GET READY FOR A 5-K
Who Are You?
A First-Time Racer
Your Goal:
Love Your Debut 5-K
Establish a run-walk plan.
According to Jeff Galloway – the 10 000-metre Olympian turned famous coach – newbies who walk should start with either five seconds of running followed by 25 seconds of walking or 10 seconds of running followed by 50 seconds of walking. Begin your first run-walk with 10 minutes of walking, then do a 10-minute period of run-walking, and end with a 10-minute walk. Every week or two, expand the run-walk period and shorten the warm-up and cool-down by three or four minutes. Work up to run-walking for a full 30 minutes.
RELATED: Walk to Strengthen Muscles
Build endurance.
While you don’t need to go further than 5km in training to complete your first 5-K, Galloway recommends working up to six or eight: “That bestows a lot of confidence, in people doing their first running-format race.” Add 1km every other weekend; in between, drop back down to a 5-K run. It’s not necessary to run-walk the entire time: if you’re comfortable run-walking for 30 minutes, do so after a five- to 10-minute walking warm-up, then finish with more walking.
Bring up the rear.
On race day, you’ll probably be moving slower than many runners. To avoid impeding others’ progress, start near the back. There, Galloway says, “It’s not so competitive, and there’s not as much nervousness for beginners because they see that the other people are like them.” Most importantly, the further back you are, the more likely you are to pass some people: “That’s how you’re going to hook someone on running,” Galloway says.
<< Download your 5-K training programme here. >>
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GET READY FOR A 10-K
GET READY FOR A 21-K
GET READY FOR A SHORT TRAIL RACE
GET READY FOR A 10-K
Who Are You?
A Long-Distance Junkie Seeking a Short-Distance PB
Your Goal:
Learn Proper Pacing
Trust your base.
Drop down from half– or full-marathon training to race a 10-K, and you’ll probably wow yourself – even if you haven’t been doing much speedwork, says Hamilton. Long runs and high volume develop super-strong cardiovascular and musculoskeletal systems. You’ll need to run 40 to 55km per week (with 30 to 40 per cent of your mileage going towards a weekly long run) to run your best 10-K – no biggie for half- or full-marathoners.
Run fast…
Still, running your fastest 10-K requires speedwork. “Training at 5-K pace builds that horsepower,” Hamilton says – the strength and turnover you don’t develop when prepping for long-distance events. Ten to 12 weeks out from race day, add a weekly interval session at 5-K pace, with no more than 7 per cent of your total weekly volume run hard. For example, if you’re doing 45 kilometres in a week, you’ll want to run no more than about 3km at 5-K pace (4 x 800 with 400 metres of recovery, for example), after a warm-up lasting at least 10 minutes.
…then learn race pace.
The biggest challenge for half- and full-marathoners who drop to the 10-K is avoiding a too-fast start, Hamilton says. So run at race pace at least once per week for the six or seven weeks before race day. Hamilton gets her athletes to start with short intervals – 200s, 400s, and 800s – to practise staying under control. “When you’re running 200 metres at a pace you could sustain for 10km, you may find that you’re always going out too fast,” she says. Once you’ve dialled in at short distances, hit the roads: work up to running about five continuous kilometres at race pace in the middle of a 10- to 12km midweek run, about 10 days before race day.
<< Download your 10-K training programme here. >>
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GET READY FOR A 5-K
GET READY FOR A 21-K
GET READY FOR A SHORT TRAIL RACE
GET READY FOR A 21-K
Who Are You?
A Hilly Half Fun-Runner
Your Goal:
Train Enough to Enjoy It
Hit the hills…
The only way to have fun at a race with a lot of ups and downs is to climb and descend regularly in training. “Instead of doing a speed-focused training cycle, it makes a whole lot more sense to focus on hills,” says coach Janet Hamilton (runningstrong.com). If you almost never run hills now, seek them out once a week: find a hill (or bridge or car park) that will allow you to climb for about 60 seconds, and run it a few times during a midweek run that’s longer than your shortest recovery runs. Once you’re comfortable with that, you can progress to a route with longer and/or steeper climbs, Hamilton says. Then, you can start adding some hills to your long runs – warm up with a few flat kilometres, run a few kays on rolling hills, and cool down with three more flat kilometres.
RELATED: A Runner’s Guide To Smashing Hills!
…and run them right.
“A lot of people don’t really grasp how to run hills,” Hamilton says. “They go into attack-the-hill mode.” This will leave you fatigued and breathless at the top, and will waste energy you’ll need later in your run. Instead, learn to run hills by effort: tune in to how you’re breathing at a comfortable pace on the flat stretch leading up to the hill, and maintain that breathing as you climb. Keep the same cadence and upright posture: “You just push off with a little less emphasis,” Hamilton says. Maintain the same effort on the downhill – land lightly and increase your leg speed a bit to allow gravity to carry you to a faster pace than you’d run on the flats: “Think about not riding the brakes,” Hamilton says. Then, if you decide to do race-pace work on hills – which is smart if you have a time goal – you can practise averaging an even pace despite climbs and descents, by maintaining the comfortably-hard effort level you associate with half-marathon race pace.
RELATED: How To Practice Hill Running When You Have No Hills
DOWNLOAD: Conquer A Hilly Half – 12-Week Training Programme
If you’re coming off another race…
Respect your recovery.
Running a half marathon for fun three or four weeks after a goal half or full marathon is okay – but only if you can keep it truly easy. “It all comes down to, can you behave yourself?” Hamilton says. “How good are you at pinning a number on and not putting out a race effort?” If you can do it, great – but take it really easy in the intervening weeks. After a goal race, Hamilton prescribes two days of walking to get blood flowing to recovering muscles without ramping up injury risk. Then, after one rest day, run five or six easy kays. That weekend, your ‘long run’ can be whatever you did the weekend before your marathon or first half. Then maintain the mileage you ran the week before goal-race week (without intensity), and you’ll be ready to go 21.1 for fun.
RELATED: How To Recover From Your First Half Marathon
If you’re coming back from injury…
Fix what’s fixable.
Returning to the site of a DNF is a learning opportunity: “Figure out what things could have contributed last time and don’t do them again,” Hamilton says. You obviously can’t control factors like weather or the course profile, but you can analyse your training, nutrition, stress levels, sleep quality, and even shoe choices leading up to your first DNF. Before your redemption race, “be honest with yourself about your current capabilities, and set a reasonable race goal based on that,” Hamilton says. For example, a 2 per cent improvement from a recent personal best is achievable, while shooting for a 15 per cent improvement – or to beat a time you haven’t run in years – could drive you to another injury.
If you’re running with a friend…
Think ahead.
Anytime you’re planning to race with a running buddy, you need to be on the same page: “It’s tough on both of you if you haven’t had an honest conversation beforehand,” Hamilton says. Make sure you’re both planning to run about the same pace. If there’s a discrepancy, the faster friend needs to practise running at the slower friend’s pace in training, to ensure it’s not so slow that it feels uncomfortable. And then, stick to the plan: “If the faster friend can’t slow down, go your separate ways and meet up at the end of the race,” Hamilton says.
<< Download your 21.1km training programme here. >>
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GET READY FOR A 5-K
GET READY FOR A 10-K
GET READY FOR A SHORT TRAIL RACE
GET READY FOR A SHORT TRAIL RACE
Who Are You?
A Roadie Trying Trails
Your Goal:
Don’t Hurt Yourself
Train on trails.
Road runners who drop into a trail race tend to underestimate the difficulty of uneven terrain and big climbs and descents, says pro ultrarunner and coach Sage Canaday (sagerunning.com). To prepare for a short trail race, you must run on technical terrain at least once or twice per week, starting with shorter, easier runs and progressing to slightly longer ones. “Start slowly, stay relaxed, and kind of ‘dance’ with the terrain,” Canaday says. “The co-ordination between your feet and legs will get better over time – a lot of it is practice.”
Rehearse on similar hills.
Find your race’s elevation profile on the event website. Then determine the length of each major hill, as well as how much elevation gain or loss happens over that distance, and find a climb near you that mimics it. Roads probably won’t do: “Most roads that cars go on don’t really go over a 5 per cent uphill grade, while on a lot of trails, you’ll hit 10 or 15 per cent grade uphill or downhill,” Canaday says. Once you’re confident doing slow, easy trail runs, add three or four weeks of weekly repeats: after a warm-up jog, start with 6 x 2.00 at a comfortably hard effort, then add an extra repeat or a little more time (30 to 60 seconds) each week. Jog down hills.
Jump to:
GET READY FOR A 5-K
GET READY FOR A 10-K
GET READY FOR A 21-K