A sub 5 minute mile, a 17:54 5k and a 1:24 half marathon on 25-30k avg. per week running volume.
A 2 year training experiment.
This one might upset a few people but to be honest, it’s overdue. If you looked at google or any running sub reddit / letsrun forums, or your favourite app, you’ll see the programmes and threads all say the same thing.
You need to run at least 50k per week to achieve something like a sub 20 min 5k.
I’ve also seen programmes that ramp you up to 60 miles a week for a sub 5 min mile. That is a lot of running, a lot of sacrifice, and pretty daunting.
So at the back end of 2022 I wanted to see how far a minimal effective dose of running could take me (I didn’t really fancy running myself into the ground). The point of this though was to highlight that
a) You don’t need to run those volumes to see huge improvements in running
b) The importance of progressing slowly (what training actually looks like over time)
c) Other training helps, it doesn’t detract.
It’s true, time on feet and high running volumes matter the higher up the elite ladder you climb BUT that doesn’t mean you won’t get crazy progress on far less running volume. It also doesn’t mean that other types of training are not beneficial or supportive. In actual fact I'd argue appropriate strength training and off feet conditioning helps keep you progressing over time. However, the internet / socials is full of running programmes that aim to hit some arbitrary goal for total running volume over 8-12 weeks in order to achieve X distance and/or time, from beginner to advanced. Furthermore, to get to this arbitrary volume it often forces increases in running volume and intensity weekly from day 1.
The problem is in the misunderstanding /application of progressive overload and our perspectives of long term training.
The common assumption is that there is a predictable linear rate of progression and performance increase week after week. Meaning, if we train something this week we can do more next week. Because of this assumption you will see planned weekly increases in running volume and/or intensity. However, this doesn’t take into account individual rates of adaptation, and eventually you’ll likely end up in a position where your rate of progression will outstrip the level of adaptation and capacity = a load management issue.
I have no doubt this contributes to findings like 570 out of 1152 of park run attendees surveyed had a current injury, and 86% were continuing to run despite directly affecting their performance and causing a reduction of running volume.
In a study named couch to ouch to couch 5k (which is a phenomenal study name tbf) found that out of 110 participants (64% reported having recreational running experience) 21 runners dropped out due to an injury, and only 27% completed the 10 week programme. One of the main reasons was due to the increased demands of volume and intensity (bare in mind this is couch to 5k, so specifically targeted towards non-active pops). The authors found...
“The progressive nature of the programme was linked to the timing of injury episodes, with participants noting that the injury episodes occurred alongside the increases in the amount of running required”.
One of my favourite quotes from this study is from a participant...
“It did get harder. But if it had been over instead of say a 10 week it be a 20 week, you know, and it was spread out a bit more, I think it would be a lot easier”.
This participant intuitively understanding rates of adaptation and progressive overload better than most coaches, physios, or your favourite running app. This is consistent within the literature across novice to recreational runners. I’ve also read a 28% reported drop out rate for marathons (not all obviously down to injury, but anecdotally I know far too many people who have followed a ‘run programme’ and struggled to make it to the start line). It appears only those who are very accustomed to their training load are better off... no shit. So how do we get there?
The importance of progressing slowly.
There are some estimations in terms of central and peripheral physiological adaptation timelines. Things like remodelling of the heart can take months to years. Tendon stiffness months. Muscle fibres shifting towards a more oxidative phenotype, weeks to months. Neurological adaptations a little less. Mitochondria biogenesis, days. The degree to which this occurs is all dependent on the environment, which is why we often see such a vast difference in outcomes for individuals following the same programme in training studies. With this in mind, it highlights the issue with progressive overload applied as it typically is. Yeah, it gives you an A to B, but it’s an illusion of control. Just because your session is faster or longer than the week before likely means you just increased your effort to perform more work. Or, due to the nervous systems ability organise itself better to manage the demands.
This is an incredibly simplified visual representation. But when you look at this it puts ideas around programming and progressive overload into perspective. The point being, you can’t rush anything, it’s a slow burn. What matters to keep these trending over time is consistency of training with an appropriate stimulus. That is challenged when you follow the typically prescribed idea of progressive overload... ‘6 weeks to no where’.
When you think about these things, you realise 12 week blocks of arbitrary increases in mileage and/or intensity doesn’t matter to long term adaptations and performance gains. All it is doing is forcing you into a position where your rate of progress will surpass your ability to adapt. Most studies are max 12 weeks long, so observations like 10% increases in mileage are redundant over the long term. Nobody trains like that. When you zoom out, what matters most is years of consistent appropriate training.
You come to this realisation that appropriate stress is what should drive decision making, not progressive overload. Appropriate stress continuously over time. Like, that’s it. That’s how you get better, that's how you continue to progress. Ironically, if we accept that higher volumes are vital for elite endurance performance, then this is also how you get to those higher volumes in a realistic fashion.
What is often then not appreciated is that you can literally do the same session for weeks & months and still see improvement. Only when you feel like you’re not getting the same stimulus do you adjust a variable. Just as an example, my running volume has increased from 10k to 30k over 2.5 years. That’s miniscule. This is why things like RPE & RIR are good ways to go re. progression. Progression then just happens as a by-product of your training actually being effective. Things feel easier, then you progress it a little. Great.
Another example, I would either switch between an easy or a tempo run over 10k depending on how I felt in the week. For tempo I would keep it at an RPE of 6-7 out of 10. I would then use HR data as a secondary measure of cardiovascular strain. Over time the pace I started at felt easier and my HR confirmed that (10 bpm less for the same given work). I then increased my speed. On the next slide is the difference over 2 years, keeping my effort at 6-7 out of 10.
Sure, if you were only focusing on running then maybe you could add a little more volume than I did across this timeframe. However, like I said I think there is just as much benefit to running gains initially by consistent strength training and off feet conditioning.
Additionally, some people will argue that you can mitigate some of the arbitrary increases by having a deload. To me though, it just tells me you’re overshooting your training initially, then planning a break which hopes there is some “supercompensation”, only to then eat like crap or sleep like a uni student. You’re just missing decent training time. By all means, take a deload week when life goes sideways and you actually need it, not because you’re constantly trying to overshoot training. It’s more applicable when your volumes are incredibly high (e.g. elite marathoners, where a lot of the taper/deload research came from). My ‘deload weeks’ in 2 years have been my wedding and when life became chaotic.
Take homes: Progress slowly based on your adaptation rather than arbitary progressions. Progression is emergent from effective training. At the end of the day, years of appropriate consistent training > everything else.
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