goal I had set for the year (which was to improve at least somewhat on my 10k from last fall where I ran a 7:10/mile pace when I run it again in a couple month).
After this week I'm not super worried anymore even with more heat coming back into the forecast for a bit. I'm actually looking forward to tuning up in the cooler weather next month and running some race efforts to see where I'm at.
Hope the weather cools off for you regardless of where you are and you can keep seeing the progress.
Today's high is back in the upper 80s and we cruise right into the 90s tomorrow through the rest of the week. This morning was the last of the nice weather (70F/58F Dewpoint when I started).
I finally got the signal I was hoping to see after starting this experiment in May.
On the weekend I normally do 10 miles, 3 warmup rolling right into 4 continuous subT miles, and then 3 cool down for my 3rd subT workout of the week. Paces have normally been around 7:30/mile, end of the subT normally shows 165-168 BPM (LTHR 172).
Things today just felt good and moderate so I just kept going after 4 and finished a 10k at subT effort (did not press it) since this is the last cooler day for a while.
Previous 10k PR was last fall at around 44 minutes (7:10/mile pace) in 55F degree weather, all out effort, no HR data but I wanted to die at the end. Ran a 10k TT (mid 44 minutes) in similar weather in April, HR peaked at 178, again wanting to die.
Today's 10k during my subT effort: 42:30 (6:50/mile pace). During the extra 2+ miles my HR was between 164-168 the whole time, no extra drift upwards. Felt great at the end.
Probably overly optimistic but when I finished the subT portion I remember feeling like I could've kept that pace for another 4-5 miles if I wanted. 15 degrees warmer, 20 seconds faster pace, and just a way easier effort than my previous PR 10k. I actually had a 5k segment slightly faster than the 5k TT I was disappointed in last month with a max HR there .
Anyway, no more constant training updates from me here but I wanted to say thanks again to everyone for pointing out exactly how much of a difference temperature can play. I knew that heat would make everything harder, but had no clue it could be so dramatic. I was halfway ready to throw in the towel after seeing and feeling like there was no improvement over the last almost 4 months.
After only 1 week of cooler weather to actually see some progress it's such a relief to see that the needle was actually moving this whole time. I'm just gonna stick with it and throw in the occasional race this fall and winter.
Just a quick update from the beginning of this experiment. I have two more race times, an identical-to-the-second 5K (18:21) and a slightly disappointing 10K (call it 38 mid, adjusted for a long course). So that's where my fitness is for comparison's sake. I probably won't have another chance to race until spring at least, but I'm hoping to do 5K-HM next summer on similar or the same courses as recent races, which should give me a good sense of what this training can do.
A few more notes:
- I'm using a SubT-Easy-SubT-Easy-SubT-Long-Off schedule.
- Hitting 3 workouts a week seems like a key ingredient. Even at just 3-4 miles of volume at pace, the frequent stimulus hits different.
- I notice some cumulative fatigue with each workout, which may not be the goal. Or maybe stressing recoverability is the point? I'm still adjusting workouts and paces.
- Getting up to 4 miles of workout volume is useful, as it opens up the longer intervals (2K/3K). 3 x 2K has actually been one of the more difficult workouts, while 2 x 2mi has been fine. Go figure.
- At 12 miles of workout volume per week, I'm putting in more work at pace than in any of my previous race buildups and doing a higher percentage of up-tempo running.
- I wonder how much of the improvement is mechanical. According to Garmin
, my weekly average steps per minute and stride length are noticeably higher. That's got to have some kind of effect.
- Without any races, I might try a steady-10K alternation workout once a month or so as a loose fitness check.
- I'm currently experimenting with 6 miles of total workout volume just to see what it's like. 3 x 2mi wasn't too bad. We'll see if it's sustainable.
Have been using my method myself. Like a whole bunch of people on Strava group, very happy with the results. Put me in the skeptical column, before I did and saw it for myself!
Congrats to sirpoc! 1:12:01. I just wish the guy would run some normal or fast courses! So we can really see where he is at! This HM had the first 5k fully uphill! I would imagine he must be at 1:10 at least, maybe less on a fast course.
Hey guys. Just wanted to add another case study to the thread.
I've been following this method for 16 weeks now. Running roughly 6 hours per week, with between 20-25% of volume at ST. My only change to the plan is that I replace Mondays easy run with a rest day.
I did a parkrun three weeks in for a baseline fitness test and ran 18.08. I've just run the same course in similar conditions today and ran.....18.08. So no progress at all for me so far.
For background I've been running on and off for 16 years (I'm 38 now). I've run low 17s in the past last when I've been fitter.
From experience if I'd trained the way I used to for the last 16 weeks I would have expected to have improved by probably 10-15 seconds. So it's a bit disappointing to be treading water with this method so far.
Anyone have any tips? Is it likely that this method just isn't for me? Or if I stick with it for another month or two might I still get a breakthrough?
Yes, I think the core question wasn't about maximizing TSS, but rather optimizing training load for time available. You could run a lot more at slower paces, but then you would need to have more time available for training. Similarly, you could hit your workout days harder, but can you manage the recovery and keep that load on?
When sirproc used to comment in this thread, the idea was that for the time available to a fairly average hobby jogger (max 7-8 hours a week but willing to run every day), what plan would allow for the most load while keeping the runner recovered enough to train consistently over an extended period of time? I think he used CTL or TSS or some measure of load, but a lot of the discussion about staying under LT2 or using HR as a proxy was mostly about choosing the appropriate intensity to be able to recover from those sessions and then repeat fequently.
He was pretty clear that if he had more or less time available to train that other strategies may or would defiantly make more sense.
After my updates in this thread over the summer I thought I'd drop back in again when I
had a race result. I switched to this style in May. My weeks look
like:
E (6M), SubT - 3x2k w/1 (8M), E (6M), SubT - 7x1k w/1, E (6M), L+SubT 4M @ subT (10-13M), E (6M), E (6M) - Ends up being about 7 hours and change a week @ ~50M (25% subT, rest E). Doable with one run a day before work.
Last fall I ran a low 44 10k, and had no improvement on another attempt this April after training over the winter months with a range of I, R, and T style Daniel's work, all the while feeling less than optimal.
After a summer of nothing SubT weeks on repeat, I did a modest taper, and I ran under 39:30 on that same course.
My recent shorter intervals were done at or above 6:30/mile pace, and my 2k intervals were at or above 6:45/mile, and my longer SubT runs at or above 7:00/mile. Those paces were +30 seconds when I started in the spring and didn't quicken much through the hot months in the summer.
I was honestly thinking maybe a 41 flat would be nice so to run a minute and a half quicker, and never having touched a 6:20 pace in my 7x1k workouts, well anyway, I was very pleased/surprised, but I guess I shouldn't have been given what others have reported after sticking with this type of work for 3-5 months. I also still feel like I have some race effort rust to kick out of my legs (and mindset).
There's something I've heard repeated that the best training is the one the athlete will actually stick to. I'm sure if I could've stuck on the 50M Daniel plan (or some other), I would have improved as well. Being able to do the work, repeat it ad nauseam, and feel healthy was a big draw.
I do still feel like I need get use to running at race effort again, but I've got fairly few complaints at the moment and plan to just roll with it. It's a push it up from the below, not a drag it up from above style of work, but it is work and the chronic application of that work does seem to yield improvement (at least for this middle aged hobby jogger).
I'm also fairly sure a similar strategy of managing load would work for longer races if someone was interested in it. I don't think the "plan" is a inflexible as it is sometimes talked about. I mean, I've stuffed my third subT into my long run, partly because I wanted the feeling of a continuous long run with some effort and partly because I wanted 2 back to back easy days. Would it be more effective with a 3rd interval session and a true easy long run, maybe? I dunno, but I like it, feeling pretty okay, and am continuing to show some improvement to boot.
Sirproc and others were aiming to find a balance between effort, recovery, and volume that works for the individual and would lead to long term improvement.
Strava stalker returns 10/26/2024:
yuppers wrote:
In other news, looks like sirpoc got another PR in the 5k today.
15:26. Wow pretty cool he's still progressing. I thought maybe he was declining recently. I tried to understand the course he ran, the distance doesn't look long enough to be standard out and back? Short loop and then long loop maybe? If so that's 3 U-turns so I'm sure he can get lower even perhaps on a full loop course. Someone send this man to Battersea Park. I think very close to sub 15.
Add me to the list who has found this thread and who has had their running live changed by it. Came across it a while back on advanced running on Reddit of all places!
I'm following 1:1 basically with sirpoc , scaled down to 5.5 hours and am 22 weeks in and just took 7 minutes off my HM , from 1:33 to 1:26. So obviously I'm not fast, but for real I had tried everything to break 1:30 and have been running for 7 years, im now 39. This is the first training plan really that has given me the structure or consistency to really understand my training but also see the breakthrough and progression. The main takeaway for me is how it's easy to stay fresh and rinse and repeat , along with when you breakthrough just a mild increase of intensity and go again. I would agree with others who have mentioned it being simple yet complicated all at the same time in a way. I think once you get what is happening here and collecting that low hanging fruit as others have described it, suddenly it all clicks into place and you can stick to it and have faith in the process.
I can see how it would be tempting to get greedy and pushing for more. But I will sit firmly in the place of others who have mentioned , not really changing things up whilst the gains are there. Honestly, legendary thread and thanks to sirpoc obviously but all others who have contributed, made spreadsheets, provided their own feedback.
just another plodcast 10/31/2024:
Running 6 years.
I am 42 and have followed the sirpoc™ method (hope the trolls enjoy that one!) for 41 weeks and counting now. I got on this thread early as it sounded too good to be true but there was enough testimony for me to give it a shot.
I'm training 6.5 hours a week, also adapted it like the dude to scale down. Schedule mostly looks the same as his, but I am using time with 10*3, 5*6 and 3*10. I will add, I have added in strides on two of the four easy days. Whether that is important or not, I don't believe so. I tweaked a hamstring playing cricket and left the strides out for 7 weeks in the middle and I still did a big PB at 5k at the end of that time. Easy runs, I used the guide suggested and just have HR on my heat unit and make sure I don't go over 70% max HR. Don't pay attention to anything else.
For reference, I have never been able to get to 6 hours training, I've always broken down way before getting to that point. Similar experience to everyone else? I can maybe follow a Daniel's plan for 12-15 weeks and then it just all seems to fall apart. There's often some aggressive easy running or speedwork that just finishes me off. If I was younger, I suspect I could handle this type of training more This method, I haven't had a break and still going strong and feel fresher. Sirpoc said something that stuck with me on Strava. "There is nothing inherently magic about sub threshold" .
I think this is the key to understanding it. It's basically given us all a perfect balance between getting enough stimulus without feeling too overloaded or breaking down. This as a consequence let's training load keep rising and rising probably past where most of us have ever got to before.
This is my 5k Progression: I have tried to race/parkrun/time trial once a month.
January (just before I started): 20:13
February : 20:19 (this was a couple of weeks or so in)
March: 20:13 (I think this was maybe 6-7 weeks in)
April: 19:56
May: 19:45 (lifetime pb 19:31)
June: Too hot
July: 18:56 (biggest jump even with the gap and lifetime pb)
August : 18:44
September: No 5k but ran a HM PB of 1:24:02
October: 18:15 and scraped home at the end of last week in 2:57:58 for the FM. My 8th full, previous best was 3:10:44 and more out of line with my 5k at the time.
My big take is that I am significantly aerobically stronger training like this, in fact hugely so. Picking off the easy gains time and time again. I doubt I will change anything up for now as I'm convinced there is still some untapped aerobic engine to release. Ultimately, this is why for the hobby jogger level this is probably the best as it allows for the consistency to untap that aerobic engine which is definitely your biggest value for money yoi can spend your training on.
Anyway I've lurker here for a long time and have lurked on the excellent Strava group and just thought since it's been close to a year , at least one person might benefit from my thoughts! Before anyone adds anything, I'm not fast and this isn't a humble brag post! I just hope it helps someone else if they are on the fence about if this is for them or too good to be true. All the same worries I had!
I’n an FT [fast-twitch runner] and gave this a try (I have a lactate meter) and I found that my paces simultaneously were quite slow relative to the guide and I was getting very fatigued after about a month or so.
I’m sure someone will respond “slow down”, but you need to create load somehow and the trick of this method is to use paces close to threshold to get a bump in CTL. I think this is why Marius himself said that more typical training works better for FTs.
So just popping in for a 22 week update. I've since run a 36.50 10k which I was fairly happy with and seemed to be reasonable chunk of improvement compared to my starting point.
I've also done another 5k which was a couple of seconds faster. But basically unchanged since I started training this way.
I definitely feel fitter aerobically than when I started but 5k pace just seems out of reach.
So not a disaster by any means but seems I'm a mediocre responder to this type of training.
I'll probably start experimenting by adding in some faster stuff. Or perhaps switch between blocks of this type of training and blocks of faster stuff. Definitely glad I gave it a try anyway.
wondering the same 11/23/2024:
I was wondering the same and have some thoughts. I know people have warned about this slow build, but wasn't prepared for it when it played out for real. I was doing the same thing over and over, repeating sirpoc method as much as possible. Nothing happened for 2 months. Like literally nothing. Was ready to quit. Made a small gain on maybe week 10. Then nothing. Then suddenly an absolute huge gain unexpectedly around another 4 weeks after that. Then it all started flowing and after 8 months I'm in lifetime shape and still gaining at 43 years old.
That seems to be the pattern, give or take , for a lot of people. It takes a lot of guts or courage I guess to absolutely go all in with this method when you don't see that initial gain. I've suspected it's because using let's say a textbook Daniel's plan, you can overload and get quite good gains. But likely you will need a break after a block and some decent downtime. Whereas this is more linear, you just build and build and build. So you can grow fitness at a slow rate in comparison, but when you scale it up to 50 weeks instead of like 10 with a traditional plan, suddenly you have a huge amount more training load stored in the bank with never needing a rest, taper etc. I don't think it's much more complicated than that, going on how some of the much smarter guys than me on here or Strava have tried to explain it.
I’m glad that I stumbled across this thread about 9 months
ago in my transition from cycling to running. Seems like I am not the only one in that. Roads out there are too dangerous these days! Anyway, like others I seem to have had great success in sticking to what the thread seems to just be referring to as the sirpoc™ method.
I started running around this time 3 years ago post lockdown
and my first run was a 24 flat 5k TT. I quickly got to around 20, progressed to a mid 19 and that was that – or so I thought. Was running I guess half structured, some Daniels I and R pace combined with the usual straight tempo, long run etc. Then found this thread about 9 months ago and things have really clicked into place after a couple of years of frustration. Things with the method laid out here just make so much sense for my lifestyle, my age, my ability and the realistic number of hours I have available. I have tried to follow the method via sirpoc strava logs as close as possible, which seems to be paying off. I just ran 17:22 at my latest parkrun 2 weeks ago. I don’t know why it seems to be working. I’m just here to report that I am delighted it has! So just a huge thanks for him for decided to post in the first place. I am sure I am not the only one who feels this way!
JS MacLexel wrote:
reader and curious wrote:
I have a question to Sirpoc or others using this method. Do you see a stagnation? How long are your stagnation phases?
I have been using it for 6 months now. I saw little progress in the first 2 months. Then all of a sudden I improved (some 10 seconds/km faster in all reps).
After that, very little progress again for 2.5 months, and then another 8-10 seconds/km improvement.
Very similar to my experience. I am 5 months in. Sub-T reps were anywhere from 3:45-3:50/km for a while – nearly 4 months of this. Paces and effort level did not improve at all for these months, but time trials did improve slowly (17:32 to 17:05). Then seemingly overnight started hitting 3:25-3:30/km and improved by almost 50 sec over 5k (17:05 to 16:17). I was absolutely floored by how strong I felt. Guess I will just be doing this boring workout routine indefinitely until I hit my fitness ceiling or want to play around with shorter, more explosive sharpening workouts. Anyone else have similar stagnation/sudden drops in paces? It is so bizarre. I don't feel faster at all, but after doing such repetitive workouts, it really just felt like business as usual until I checked my watch for the time and surprised myself week after week.
For anyone curious at how far this method can go and is interested in sirpoc progress still, he just ran 31:28 yesterday for a really nice big PB jump. I think now at 41 year old?
Yeah I'll happily consider myself one of the losers following. Gone from 21 min 5k to 18:24 in a year following this thread. Previously had been running or following other plans for close to a decade.
Sirpoc's training is out there. It's not a secret. His performances in his 40s speak for themselves and testiment to this system.
There are dozens of testimonies in this thread of people who have improved more or less copying him. Hundreds on Strava. A guy posted in fantastic detail the other day on Reddit how he went from almost 7 years as a stagnated 20 min guy well into his 40s to breaking 18 after 9 months of this and still improving, even down to the Mile. Question is, why wouldn't anyone consider training like this? Not even should they.
Also, no disrespect to Kristoffer, but sirpoc is at another level to him. Sure, he has Henrik coaching him. But I'm just as likely to follow the guy who has had truly remarkable results and as have others following his lead than someone who really is scaling down what he knows from elite to hobby jogger
Would a pro train like this? No, obviously not. Are most of us pros? Hell no. It's all very well looking at the training plans of olympic runners, but the reality is we should be shaped by guys who have life balances, stresses, jobs, other things going on in life like a sirpoc. Also, I think there is something new here. Find me one other training program that doesn't have speed or vo2 work built in, no strides, no straight tempos and basically just two paces of running. Pretty much none and none with this level of success.
He's probably given as much to the LRC community for free than almost anyone I can ever remember.
If respecting or being inspired by that makes me a loser, give me a T-shirt now.
The great thing about this these and why it is so damn good is even when the usual guys try and troll it or make it toxic, the positive still shines through. Think how rare that is for LRC and you'll understand why the only loser here is guys who make posts like the one I'm replying to.
I thought I would post here, as I think it's worth someone coming here now and again and giving a fair and long term review of this method, system or whatever we have decided to call it.
I have been coming on LR message boards for many years to read. I'm now 50 and anyone who has been here a while will likely be as beat up by the place, skeptical and probably down right miserable by a lot of the experience.
I don't believe in miracle cures. I don't believe in miracle training. In fact, quite frankly I had this thread down as a bunch of idiots fumbling around in the dark. But hey, don't judge me that's how LR makes you feel! But then, you actually take a step back and think 'Hmmm, there is a lot of actual positivity here'
So, my background, I ran in school. I was average. Very average. Gave up, came back as a married, hobby guy at 36. I ran 19:11 for the 5k and a 1:28 half at 38. I stumbled around that level for a while, mainly using a mixture on and off of various new ideas coming out, or simply going back to more traditional methods from various cookie cutter plans you will find in the usual literature. I actually scraped an 18:56 at 41 from a day where it all came together.
Anyway, come around this time last year, this thread I guess was in its peak. I seemed to tick all the boxes. My best was long behind me, I was running around 6 hours a week still with various plans but I was going nowhere. Was running around 21:30. Tbh, I was pretty happy with that at nearly 50. But decided, why the hell not try this new craze.
Wow, did I make the right decision! I read most of this thread through twice. To make sure I hadn't missed or messed up any of the interpretation. Set out to just start out right away:
My initial impressions were I must be missing something, at the end of my first week it felt way too easy. Almost like a recovery week from what I was used to. The workouts felt like I could have easily done more reps although I did start cautious and that's not a feeling I have had in my previous years very often!
I was already doing 6 hours so I basically just replicated the classic here, 3*10, 6*5 and 10*3. And I just went on .....and on.....and on. Suddenly week 9 I noticed things were significantly faster. I jumped in a 5k , ran 20:50.
Just kept going. 3 easy runs and the long run plus the same workouts. On and on and on. Boring. Very boring. I hopped in another 5k around week 16. 20:21.
You see the pattern. On and on and on. Week 21. Ran 20 flat. You know the pattern, same week in week out. This was by far the fastest I had run in a very long time.
Anyway, I was building to a half, this was around week 28. I ran 19:32 in a random 5k I jumped in , them the week after I broke 1:30 with a 1:29 flat in a HM.
As time as gone on, I kept improving, when, remarkably just before Christmas I broke my best from when I was 41, a couple of days after my 50th birthday . I ran 18:29 and was blown away by it. To have a sense of achievement at this age just blows my mind.
The key to this is the consistency. It has allowed me to just keep going, doing my own thing. Whilst fellow old friends of mine are training themselves into a black hole of fatigue, I am staring into said black hole but never faling in. Anyway, last Sunday I broke 1:25 and ran 1:23:55 in a half. Cleaning up on my new age category of 50+ afterwards much to my delight!
I have managed to increase load as that time has gone on. From hovering around 6 hours to managing sometimes to squeeze out around 7. Running everyday I can, as suggested. Paces from the original posts way back now, seem pretty good. Maybe I had to slow them a bit for the first month or so, but quite quickly I feel into the Goldilocks zone sirpoc84 suggests. Easy runs are easy, just cap at 70% HR and whatever will be will be.
Probably the most difficult aspect of this is working out a balance between how much you have improved, versus where to go next in terms of paces, more time training to squeeze some more load out.
It seems madness to me now I was doing 200-400 repeats to give me a speed boost in a 5k. I mean really. I was a 21 min guy. This is simply madness when you think of it. Absolutely the limiting factor is my aerobic engine was running out of fuel wah before any speed I had in my legs was usual.
I just wanted to share this and hope it might inspire someone else to never give up on improving based on this thread. I thank those who posted their own experiences here that helped me decide to dive head first in myself.
Highly recommend the Strava group by the way, all the main characters of the thread post there regularly and as others have said, it's not behind any paywall which I find remarkable. You won't find a better bunch of free resources on the whole web.
I can add an anecdote / data point for this style of training. I’m mid 40s M, averaging 100 km / week on singles. Have typically followed Pfitzinger training plans for the last few years (rotating 5/10/15 km type training plans). To be fair they have worked OK for me, have seen steady improvement.
Was targeting a 10 mile race, so thought I would trial this type of training. Also fulfils the specificity argument as I run 10 miles in under an hour, so good threshold kind of pace - hence plenty of work around threshold can’t be a bad thing.
Simply rotated 5x 6 mins, 8x 1 km and 20x 400m workouts every third day for the last few months. Having said that, depending how I’m feeling I still like longer progression runs and tempo runs so still getting a balanced diet so to speak.
I found the workouts manageable, obviously easier than some of the Pfitzinger VO2max workouts which can leave me a bit dead. Always tried to keep my HR not getting much higher than 85-87% of max. Took 2 mins off my 10 mile time. Whether that can be wholly attributed to this style of training, not sure (I’ve had a very nice steady 6 months of 100 km/week which can’t be a bad thing), but I found it OK and easy to follow - and felt less beat up than Pfitzinger. I’m generally sceptical that any training plan is massively efficacious compared to any other, but I certainly didn’t regress using this approach. I did a 5 km TT a month or so ago and my pace had improved slightly, so still some gains even though I wasn’t doing anything specific at that kind of pace for quite a while.
I do have my own prejudice that you can gain some psychological strength from really hard workouts, which this style of training doesn’t really get you to. That might just be my own mental myth.
I’ll probably continue using approach for a little while longer.
I actually am enjoying the debate on to strength or not to strength! I would say, a year ago I was totally on the strength, hills, specificity side of the fence. Until I found this thread.
What sirpoc laid out, made sense in theory, after all it wasn't just what to do, but why. Many thanks to him by the way, whatever anyone things the dude has given more to hobby joggers in my opinion, than 99% of these influencers with thousands of disciples.
I found this thread in February 2024, so my journey is coming close to a year. I am a mediocre runner. My biggest achievement was winning my local parkrun, if that is even a thing. I ran 19:23 and I am 35 years old. I got there through a lot of hard work. A mixture of classic stuff like Daniel's 2Q plans and specific strength sessions, got me to around 19:05. I certainly felt stronger with some lifting etc. This was all around 2023.
Back to February 2024 and like I mentioned, something just struck me with all the knowledge here. I've seen other posts saying the same, so I think there's something about the lay out etc and sirpoc's explanations that resonates with people, the 'Ah that is me' when he describes the struggles.
I started off with good fitness it must be said, with 5 years in the bank and a near 19 flat. Not good but obviously not terrible. So I basically jumped straight in. The paces were very near what I could cope with, although I was a little thrown off with how easy the easy runs were and that took a lot of time to adjust to compared to other programs.
The main issue I noticed after a few weeks, was how hard it was to do some basic lifting and stregth work and fit in 3 sub threshold workouts. In fact, it was near on impossible. My legs hurt couldn't cope with the demands. The strength stuff was merely standard stuff you will see in a lot of classic coaching books and manuals.
I jumped on the side of the fence that I would just throw the lifting and stregth work out of the window and purely went 4x easy and 3 x sub threshold and nothing else, not even strides. Oh boy did I make the right choice.
By Christmas parkrun, I ran 17:22. The progress was pretty steady. I had a breakthrough around week 7 in training which translated to a PB in week 9. It's been pretty steady since. I was have dropped maybe 10 seconds on average each parkrun. Yes, I am racing maybe once maybe 3-4 weeks. But I was doing that for the previous 5 years so it's not like suddenly that's the big factor. Another big note here, is initially I was doing 6 hours a week for most of that time, while I was doing 6 hours a week for most of this, I have slowly been able to ramp it up to 7. This is the first time in my running life I have got anywhere near 7 on a week by week basis and I feel a ton better than I did on my previous 6.
Here is the interesting bit. I added strides back in and some lifting around the new year. Suddenly, I really started to struggle. After the first week or so, I assumed it would just take time to get back into it, but if anything it got worse. My legs just felt like lead when it came to sub threshold days. Anyway, the last week or so I have given back up strides and anything you could consider strength work and almost straight away within a few days it suddenly felt like 4x easy and 3x sub threshold was definitely doable again.
I'm not sure if there's a conclusion here, but I just thought I would post based on the fact it seems to be a big debate of what to include on top. My legs probably actually felt stronger and less fatigued in general with the long period of nothing but running. I actually only got back into it because of a couple of videos I saw from some old school coaches and it convinced me now with the biggest base I have ever had, to add that work back in.
Anyway guys, thanks for the amazing thread, all the big contributions, the Strava group and thanks to sirpoc for his original posts. Whatever motivated him to do so, I'm glad you did! Keeping an eye out for if he ever does a marathon?! I believe the London Championship entry list went out today. Is he on it?
Oh, I honestly agree it would be kind of cool for a KI and sirpoc show down! I agree I would rather see that than half the garbage being put out on YouTube and Instagram these days by running channels!
former Daniel's truther 2/04/2025:
... Speed is totally overrated, vo2 workouts are overrated and I haven't ran anything even close to 5k pace since reading this thread early last year and I have taken 2+ mins off my pb down to 16:49. I'm 37. ...
I'm on the Strava group. I've gotten down to mid 16 training absolutely, exclusively like this and I'm 44. That's my lifetime PB and been running 25 years. Sirpoc will break 15/31 soon, but his potential is probably on a different level to most of us and may well run sub 2:25 in the marathon. There's another American masters, sub 16. He also trains the same almost exclusively in the sirpoc method. Which, in my opinion, it should be called.
Norwegian Singles method is too broad and people are way over complicating it. If we just name it after sirpoc, we can just say 'go look at his Strava' and honestly within 5 mins scrolling you will have worked out the fundamentals.
I think the remarkable thing about this method though is how many testimonials we have seen from 19-22 min runners. Who have broke through in some cases half a decade or more of stagnation training the more traditional methods, growing many different crops in your analogy. Some guys have been training for 5-10 years and suddenly this has allowed them to increase load in a way they never ever have been able to prescribe before, knocking minutes off even 5k times.
That is what is quite striking, almost shocking when you see past who is fastest and look at the at times absolutely staggering progress some are making. There was a guy who posted on Reddit in depth and it was a really cool, informative post. Whilst he isn't fast in the bigger picture, his improvement is almost unbelievable. The good thing about Strava, is we can see this progress from guys in the group day to day. Obviously, the group is grown but as others have said, if you know who to follow it becomes less noisy.
The typical peak, build, specificity for the event requires some easing off the pedals, coupled with some race specific work. If you are going to go all in on this method though, one race in the grand scheme is just a blip. You are looking to build more and more and more. Yes, you might not perfectly built for that 5k, but long term you just kept building with a tiny taper. Sure, you might give up a few seconds without that specific race preparation or sharpening, but you are also still back to it a day or so later and you are still in the same phase of just being able to just continue to do the same thing, over and over.
The next 5k or the one after that, you have continued to build more and not interrupt training with doing anything sub optimal, for the long term build. The increase in speed will naturally just come with the increase in pushing up the threshold from below. If you look at some of the stuff sirpoc has shared on Strava, it's fascinating. The CTL to performance graph was insanely insightful and has certainly worked out the way he's intended. I will say though, it takes a huge step out of ones comfort zone and is a huge leap of faith for people, including myself, who are used to those 8, 12, 16 week builds to something specific.
The other advantage is whilst you never completely master one distance, you are pretty darn good across a broad range. I think there's a huge argument that's the main benefit here for the hobbyist and I don't think that's mentioned enough.
It's hard to get your head around. But if you are thinking ahead to just one particular race, a more traditional build is perfectly fine, but there's only so many times you can do that without having those peaks and troughs way too familiar to most us. That to me, seems to be the trap a lot of people have gotten into and why, as questioned above, so many people seem to have broken through a plateau when really trying to do this style of training as close to 1:1 as originally laid out as possible.
I'll put myself in the group a lot have others have admitted, my skeptical nature was pretty high on this, which turned to curiosity. That in turn, turned to why not. Now, I'm unashamedly in the camp of thinking, for th average hobby jogger this is probably the absolute smartest way to train.
Someone questioned above, why would one train like this so boring and long term? I can only give my opinion. But I never in my life came close to my modest target of breaking 36. I think a lot of people's focus is the 5k but mine has always been 10k. I had pretty much tried all avenues and always got a mid 36 at best. I've been on the Strava group and followed everything as closely as I can. I ran 34.26 last weekend. I can't lie, I had a boring 7 months of a slow, steady but very doable build . But, who cares? I was also really bored of missing my target and now more than happy to train like this if I can finally smash through and put long term running goals to bed!
Hi sirpoc,
Been following this thread since its early days. Following your training I've gone from:
18:11 5k (track, xc, & road over the last 10 years) on Jack Daniel's training / 50 mpw to 17:38 on Sirpoc structure / 30 mpw. I'm looking to build up to 50 mpw and see where your training takes me next--an injury took me out for a solid year before I could attempt this.
Anyways just another anecdotal story of one of thousands you've affected--you're a treasure to the running community.
All the best,
Letsrun Fan
Sorry to bring some negativity here but is anyone else getting slower? I haven't changed anything in my training except to add a little more sub threshold. Over the past 3 months I've slowed by 20-30 seconds from a high of 17:30ish. I'm thinking that perhaps my improvement came from racing parkrun / doing races most weeks and not from the sub threshold. I'm not sure but it's really frustrating. I feel like the premise of sub threshold is correct but it's not translating into improved fitness for me.
Trey79b wrote:
Does this method work better for a predominately slow twitch fiber type vs a fast twitch?
I don't think it matters. I have had huge success following this and even using sirpoc methods to coach youngsters, seems to work, for the most past, across the board. The people without discipline and stray way outside the carefully constructed parameters, are more likely to fail than y'all looking at who is fast and slow twitch.
I'm old like sirpoc and I am now running close to my best. I'm so fast twitch it's not even funny, it took a little longer to adapt, but I got there. Polar opposite and rightly the non lactate testing godfather of this is sirpoc and that dude couldn't be more slow twitch if you tried.
Not wanting to pour salt into anyone's coffee, but the most important thing is you understand what you are trying to do in the short, medium and long term here and how you will account for that. It seems simple on the face, but is actually one of the harder systems in the fact that there is no end point. So, you have to understand to how build and so on. It's more or less done for you in a Daniel's block, or a 18/55 plan. I think that's been lost a little bit. Hey it's not sirpoc job to do that, he's done enough. But if you follow him closely enough and the small changes he drips in every so often, you'll understand what I mean.
The good news is a significant majority of people who buy into this have seen remarkable progress.
Or Daniel is holding you back wrote:
Or Daniel’s is holding you back.
Easy for you to test, use the sirpoc protocol for 8-12 weeks and compare how you do.
other than hitting paces either side of half marathon effort, it’s all about consistently, unlike Daniels parking and thoughts and more like lydiard without the peaking
This. Daniel's was holding me back. Seasoned runner here, love the thread. Jumped in around Easter last year and never looked back. Went from 38 to 33 in almost a year using sirpoc method in a 10k, which has been my focus. Training 4+ years almost exclusively with a Daniel's inspired coach after using the books basic plans myself for a cycle. Previously unstructed training for the two years previous. 33 years old.
The big factor is the boom and bust Daniel's and his followers bring. It's insane when you think about it. In my opinion, that way of training is actually probably the best way if you are looking for just a 16 week block or build to one point in time. Almost the fit person, but casual runner than maybe has signed up to a half or 10k and it's all they care about. But outside of that, it's actually insanely sub optimal.
For the seasoned runner, I'm 100% now behind what sirpoc has laid out will make you better over a long period. It's not even close. I'm glad and thankful I found the thread. Haven't posted before but the above really resonated with me and thought I must throw my hat into the ring.
Daniel's reformed truther 2/28/2025:
... I will add I am incredibly fast twitch, I saw that debate - but I also have absolutely smashed through walls and boundaries in my second life as a runner. I've run 16:33 which is almost my best from college and I'm 37 with a family of 3 to look after and all the stresses that brings. I've totally ditched absolutely everything but the 3 sub Threshold sessions a week and the easy. I was pretty happy with my turkey trot 18:21 in my 30s but absolutely delighted with my 16:33 a year and a bit on. Shout-out again though to sirpoc himself, always happy to help and answer even though I'm sure he's fed up on Strava and pushed me onto the right path when I had some questions. TL;DR of this bit, whilst I maybe took me a few extra weeks to adapt than others have suggest. This is absolutely for older fast twitch hobby joggers like me as well.
I'm not the guy who went from 5 to 6, but I am a 40 year old master who switched from more traditional training to this style in the middle of training for a sub 5 mile. For the two months before racing, I did not paces faster than 1:30 400s; no strides or anything. I also stopped doing the long run. Ended up with 4:59 mile.
Now I don't have a good prior and don't know what I would have got had I continued more traditional training, but at the very least I don't think it hurt. I think if I had a 6 month or so timeline to do it again, I would go full this method for 5 months, then substitute one workout per week during the late month with some 200s-400s at race pace or faster. But I have very low certainty that would help.
the thread that will never die! 3/01/2025:
For those thinking about the mile. Here's just my experience. I had always wanted to break 5:30. I was always on the cusp of it and then it just never worked out. Followed quite a few classic mile programs , all resulted in around that.
Decided to focus on other things. Found this thread around 14 months ago now, to train mostly for 5k, 10k. Before this, was training in the classic cycles, 5-6 hours a week for probably a good decade. Limited success, knew my place in the hierarchy of hobby joggers. You get the drift! Didn't really think about the mile. Anyway, pretty much went down the 1:1 route as seems to be the next success of copying the sirpoc method. I call it that, as there are other ways to dial this up but I think mostly 1:1 is the best option rather than the more catchy NSM which is broader.
So no hills, no strides, no 200m track repeats, just get into the meat of the routine and tick off the 3 sessions a week and otherwise just easy running.
Summary, low 17 5k, mid 35 for a 10 and ran a low 1:18 HM. All absolutely blew apart my PBs. Scroll ahead to January this year, jumped in a local mile with no other thought than being annoyed it would break up my winning weekly schedule, ran 4:57.
OK maybe you could make an argument for dialling in something short like the mile to really tease out a few more seconds? By what's the point. It's neglible probably compared to the absolutely huge jump I've made due to the nature of the aerobic gains across the board. And hey, it's a whole lot of fun suddenly beating people comfortably who have beaten you in all distances in the past!
Also note, couldn't imagine running any other training method, where for the most part you can go day in, day out and no breaks between the seasons of cycles.
Basically just erring on the side of caution, my HR even at that pace is higher than many people recommend but if I slow down even more it starts feeling weird form-wise so it's a sort of a happy medium between 70% HR (which would be 6:30-7:00/km for me) and 65% MAS (which would be around 5:26-5:46 depending on which VDOT equivalent you go with for my 5k/HM times, 5:26 would be 65% of my mile pace while 5:46 would be 65% of my 3k pace)
Incidentally, I can now report that at least for me, this method really didn't translate to the marathon at all - today, I split the first half 10 minutes slower than my HM PB from 4 weeks ago and still bonked hard between 28 and 35km, ended up jogging it in to save my legs when I realised the PB was off the table, 2xHM+33 minutes was the overall time. Doesn't help that I have recently been doing a lot of these intervals on the treadmill, aerobically I felt great but the legs didn't respond well to pounding the pavement even though my marathon PB was only 16 weeks ago with more traditional training.
Spoc has gotten his long run to 20 miles, though, and his overall mileage is way better than mine, so it's less about the method and more about respecting the distance, hopefully he can convert his time better than I did.
EDIT: Also, the marathon is quite unique in terms of the mental grind, I think, so it's worth thinking about whether this method, or any other training system is aimed at just improving the underlying physiology, or whether grit and toughness can be trained as well and that's why some people hate on this method too much as it feels too easy. Spoc is coming from years of performing at a high level in cycling time trials so I'm sure he was used to the suffering already, but if you've never run some of these distances before, the mental reset after each rep is so nice in training but could backfire on race day. Basically, my main limiting factor was muscle, but I also wasn't willing to suffer enough to push through that pain, not sure if a Pfitz style 18 miles w/ 14 miles @ MP would have helped with that.
marky_markcarr 2/09/2025: [from Reddit]
Final update for a while using the sirpoc ™️ / Norwegian singles method - Mile PB
I'm going to call it then sirpoc method (he sometimes posts here as spoc84 I believe that is truly him), mainly because Norwegian singles is attributed to him and he laid out his fantastic adaption of it on Letsrun which has exploded. I even hear podcasters talking about this lately. For a while it felt like I was just in on the small niche secret from the original thread.
https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=12130781&page=1
I have stayed 100% faithful to his routine. Which , I'm sure a decent amount of you know by now, is in simple terms, 4x easy runs and 3 lots of sub threshold. There's actually way more to it under the hood than that, but that's the TL;DR.
Anyway, a lot of people have spoken about speed and where we are at with that. Is this the limiting factor of the system? My case is interesting as I have given up everything , even strides and just followed sirpoc 1:1. Anyway, the last update I have I spoke about breaking 5 for the mile, I ran just outside.
Anyway this week I ran the Mile again on Tuesday night in 4:57. I just thought I would add what I changed, to dip under. Well, nothing. Just more of the same.
I just ran today 17:17 as well, (another pb) What's interesting is how both attempts in the mile now, are actually VDOT wise probably quite a chunk better, than my longer distances. A 4:57 I would have thought gives me something like a shot at a 17 flat. Obviously my times as posted before have come down drastically across years and years of training via seemingly sub optimal but mainstream methods, but a lot of the worries I have seen people have is that you will lack that real top end speed, training like this.
Obviously it's not a magic pill, just a very smart and effective system to increase load probably beyond where most of us have every been.
The 3 min repeats I have been running around 3:37/km up to 10 min repeats in 3:47/km. This has mostly been the last month or so since I last posted. So 3:37/ km is the fastest pretty much I have ran in training.
I guess the mile really is that aerobic? Even though my training paces are way slower, I can just seen to rock up, lock into the pace and go for it. Maybe I'm not going out hard enough in the 5k. Who knows. I've not really seen people talking a huge amount about adapting it for the track and short stuff, more people seem interested in scaling it from 5-k-HM which it was designed for, up to the full.
So hopefully this is a good follow up to don't be scared there's no hills, strides, or anything remotely fast. After a good amount of time doing this, seems the aerobic engine increase is worth more than whatever leg speed you could have gained in the same time?
Anyway I just thought people might find it interesting, as there seemed to be a lot of interest the last two times I posted and people were asking for a follow up in some cases.
Hope everyone ran a great weekend.
marky_markcarr 3/18/2025: [from Reddit]
How I ran a 2:44 Marathon using the sirpoc™️ Norwegian singles
Some of you will remember my posts I guess from how I broke 5 finally for the mile and crushed my PBs at other distances. But now the Marathon. I'd never never broken 3:15 in fact my PB was a 3:24, ran around the time I was around a 20 min 5k runner. I think for that, I followed Piftz 18/55. That was probably around my highest ever mileage I've put my body through until now. As I've said before, I improved greatly using sirpoc methods without a huge increase of hours , but I did manage consistency and now I have managed to push on, especially in the last 8-10 weeks.
https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=12130781
For those who aren't sure what this method is, the original LRC thread is here.
Strava group is here.
https://strava.app.link/Ddzgv88DPRb
There are other sources out there, but these are probably the best, as sirpoc still posts on both. I do believe he posts here as "spoc84" but nobody has confirmed it's definitely him.
Anyway, I won't go over too much old ground. But I noticed the man himself was doing the marathon so just decided to slide into what he was roughly doing. I had Barcelona booked in this weekend just gone, so I had around a 9-10 week build once it became clear what he was doing.
My main difference is now I've been really extending the long run in the E-ST-E-ST-E-ST-Long pattern. Each Sunday adding on a little bit until I got to 2.5 hours. I wanted to go to just around or below time on feet, wasn't focused on distance. But it was the easy pace. I added in a medium long run of about 70-80 mins on the Wednesday and on either the Tuesday or the Saturday I did what I would call a "big" sub threshold workout. The pace dialled back from the original suggestions, it was maybe between 30k and Marathon pace. First week I did 4x10 mins just to get me used to more than the basics I'd been doing for a year (basically 3x10, 10x3 and 5x6 or 6x5).
As the weeks went on, I extended it more and more and finished with 4x15 and then the last session 2 weeks out was 4x20 at goal pace. That's when I knew this was going to be possible to break 2:45. I had an idea I was there, but this confirmed it.
Week after this I did back to a normal sirpoc™️ week with just the half hour sessions and then the final week a more traditional taper. Just to clarify, I was following and copying the man himself in adaptation this in a real time basis, this isn't something I have come up with myself.
The race itself I split into small sections. I felt very strong in comparison to my previous attempt but obviously I am insanely fitter, thanks to the method. I felt like I was super strong most of the way and never really had any doubt, until the usual last 6 miles. I am not sure training will ever solve this part of the marathon !
I think my peak week ended up around 8 hours. I still feel like I could have handled more. As I have posted before, traditional methods or training or coaching plans, have left me feeling wiped up training for any distance, around the 5+ hour range. The speedwork just trashes me. I'm a relatively experienced hobby jogger so this success has taken me by huge surprise after a decade almost of disappointment.
I don't think there are huge miracles here but I do think there is almost no better way to train on limited hours, for any distance, with a bit of adaptation. It's packaged in a way that's manageable, consistent and allows you to scrape out the most of your talent.
I have shamelessly copied sirpoc 1:1. This includes no speed, hills or strides. Obviously he is way faster than me or just about any other masters runner and I'm sure he will blow way past 2:30 in his marathon!
I hope this helps a few people at home you could adapt it to the marathon. As that seems to be the biggest question I see about this lately. Note, I think this probably only works as an adaptation of you have the original system in your legs for 6-9+ months at least consistently. I have a huge base, to build on from the previous 12 months. I just put the icing on the cake.
Happy running all.
ainomege 3/18/2025: [from Reddit]
Thanks for the update. I saw your original post back in early January and that prompted me to start implementing the sirpoc method. The progress I made in 2.5 months is crazy rewarding. Without your initial post I would still be digging myself into a hole and probably quit running for a while again, instead of enjoying slow and steady gains while feeling incredibly fresh. Thanks again!
Canthatsgood 12/16/2024: [from Reddit]
I’ve been doing exactly this method for 13 months. You can probably find me in the Strava group if you hunt. I’ve been running competitively for 30 years, now a masters category, and I’ve peeled back my performances to about a decade ago marks. It’s insane. I do HR guided basically as you describe above inching up towards the last rep to lthr. I continue to have big gains, closing back half of races really strong when that was never my strong suit. Keep it up. I’ve found the longer reps keep my legs the freshest and oddly are the quickest workouts to complete. I do 5x2k, 6xMile, 3x2M. I do no strides, don’t even do a long run. I’ve still maintained speed in track races down to 800m. Been an eye opening journey
Hopefully this post doesn't embarrass "sirpoc" too much. I say that, mainly because he's a really down to earth and humble guy.
My story is I am mid 30s. An OK runner and have been running track and the road for around 8 years. I have been obsessed with a long term goal for a long time, of breaking 18! Hey, I know some of you guys will be like breaking 18 is chump change! But for me it seemed like a hurdle I could not overcome.
Anyway, the meat of the story is I get talking to this guy at my local track. I saw him often and he seemed to not really be killing himself during this track time and yet me and my buddies are out on the floor, spread across the track after 6*1k. 7*800. You get the idea. Then this guy is still going but clearly not all out. Also, on my "easy" runs I'm overtaking him if I see him out on his easy days. It didn't add up. I saw him at a race and asked him what this secret was as he was crushing me and others I knew all last summer and leading into this year.
He was quite helpful when we had ended up leaving around the same time after one session and I asked a few questions. He said about how he just does 3 sub threshold runs a week and that was it plus easy. I was skeptical but he insisted that was it. I googled it and found quite a lot of information but mostly just used a lot of what he told me. He offered to give me some basic plans and we exchanged details.
The guy kindly send me weekly plans off his own back, he had no need to. All he said is I will owe him a beer one day and that I would easily break 18 and was happy to help.
Anyway, let's get to the good part! Firstly, after around 9 months of this I broke 18 finally! And 17 ! I ran 16:54 this weekend just gone. For a while I kept the coach I was paying at the track but he told me this plan was crazy and I was going to fail. So we parted ways. My instincts told me this guy who offered to help would get me there. No idea why.
Now, the funny thing? The guy turned out to be sirpoc! I literally never put 2 and 2 together until last week and the 10k he ran. He never once told me he was basically THE guy, effectively the person who laid out the whole NSM you will find here, Strava, reddit. Or the sirpoc method. Or whatever this is. I just find that really sums the guy up.
Anyway, I would just like to thank him again and who knows, maybe this will help one other person have the confidence to sticking to the plan. The not running near race pace was the thing that spooked me the most. Especially as with my group of running friends I was the only one who really went with this.
My main takeaway is I feel fresher to put the work in. The sessions and easy paces my coach had me doing were really holding me back I think. So tired. 75-80% HR on "easy" runs was nuts looking back and that coupled with how hard workouts were, always felt drained and once a month he was having me have a down week to recover. Maybe more so after a key race. This is that boom and bust cycle we keep seeing people talk about I guess. Now I truly feel like I can run everyday and things are under control and I can build load.
My race at the weekend was strange. I knew I was going very well as my paces obviously were much higher in training. But I was turly taken back at how easy 3:28/km felt for the first K. As I hadn't ran anything near that, so I was nervous. But I finished strong with a 3:21 KM and that was it. My adult lifetime goal blitzed through. I hadn't run a 5k in 9 months, but I did run a low ish 35 10k the week before in the race sirpoc was i, so I knew this was possible if I held it together and paced it well. So wasn't a total shock, but to break 17 is almost a lifetime running achievement ticked off!
Anyway, sirpoc , next time you are at the track, there will be a full crate of beer waiting with your name on it! Good luck in London pal!
I'm actually firmly behind this. Very much a HJ here and part of the Strava community . I'm 44 and had a reasonably well known online coach/influencer who insisted I couldn't break 17 was because I lacked finishing speed. I was regularly running 17:20-30. So this sounds scarily familiar. I was frequently doing workouts where he drilled me into needing finishing speed and kick and this being the only way I could learn to run fast enough to break 17.
No coach now and 8 months of your method, dropped everything but almost a carbon copy on a time scaled level to what you are doing and ran 16:42 on what I would consider an average course. Pb on that course was 17:40. So I hope to get myself into a quick race and dip under 16:30. More than I could have dreamt of .
For what it's worth, sub threshold I think people have to remember is a state, not a pace. We aren't always running slow. It's likely somewhere just a hair slower than 10k pace up to between HM and M pace. So it's not outrageous to think you can suddenly hop in a 5k and be fine. I will note I feel slower, in the race. It's very, very odd but the 16:42 felt like there is no way it could have been quick. I think mainly, my engine is just bigger, it just feels more cruise control from start to finish. Just my thoughts anyway, this post really resonated with me 😊
just another random runner 4/19/2025:
I've been doing this method for a while now, i struggled with the shorter races for maybe the first 1-2, but then it just all seemed to click into place. I'm late 30s and I have managed to beat my college XC PB in a road 5k exclusively training like sirpoc.
I remember reading this thread in 2023 and being dismissive. 2024 came around and I would say some of sirpoc's early posts started to remind me of how I was feeling.
The easy day debate is interesting, it was really, really hard for me to reign myself in and run under 70% MHR. If you look at sirpoc easy days, we know his max from data he has shared is at least 191-92+, so he is doing his easy days consistently at like 67-68% of max HR average. Sometimes way easier, maybe even 65%. If that's good enough for a 30 min 10k hobby jogger, that works for me. You also have to realise, he was still doing runs this easy relative, even when he was really just another hobby jogger. That was the wake up call for me and to check my ego in at the door. It's meant I've had to park running with other people, but it's absolutely critical for me to stay truly easy to feel like I can actually do three meaningful workouts a week.
I think that it's also worth remembering while this method probably fits as a cut and paste program better than any other ever seen for a hobby jogger, nothing fits everyone's physiological make up. But if I was going to randomly just give a cut and paste program with zero tweaks to your random turkey trotter for the next year, I don't see anything better out there that would improve a guy or gal over the course of a a calendar year. The sirpoc method I think has as good a strike rate as I've ever seen here on LRC.
Massive respect to the guy, hope we does well in London and I hope he brings out a book or something. This thread alone is better than most of the literature you can find. To have it condensed would be fantastic. Would be great for someone in the running publishing world to collaborate with him perhaps.
On a hot day full of blowups, sirpoc goes 2:24 in London. Goat hobby jogger.
what next folks? wrote:
I mean where do we even go from here? I mean most people are rooting for the guy, no doubt, but most of us probably thought anyone actually gonna train like this for a full marathon, was gonna be a bust? I had 2:32 at best and probably was thinking like 2:35. The fact I thought my London block was better training and I ran 2:34 shooting for sub 2:30 tells you the joke is on me. I'm pretty annoyed at myself as I did used this thread to set PRs from 5k to HM last year and just assumed it wouldn't scale to full or nobody had laid it out. Last year's success gave me the PBs to set my goal. Used a respected coach I won't name since December, thought that would out cherry on top and seal the deal for sub 2:30.
Here's the kicker, my fitness score /CTL was dropping but I just assumed I could cover it with the marathon specificity, even though it all felt harder with said coach for the lower training load. Boy was I wrong and as I said im kicking myself right now.
That sucks for you man. To be honest, in January when it was clear sirpoc was doing the marathon I went all in on this method. I ran Manchester and ran 2:52 which is my first ever sub 3 in 12 attempts and only 10 finishes.
Never met the guy and don't know him, but read this thread to death and I figured two things. He's smart and I thought it he's running it, he pretty much knows this will work, as he isn't gonna put himself out there like that. The key for me was the long run and the time just getting used to being on ones feet that long, but still being able to do 3 workouts a week. I've tried Piftz a few times and Canova based ones scaled down, with a lot of 85% and then working up paced MP runs but I felt pretty cooked on that on hobby mileage.
If anyone is interested , all I did was basically train 2+ days behind sirpoc. I haven't spoken to him or anything. I just watched his Strava like a weirdo and scaled the distances to the time I had available. His 5x5k I had guessed was a touch faster than goal pace and I just made it into 5x15 mins for myself and so on. I think you get the idea.
Never felt so strong . It was a different experience for me yesterday. I had been training the normal sirpoc method for reference since last July, but this is my first marathon in that time. Personally I think you need a good few months probably of the original system, then that next phase and bringing in the new sub threshold distances slowly and then finally the special block, or whatever we call it? The special block for me was a huge confidence booster and the only time I really felt it was getting hard. The taper being just a week out came about the perfect time.
I didn't do anything really but easy in the final week. I think whatever method anyone uses we can all agree that's just preference and probably has zero impact on your race.
I had him down for sub 2:25. Even lexel of all people if you look at predictions pages back knew he was at least sub 2:25. I just didn't see a scenario where he would even start if it was not sub 2:30.
After about 5k yesterday I knew I was going to run sub 3 . Can't explain it just absolutely knew. Was glad to read on here today when he dust settled he absolutely crushed it. One of the many people sirpoc who owe you a beer! Cheers!
just posting because I feel good
started doing this a few months ago. Based on a recent 5k performance back then my prescribed subT reps for 1km-3km were at 4:00-4:12/km.
Recently the reps have felt much easier, and I found myself running faster than the prescribed pace if I wasn't focused. HR on my watch for the subT reps was trending downward. I took this as a sign to do a parkrun this Saturday. One workout I forewent my prescribed pace and ran mostly "on feel" trying to replicate subT effort from when I was just starting out. I worked backwards to find what 5k time correlated with these faster subT paces. That was my goal for the parkrun, ~18:30.
I exceeded my goal, running 18:10, which means I have "leveled up" and will now update my subT paces for future workouts.
Still crazy to think I ran ~3:38/km for a 5k while running no faster than ~4:00/km in training. Running the race felt strange, like I was strong aerobically but felt awkward mechanically. And I had to stay focused on race pace or else I would go autopilot and fall back to my subT training pace.
I’ve been doing this for 5 months exactly as prescribed and had a big breakthrough today. FINALLY, broke sub 20 on a 5K with 19:53. I got close last summer, but the training was killing me and I was falling apart. It really felt like I had a mental hurdle where it was impossible to break 20. I’m 42 years and as silly as it sounds, I thought I was running out of time before I read about this method. I would guess I was in 20:40 shape when I started in December. I also had a big half marathon PR 4 weeks ago @1:30. I was expecting 1:33. I didn’t realize in until after, but the pace I ran the half in matched exactly the pace I’ve been running the 6 minute reps at.
One thing that doesn’t get talked about enough is that training like this is really hard work. There’s a reason CTL continues to go up if you stick with it and stay consistent. Like others have said, the “magic” to this is being able to do it day in and day out and not feel wrecked. I did Pfitz 18/70 last spring and it was miserable. I was in great shape but was completely fried by the time the race came around and underperformed for my fitness level at the time. I feel like I’m actually working just as hard or harder with this approach because I don’t feel much cumulative fatigue overall and have the ability to do every sub T session as planned. Really looking forward to seeing where this goes.
1 year update. First of all, congrats to sirpoc on the marathon. Wild time for a first. I've only just noticed the guy has ridden a 48:03 25 Mile cycling TT. Someone get this guy to the world duathlon champs, now!
I'm sure he has so many people reach out, but around 13 months ago he was kind enough to give me more time than he needed to, for how I could push through my own stagnation. I was running 5-6 hours a week and not consistently for probably around 5 years. Following up and down blocks never made sense to me which is why this thread appealed , my last was a Daniel 5k plan and the one before that was a Piftz 18/55 for the marathon.
PBs 13 months ago 5k up to full:
18:35
38:50
1:26
And a very weak 3:03
I thought I would post now, as today I finally ticked off all PBs. Basically have trained the full sirpoc method, 7 days 3 ST 3 easy+long .
Have updated as I have gone all my thresholds, when new performance arrives. Have only missed 13 days training all year due to illness and small toe issue.
Couldn't believe how EASY it felt after a couple of weeks to execute. There was no post run fatigue or pre run fatigue. Suddenly just about all my fatigue was gone. However, I did notice I felt a really sluggish on the runs, which was odd, as I felt good physically and mentally going in. I got WORSE as about week 4 I ran a 5k TT and barely broke 19, although was a tad windy. 6 weeks. Wow, someone else said before they felt scammed? I thought maybe I'm being trolled here. I just felt like I wasn't moving . That is the only way to describe my running. It was very odd!
Week 8 another 5k. awful. This almost certainly wasn't the method for me. I actually spoke to sirpoc and he said give it another month. The day will come. I don't know why, but I did actually listen to this, but for real guys , I can't explain how this all was sucking. I wasn't looking forward even to running now.
BUT then something crazy happened. I had been doing still the vanilla plan, if you have seen sirpoc Strava, you know what I have been doing right. He gave me a few insights and confidence boosters of stuff I don't think I've seen him post too much of. Anyway, the crazy thing was I entered a 10k and ran 36:56. I didn't just break 38 but cleaned through 37. This was probably my week 10 or 11. I thought maybe the course was short or something.
6 days later I jumped in another 5k. Ran 17:48. If you had asked me if this or the 18:35 I had run previously felt faster, I would have said the 18:35. This 17:48 felt so slow. It was insane I just didn't even feel like it could possibly be fast. This is so strange as I have seen so many people talk about this phenomenon when switching to this method in not just the way the run feels, but also it takes ages for it to all click in. Then when it does, BOOM it hits you in the face!
I progressed more and and now up to almost 7 hours some weeks, still on the absolute basics and still learning about how to develop this, pacing , all the good stuff sirpoc still talks about. The weird thing is I still don't feel like I have any speed in my legs yet I'm way faster.
Update to today: PBs sit at
16:53
34:59
1:17:04
And the big one! 2:39:39. Absolutely terrifyingly even though absolutely all my running friends warned me against it, I just followed week for week sirpoc method adaptations for the marathon and just took over 20 mins off! To say it felt easier than a PItfz build would be an understatement and I'm glad I had almost a year beforehand of his training before I dived into the special block. As for that, boy was it harder than the vanilla plan at the end still, but definitely was a nice mental prep, but still way way easier than PItfz where you feel wrecked going in and maybe you come through, maybe you don't.
I've never felt so good at 30k in a marathon. Even when it got the usual sketchy period with 5 miles or so left, I knew I had it and dug deep for the sub 2:40!
My main thing is you have to be MENTALLY strong to train like this. It's quite a sacrifice. It's not particularly fun. You have to decide to you want the grind and heavy lifting and performance, or the fun of training maybe with others, letting loose when you want but maybe a much worse performance on day.
Thanks to the thread for existing, thanks to sirpoc , thanks to all guys who had even posted with confidence a year or so ago to make me think maybe this could just work for me!
As the thread seems so active I thought maybe you know, that this would find one other person to think 'yes' this could be the option for me.
If you ever are in Ireland , drinks are on me!
Great thread, have been implementing this a while now. Thoroughly enjoyed the podcast. I recently ran a 5k PB at 49. Have been running since I turned 40. Remarkable just how following it after a while everything feels so steady and under control. Compared to the hectic nature of any previous plans I had put myself on or be coached. Nothing remarkable but 17:58 not bad for my age. PB was 18:12 from 5 years ago. Basic program, no hills, no 200 repeats, no strides. Hardest part is actually running super easy I would say, on the long run or non workout days.
Well,
I did this training for about 7 weeks. I got up to pretty decently mileage for me. 30-35 miles vs my usual 15-20.
I ran a 5 mile race at 6:10 pace yesterday! This is compared to a 5K at 6:20 pace last summer.
Volume is king, and this system lets you get some good volume in.
Pretty low effort post, but this stuff works.
I have started NSA somewhere in February, thinking I was around 21/43 for 5k/10k, but realistically I was 21-low/43-low at best. These are my results, 4 months in, even though my training was (still is) not perfect (running intervals too fast at times):
Date: VDOT - Time / Distance (pace) - Event
05.04: VDOT 48.1 - 42:44 / 10K (4:16) - 10K Race (USAMV)
26.04: VDOT 48.5 - 8:02 / 2100 (3:50) - 2100m Time Trial
15.06: VDOT 49.1 - 13:59 / 3.53K (3:57) - ~3.5K Race (Race for the cure)
I have yet to have breakthrough, probably because I'm still adding more load (just added a 9th rep for 3:00/1:00 day) and still not fully adapted to the ever changing schedule, but still improving.
My mileage was around 70-75K week in/week out, with some rare 80K weeks lately, and that's because I have long WU/CD to the nearest track. Standard schedule is 6:00/1:00 on Tuesdays, 3:00/1:00 on Thursdays, 1:10/0:30 on Saturdays and 90-ish mins long on Sundays.
It looks like I've gained 1 VDOT in 2 months, between April 5th and June 15th. I don't know how much is the normal improvement rate, perhaps someone else can share their results?
A lot of what goes on in this thread goes over my head. Seems a lot of people want to come to it to let everyone know how smart they are, yet never took the trouble to be the ones to lay all this "so called simple stuff that's obvious" out, but then turn up late to the party. Hey ho.
Anyway one thing I can contribute is the marathon. I'm slow. Slower than sirpoc, slower than Grandma's guy and slower than marky_mark from Reddit.
I have however, been doing this plan for about a year. And have progressed at all other distances. I jumped on the marathon adaptation, probably about 6 weeks behind sirpoc and just copied and scaled it for my hours as much as possible, virtually keeping it a 1:1 scaled replica. I was trying to break 3 hours, capping long run at 2hr 50 easy. Previously have done 4 marathons, last two Pitfz plan and Hanson and felt cooked like a goose! They are kind of insane to me, looking back now.
Peaked at 6.5 hours pretty much in all marathon builds, made it safely to just over 6.5 with this and the scaled plan. Never broken 3, or really come that close. 3:05 best effort on a net downhill. Recently ran 2:56 and paced it quite conservatively, maybe could have gotten another minute out of it. I'm older, 48 and pretty damn happy with that. Actually, ecstatic. I thought the sub 3 dream was gone. Can't thank the thread, contributors and sirpoc enough. Wish there was a way to repay him!
Used the plan for the special block identical as well (imho the most important bit) and 1:1 scaled the taper.
Easily the best I felt in the build, in the race itself I felt super strong and controlled and actually feel not to bad and back to training properly now after 10 days.
I wouldn't baulk at trying it. Very rarely does anyone seem let down by this sirpoc method in the normal sense, I don't expect the marathon will be any different, assuming you set yourself a realistic goal and target. Hope this finds it's intended target, maybe those who aren't sure
Alfie wrote:
There have many posts on this thread, where it has been questioned whether this method is good for more FT runners, and whether they need to add or modify some components.
There's been plenty of posts, one I agree with is if you are FT like me, even more likely to succeed to train like this. It actually worked on my glaring weaknesses.
I struggled with the paces at first, but after a few weeks of adapting I got used to it.
Very FT, 400-800m in college and had huge success training like this in adult life. Only really care about 5k turkey trots, I occasional 10k and a few HM.
Am thinking about doing a marathon next year and hopefully this will help me succeed there as well. Hobby jogging for 5 years, peaked pretty damn early but then in the last year I would say about 7-8% up turn in performance , using sirpoc method. One argument I don't buy is the going to the well in workouts. Just silly to me. I'm faster surely because I am aerobically fitter. I don't see how I could have gotten that 7-8% uptick in performance just by that.
RunnerSam wrote:
So I read the whole thread in April and started on May 1st, I was in about 18:20-18:25 5k shape and coming off of very little training from the prior 6 months due to injury. I did eight weeks I don't think I could break 19 in a 5k right now and I'm debating stopping. I was holding myself back the first few weeks during workouts and now I'm running them slower but at a higher effort. Maybe it was unrealistic to think I would improve off 50-60 mpw when all my PRs (16:56 1:18:00 2:43:41) are on 80-90 mpw. I'm just surprised that I got slower when I expected to have some improvement purely from consistent mileage and any workouts. Workouts were all half mile to two mile with 60-90s rest, (wrist) HR on easy runs was always under control (low or under 130s bpm). I figured I should ask for either encouragement to push through or permission to bail before I just give up.
Not saying this is the case, but I started this at the start of summer here last year, which is a really bad time in hindsight. Everything gets relatively slower, so it actually turned out I probably had got faster, just didn't realise it or feel it. After around 12 weeks I had definitely got faster measurably, even without taking the summer into consideration. There's also no quick fix here, no matter how you look at it.
It also doesn't work for everyone. I have a group of running friends I meet with for the easy days, Mondays weds and Sundays. After my progress, just about everyone in our mini club has tried it. Out of 8 of us, 4 have gotten significant progress that is game changing for us , 2 have had moderate success, PBs but nothing like the 4 of us, one guy couldn't cope with it, in that he just wouldn't stick to the paces and called the whole thing dumb, and one guy stuck to it rigidly and got worse. I cannot tell you why, he also seemed on paper like the perfect candidate for it.
50% with significant progress, 25% with good progress though, is a pretty damn good strike rate for a bunch that are already seasoned runners, with all but one of us having at least raced a marathon and all generally have trained pretty consistently on 5 hours or more a week, for a good number of years.
But goes to show also, just some people won't respond. I don't think that's a criticism, I've seen sirpoc even admit of course not everyone will come up trumps.
I don't want to just go on and repeat what others have obviously pointed out, but as a starting point for anyone wanting to get better or move up potentially to the next level, this is the most likely starting point to give you the best chance of success, over just about anything. It of course, nothing comes with a guarantee.
Hey LetsRun crew,
I’m a 38-year-old American runner, and today, July 4th, no less, I smashed my 5K PB, going from 18:32 last year to a low 18 in February, and now a mind-blowing 16:56 using Sirpoc’s Norwegian Singles Method. (I understand 16:56 isn't mind blowing, but it is to me!) The irony of a Brit helping an American hit a PB on Independence Day is just too good! I owe a massive thanks to Sirpoc and wanted to share my progress and thoughts on this approach.
Background: I’ve been running on and off for 8 years, never ran in college but played sports growing up, so I had some athletic base. Like Sirpoc, I got stuck on Daniels training, hitting a max of 6.5 hours a week in October 2024 but feeling burned out and needing down weeks. That got me to an 18:32 5K PB last year, but I was going nowhere. Then I found Sirpoc’s Norwegian Singles Method posts here and went all-in on the classic approach starting early December 2024. After ~2.5 months of NSM, I hit a low 18 5K in late February 2025, but I hadn’t raced again for 5 months since then due to working away. Luckily, I had access to a treadmill to keep training consistent.
The Journey: I stuck to the classic NSM—three sub-threshold sessions a week, three easy runs, and a moderate long run (75-90 mins). My workouts were 3x10 min, 10x3 min, and 5x6 min, keeping my heart rate below LT2 and erring on the slower side, per Sirpoc’s advice. I worked up to ~7 hours a week, which I’ve never managed before, and I feel fresher than ever. I hit a CTL of ~60-65, likely my highest ever, though it’s hard to tell looking back at data as I wasn't really collecting it properly until I started NSM. Still, getting to 7 hours without crashing makes me suspect this is my highest training load ever.
The Race: Today’s 5K was unreal. I didn’t feel super fast—like I was missing a gear or two in the final kick—but crossing the line at 16:56 with negative splits? Breaking 17 feels absolutely crazy to me at 38! That’s a huge jump from the low 18 I ran in February after just 2.5 months of NSM, and I’m still pinching myself. The NSM’s sub-threshold focus built a monster aerobic base that showed up big time, even without that “sharp” feeling.
Thoughts on NSM: I’m sold on this method. Like Sirpoc, I was stuck on Daniels, and NSM’s sustainable approach was a game-changer. The sub-threshold sessions are mentally tough more so than physically, but manageable, and I stayed fresh and injury-free. I did feel a bit flat on top-end speed, but the results speak for themselves—does it really matter when I’m running this much faster anyway?
Big Thanks to Sirpoc: Sirpoc, you’re a legend, dude! Your journey from a 19-minute 5K to mid-15s (and a 2:24 marathon?!) as a masters runner is inspiring as hell, and it rang true for me since we both hit a wall with Daniels. Thanks for breaking down NSM on LetsRun and Strava and making it accessible for us hobby joggers. You’ve changed my running game, and I’m grateful.
What’s Next: I’m all-in on NSM and loving the process. I’m thinking about trying the Sirpoc Special Block and tackling a marathon in 2026. Has anyone had success with NSM Special Block? For those who’ve done the Special Block, how did you transition to it, and what kind of marathon results did you see? Also, how do you deal with that “missing gear” feeling without speedwork? I’m curious if it’s worth addressing when the times are already dropping like this.
Will add my thoughts for what it's worth. Full time dad, ran fast short stuff in my younger days, got into distance running on a corporate event a number of years ago now.
My Background:
Running since 2019, I hit a wall with Pfitzinger plans M plans. Not stuck, but plateaued, disillusioned, and fed up with running. Found Sirpoc’s NSM posts here and started the classic method in mid-2024. My 10K PB dropped from 39:18 to 36:16 in 8 months. When I saw Sirpoc building for his 2:24 London Marathon, I followed his marathon Special Block, about 7 weeks behind, trusting his track record, he doesn’t miss, right?
NSM and Special Block:
I followed classic NSM with three sub-threshold sessions (one extended: 3x16-17 mins, progressing to 4x, then 5x near the end, all below LT2), two other classic NSM workouts weekly, a gradually increasing long run (capped at 2:40, time-based), and the occasional midweek long run. Peaked at a 7-hour 49 week, all singles, per Sirpoc’s approach. Compared to Pfitz or Daniels 2Q, it felt shockingly easy—no burnout, just sustainable gains. The Special Block, started 3 weeks out, was tougher but manageable. The 10K and HM tune-ups were huge confidence boosters; the HM (1:18:33 PB, 3 weeks out) was a game-changer.
Marathon Result:
My previous marathons were rough, 3:05 PB, a brutal 3:16 on Pfitz where I barely finished. With NSM and the Special Block, I ran a 2:48 on a hot day, a massive PB. The super-short taper was a mental shift, but it worked. Felt strong, no fatigue, and executed well despite the heat keeping me from sub-2:45. With others struggling, it’s a big win. The whole thing is certainly unconventional, not just the taper was a little strange in comparison, not running virtually any marathon pace is really going to throw or put a lot of people off. But who cares if it gets the job done?
On “Missing Gear” and FT Runners:
As a fast-twitch former 200-400m runner, I get that “missing top-end” feeling. NSM’s aerobic focus feels flat for speed, but it’s a strength for FT runner, it builds our weak aerobic base while keeping enough zip for race day. I didn’t add speedwork, and my times still dropped. Don’t buy the “NSM isn’t for FT guys” talk. It’s more effective because it balances us out and actually focuses a lot on our weaknesses and stuff we try and avoid doing, because initially we suck at it.
Special Block Transition and Advice:
Your NSM base is perfect for the Special Block. Keep the classic structure (sub-threshold sessions, one extended, plus long run and occasional MLR) until the Special Block 3 weeks out. Stick to Sirpoc’s plan and don’t tweak it. The method’s finely balanced, and what you think you want doesn’t matter if you buy into it. Trust the tune ups and short taper: my 2:48 off a 1:18 HM shows it works, even in tough conditions. For me it was an absolutely huge shift to the next level up in my running.
South coast runner again 7/06/2025:
hobbskesslerfan4444 wrote:
Sirpoopy 31:05 at Lordshill 10k for second place
14:57 VDOT equivalent on a kinda hilly course (140 ft elevation gain most of which is from what looks to be 3 steep hills)
I was there today, live on the south coast and this is one of my local 10ks, along with Eastleigh which sirpoc won.
Surprisingly good field today at Lordshill , with sirpoc and the lad from Southampton having a pretty good battle from all accounts, with sirpoc just missing out. Fantastic run from both of them, a good minute or so at least ahead of some other quality regional runners. To be honest, he's definitely in the mix with real proper sub elite guys at this point. His age makes him stand out for sure.
Wasn't a particularly quick day or quick course! The final climb is a stinker and to nearly break 31 here, I would be surprised if he isn't well under 15 5k shape. About 60-70 seconds slower than Eastleigh for me usually, although I was still about 2km back down the road as he was finishing! So me being slower is an understatement!
Until he runs somewhere like Battersea, we are never going to know.
So, an update after a year on NSA. I was in good shape last fall, but there were no local races. Then in January I got injured – not from overdoing it, but from trying to run a workout on a crowded indoor track with sharp turns and a lot of pace changes. I tweaked a calf, and it cost me a month. Then after some progress, I fell during a workout and had a nasty fatigue reaction and lost more time. After 3 months of mostly lousy training, I started over in mid-March with some ridiculously slow workouts (like 2 x 1 mile at slower than MP).
The thing is, even doing 3 ridiculous workouts a week gave me more average workout volume per week than any of my race buildups in the last 5 years. Those big workouts I was doing looked cool, but they were taking so much recovery at my age that my weekly training load was actually pretty low. After a week of doing ridiculously easy workouts, I was able to start increasing pace and volume and got up to 4 miles/workout before I decided I felt okay to try a 5K. (This is why I think it’s okay for beginners to start NSA at relatively low volumes – I’ve done it myself a few times.) The race went fine off of 3 weeks of training, although I ran slower than last summer when I started NSA, and it left only 7 weeks until my goal half marathon.
I switched some things around. I stopped lifting because it was keeping me from recovering completely. My form felt like garbage, so I added a few pre-workout strides that focused on arms, knee drive, glutes, and driving my feet into the ground (and it actually helped a lot). I switched to doing the same 3 workouts each week: 3 x 3200, 4-6 x 1 mile, and 7-10 x 1K.
That meant a HM build with relatively low mileage (47/week over the last 8 weeks, peak of 55), with just a couple of 13-milers for long runs and a “peak” workout of 3 x 2 miles at 6:36/mile, which honestly is kind of a joke. It was also my shallowest taper. Seeing the graph of sirpoc’s CTL vs. 5K times finally clicked for me, so instead of a last workout 12 days out and then tapering, I did regular workouts the week before race week. I did cut back mileage and workouts for race week, since I’m old and a HM is a long race.
The result was that I ran my goal half marathon in 1:22, averaging 6:17/mile (in Vaporflies), right on pace from mile 1, with miles 1-12 not varying more than a few seconds in either direction, and just slightly faster on mile 13. That seems like a pretty solid result for 10 weeks of training coming off of an injury. It’s the same time I ran in this race 2 years ago, but when you’re past 50, running the same time as 2 years ago is a victory. If you believe in age grading, it was my third best race ever. I’ve been training seriously as an adult for 10 years, so I can say that NSA is at least as good as anything else I’ve tried (and I've tried a lot of different things), and I’m sticking with it.
Now I’m experimenting with one change in my training. Before the HM, I was focusing on building workout volume, but I was up to 30% or more of weekly volume from sub-T workouts, and most of my paces ended up in the 20K-MP range to keep the stress manageable. Now I want to get closer to the standard NSA paces by cutting back on workout volume and progressively increasing pace within the workout. Lots of volume at 20K-MP may have worked for a HM, but I think I was missing some of the benefits by forcing the volume and sacrificing pace. In other words, just do what works for sirpoc.
My own NSA update. Good progress!
Background: I'm 57, and have run for a number of decades. PRs I achieved when I was 20: 15:50, 26:06, 32:55, 55:26 (10 miles). Over the years, I've on occasion upped my training. Biggest blocks were marathon training in my 30's (2:57). Last year at age 56, I ran an 18:29 5k on a relatively fast course. But at my age, injuries inevitably creep in, and I've had the classic missed periods of running as I've had to recover. This had stymied progressing.
My mileage over the year prior to starting NSA varied between 30-44 mpw, subject to missing weeks due to injuries.
NSA: I came across NSA via a post on Reddit Advanced Running. I then inhaled this thread, which took several days. Immediately two things appealed to me: (1) Lower risk of injury, something appealing to us older runners. (2) Use of sub-threshold. I'd become a fan of Steve Magness's Science of Running, and he's big on use of threshold training. Sirpoc's sub T immediately made sense to me.
I began NSA on June 2 this year. I'd been upping my mileage in the weeks prior from low 40's to 50 mpw the week before. So I was doing higher mileage as I began NSA. After a bit of experimenting, I settled on these three sub T workouts each week: 4 x 2000, 8 x 1000, 5 x 1600, done on the track. I had been doing my distance runs in the low 8:00 to 7:45 per mile range. I immediately slowed to 9:15 per mile on the easy days.
The first 4 weeks were rough! The higher mileage and the three sub T workouts were really taxing. I had no interest in doing my easy days at a faster pace because I needed them slow. Leg fatigue was a real challenge.
Then at week 5, I noticed I was recovering from the sub T workouts much better. My easy day pace dropped to 8:40 or so, with the same low heart rate. I ran 58 miles that week.
Week 6, I got that sub T pacing bump I've seen others mention. In week 5 my 4 x 2000 workout was right around 8:03 per rep. In week 6, I found myself running 7:53 on the opening rep, and my heart rate was the same as before. On the 5 x 1600, my first rep was 6:11, and it felt about the same as the 6:17 I had done the week earlier.
Due to the missed training and injuries, I haven't raced often. My last race was a Turkey Trot in 2024.
5000 m race: In week 7, I had signed up for an evening track race, the Tracksmith Twilight 5000. My understanding is that the effects of NSA really take 3 or 4 months before you see meaningful benefit. But the improvement in pacing week 6 gave me some confidence. Based on various methods (including the Lactrace pacing calculator), I guessed I was around 18:00 shape.
My heat had an 18:00 pacer. I settled on how I was going to run it: stick to that pacer. The race itself was typical crowded track racing. There was bumping, I found myself boxed in and losing ground to the pacer. I busted out of the box and pushed up to run behind him, along with several other runners. We were just going round-and-round following this pacer.
We were 9 seconds behind 18:00 pace after 4000 m, so the job was to push hard on final K. I did, and ended up running 18:01. This is a personal best in my over 40 running career. NSA delivered, even early in my training cycle.
A couple post-race notes: In reading others' race reports here, I saw people describe the feeling like they were actually slow, and then being amazed at the times they ran. I never felt that way. It was all just keep pushing through, even as it got tougher the final 1600.
The speed (or lack thereof) aspect of NSA. My final 400 was a respectable 81 seconds to close. Relative to my fitness, that was OK. Looking at my 18:29 5k from last year, when I was doing hard 200's in my training, I also closed in 81 seconds.
NSA is working: better fitness, injury free. Looking forward to finding another race in a month or two.
Progress report!
20:44 - 18:43 in 8 months.
Background:
30yo male, 6'1, 84kg/185lb
Was a naturally decent runner when younger, especially sprinting, but never trained as a runner, just played sports.
From age ~24-28 I trained/competed in Powerlifting and did zero cardio, was about 94kg.
Then completely 180'd and took up running in 2023. I had a goal of running a 50k mountain-y trail run at the end of the year, so slowly trained towards that. Did lots of quality work though, and in hindsight, was absolutely throttling myself on workouts. Managed to keep mostly healthy though. I did a 5k in August 2023 in 22:01.
The first half of 2024 I pulled right back and was just running ~15-20k a week.
In June '24 I ran a 10k in 49:46 that just about killed me. And in August I ran a 5k in 21:40, just before I found NSA.
NSA
Then, I found the LetsRun thread and begun slowly building up to 6x runs per week and three workouts a week. I was very cautious of injury, so probably took it easier than I needed. I started with just one workout a week whilst I built my base, then added a 2nd (slowly), and then it wasn't until December 2024 that I started "full" NSA. Up to this time though I still made some solid progress, running 20:44 in November 2024.
Since the start of this year, I've been much more consistent; the last few months even more so. Really heading the advice of the big man and hitting my K's, week after week.
I've started racing much more, too, trying to get something in every month.
Progress has exceeded my expectations. I just ran 18:43 on the weekend; so about 2 minutes faster than 8 months ago.
Clear progression below:
Aug 2024: 21:40
Oct: 21:01
Nov: 20:44
Dec: 21:53 (tried to run sub 20 but it was too hot and just not fit enough, ended up jogging it in) *full NSA begins*
Feb 2025: 20:15
April: 19:41
May: 19:35
June: 19:13
July: 18:43
I currently run 6x per week, and am going to start sprinkling in a 7th.
My workouts are the classic 10x3, 5x6, 3x10 (with 1', 1'20", and 1'40" rest [feels right]). My LTHR is 183 based on 30m Friels. A conservative workout tops out at 177, and a very aggressive one at 183. I osccilate between those depending on vibes, and tend to naturally periodise that over weeks (e.g., have a week where I'm a little more on the aggressive end, and then a couple where I keep it chill - that might align with pace changes too...once I get to the more conservative end of a given pace, I'll up the pace, irrespective of whether I have a new race PR to be guided by).
I run my easy runs v easy, around 5:40 - 6:20m per km, (or 9 - 10m per mile). This hasn't improved a tonne, nor does it bother me. I'd run them at 8 min per k if I knew it made my times faster come race day. I don't truly know my max HR but I estimate about 200, and so try to stay under 145 (72.5% max), let it drift a little if uphill.
Workouts and Autoregulation
When I first came to running from Powerlifting, I was quite confused by how running training programs tended to work. Workout prescription often felt random and haphazardous to me.
The way I trained via powerlifting was using RPE, and very consistent blocks of work. For example, Squat 3x5 @RPE 8, and do that 4-5 weeks in a row, then deload.
This was simple.
You squat to that effort that day (with RPE being a proxy for reps in reserve, so RPE 8 meant you could have done 2 more reps), then next week you plan for a slightly heavier weight, but let RPE guide you; if your warm ups are slow, you pull back, if you feel good, you add more weight - all that matters is that you get the stimulus of the prescribed sets/reps/RPE. Training like this, it was very, very easy to get stronger. Provided you rocked up, did the work as prescribed, and rested and recovered enough, you got stronger like clockwork.
With traditional running programs, it struck me that there wasn't as much inbuilt tracking as to where you were. Workouts differed a lot, the intensity was often vague, etc etc.
This is where I think NSA shines and how I've used it to my benefit. I have my prescribed paces; the paces I expect to be able to hit based on recent progress. But then I use HR and feel to guide whether I push or pull those paces. If I can clearly see on one day that my HR is trending lower than a normal session, I'll naturally up the paces as the workout goes on, ensuring I still stay a bit under my threshold cap by the end. Conversely, if life's been busy, I'm underslept, and my HR is higher than normal on my first rep, I'll pull the paces back for that day and get the stimulus I'm after.
Much like powerlifting, it's very clear whether progress is happening or not. My paces start improving for the same HR/effort. And because they improve, it's also much easier to pace well in my racing. If my paces have improved 5-10s in workouts since my last race, I know I can expect a big performance jump, and so pace accordingly.
Injury talk
I've had no injuries but two minor niggles earlier this year, both were a feeling of shin splints. I immediately took action (pulling back on intensity, doing slightly graded stuff on treadmill, more calf work) and both times they resolved within a week. Interestingly, at this time I was doing strides a couple times a week. After the second scare, I thought "f it, I'm going to fully commit to nothing additional", and haven't done strides since (except for maybe 2-3 the day before a race to get a bit of turnover, nothing crazy). Body has felt perfectly healthy since. Yesterday, I kicked very hard (last k was 3:32, and last 200 was 36.9s) so it doesn't seem to have had any noticable negative impact omitting the strides.
Otherwise, in general, I feel fresh and good to go. Motivation is high and I look forward to my workouts.
I still strength train on average about 1x per week for health reasons. I squat deep and relatively heavy in that session (3x5 @100-120kg / 220 - 265lb, which is around RPE 7--8), and do a couple of upper body exercises, and one calf exercise.
Future
I've got a 10k next weekend, and a half marathon in a couple of months, too. All very exciting.
I have total faith that (for the next little while) I will simply keep getting faster provided I continue providing the consistent stimulus, week after week. It's exhilirating.
We have a baby on the way in December, so I'll be pulling back on training once they come, so trying to make the most of running til then by nailing my training and racing lots. Would love to crack sub 18 by the end of the year.
Thanks for everyone's contributions. I've loved this little corner of the internet and the sensible and methodical approach to training. It's simple, repeatable, and effective. Honestly, it's also pretty damn easy, in the sense that you never have to go to the well in workouts. On my most tired days, I'm still fine to train. Without thrashing myself at all, with no deload, the times just keep coming down...wild!
Add me to list. I ran 3:38. I am slow, but I had never broken 3:45. I copy your last 10 weeks, but I was doing NSM for 7 months previous and i don't think your first month is too much different from normal NSM so no problem there.
Feeling was good in race and felt fresh and well prepared, u could say strong. For those interest, I cap long run at 180 minute, despite this much less than goal time. I think beyond this probably u run into risk problems. I think maybe if slower than 4 hours, might be tough to replicate. But I think this provide a wide range for hobby guy. I don't think this is total beginner training , low intermediary to sub elite is range.
Your training keep me in control like no other, I think this is secret. Maybe some guys play around with to much and it end up a mess. Just my thought. Thanking u anyway .
A lot of talk about the marathon in this thread at the moment, which makes sense, but I will add my two cents about the other end of the intensity distribution. I ran a disappointing 3:31 marathon in mid-March, then took the next two months pretty easy, training in the spirit of this thread but with 600km total across all of March, April, and May (so including the end of the marathon block and the marathon itself). Started being really consistent in mid-May, so this is the 12th week of me really training like this, weekly mileage slowly ramping up from 53km to 70km, nothing crazy but really consistent (haven't taken a day off in 50 days). I ran a 19:57 parkrun on a pretty good if not amazing course on the 7th of June and then stalled out, messaged sirpoc recently to ask him what he thought since all the parkruns since then were in the 20-low range with no real signs of improvement (or so I thought). He encouraged me to stick with it, and so I did.
Four days ago I jumped into a local mile road relay and ran a 5:28, which is a 19 second PB. Apart from two sessions I did with my old running club for old times' sake (10th June - 13x370m @ 3:39/km avg, 15th July - 11x370m @ 3:36/km avg), and the aforementioned parkruns (5 in total since that 19:57), all my training was slower than 4:10/km for the fastest reps, and as slow as 4:40-4:50/km for the 10 minute reps depending on the conditions, and I raced at 3:24/km while feeling unaccountably amazing throughout. My easy runs are even more comically slow, I never go faster than 6:00/km and often shuffle around at close to 7:00/km. I did do strides here and there, though, cos my turnover sucks, and I also do strength training once or twice a week, and I played football a few times, so it's not 100% strict NSA, but it's still pretty amazing to me that on unspectacular mileage and pretty much no X-factor training whatsoever I could go that fast over that short a distance. I've been running for 8 years, as well, so these aren't really newbie gains.