Running in Circles

Track workouts are one of my favorite weekly workouts – often one of the hardest of the week – but many triathletes don’t make use of them and I wonder perhaps if one of the reasons is because some aren’t sure how to put them together. I’m no certified coach, but I listen to what’s out there, I try a lot of stuff, and I do what works for me. It’s a little of trying to be a good student of the sport, paying attention to the science, and going with what “just feels right.”

Track workouts are the best way to gauge your pace because the 400 m loop is a constant.

So, if you want to get on the track but you have questions like what goals to set, how many intervals to do, what speed you should do them at, how long you should rest, etc. give this a try. All you need to figure out is, (1) how far your intervals need to be, and (2) what pace you should run them.

Your track workout is a key running workout, so first place it somewhere in your training week so that it is not right on top of your long run day or any other strenuous workouts. For most, the long run day is on the weekend so Wednesday is a typical track day. The track workout will be similar to a typical swim workout with a warm up, a main set, and a cool down.

If only a college near you had the gumption to actually build a track like this! Think of the possibilities!

Warm Up

You just want to get the leg muscles primed. We typically do a 1.5 mile warm up, or 6 laps around a 400 meter track. This should be at a nice, social pace. If doing this workout with friends, use the warm up to chat and don’t concern yourself with the pace. You should have no problem being a chatterbox during the warm up. Stretch a bit after the warm up.

Main Set

This is the fun part! For most triathlons and short distance running events, your intervals in the main set are going to probably be between 400 meters and 1600 meters. For marathons and iron distance triathlons, you might bring your interval distances as high as 3 miles. This season, I’m following a modified version of a marathon plan designed by the Hanson Brothers. This plan is for an Ironman, and the first half of the 18 week plan has the track workouts designed for increasing speed:

3 mi total intervals (10K pace) – max 1600 m interval

Examples: 6x800 m, 3x1600 m, ladder of 2x400 m, 800 m, 1600 m, 800 m, 2x400 m

Rest Intervals 400 m

The second half of the marathon training plan has track workouts designed to increase strength. For a marathon or Ironman, this makes sense. You’ve used the first part of your build up to get used to speed. Now you build that speed over a prolonged interval:

6 mi total intervals (:10 slower than 10K pace) – min 1600 m interval

Examples: 2x3 mi (1 mi RI), 3x2 mi (800 m RI), 6x1600 m (800 m RI)

(For more about the Hanson plan go to www.hansons-running.com)

If your season has shorter distance races in it, you may not need to progress to the strength phase of the workouts as sprint (5K) and international (10K) distance races require more of a speed focus. If this is the case with you, you will want to increase the interval pace to at or below your goal race pace. So, for a 5K, for example, perhaps you would want to try your intervals at 5 to 10 sec faster than 5K pace.

All you need for running intervals on a track is a watch with chrono feature to record your splits and check that your on your target interval pace.

As for the Rest Interval (RI), it’s meant to be active. Instead of standing still resting, you need to jog easily to keep moving. So a 400 m RI would be an easy jog around the track before you start the next interval (about 2:20 or so, but it’ll vary for your particular speed). Every now and then, or again if you’re concentrating on short races, I like to increase the intensity of the workout by substituting the active RI’s for a very short Static Interval. For instance, 6x800 m with SI of :45. This makes the workout much harder as it shortens that recovery period, but it’s a great way to shock the system into handling speed when you’re fatigued!

Tip: One thing regarding the track workout on race week: keep it down to a simple 4x400 m. You don’t want to exhaust your legs going into a race with a hard workout, but you do still need to keep some intensity in that tapering week of your race.

Now, what about pace? How are you supposed to know what your 5K or 10K pace is unless you’ve just completed one and you know for sure you just put everything you had into it? Here’s where a bit of science comes in.

It's called the VDOT method and it isn't an easy test. It refers to the volume of oxygen consumed per minute and you can read about it several books by Jack Daniels. To find your VDOT, go to the track and do a warmup as described above. Then, run 3 miles (12 laps) as fast as you can in which each mile is consistent and record those mile splits. If you run the first mile in 6:00, the second one in 6:10, and the third one in 6:47 you didn’t nail it. Try to keep each mile within 5-10 seconds of each other. This is a really tough workout! It’s just like doing a 5K all out. Remember to cool down after you’ve finished. Take your recorded mile splits and apply it the VDOT calculator at http://www.attackpoint.org/trainingpaces.jsp and it will spit out your split times for various distance intervals. Here’s my last VDOT as an example:

In this example, Threshold (T) pace is most equivalent to my 10K pace so my speed intervals in the above workouts would be done at a pace at 6:25.

There are other run calculators on line: Mafftone, McMillan. I have a spreadsheet that compares them all if you'd like to apply it to your particular pace.

In truth, I find that I can do my intervals faster than the prescribed pace as dictated by the above method, and my guess is you will too. But you have to consider what you’re training for and does it make sense to push the pace beyond in these workouts given your goals. In my case, as I’m training for an Ironman, it probably won’t be of any further help to run my 800’s at, say, 5:50 pace rather than the prescribed 6:11. I won’t be using that kind of speed in the marathon leg of the race anyway. The goal is to dip your pace under race pace just the right amount to add speed and strength to your race legs, while still keeping it at a practical percentage of race pace. So, if you’re on the track training for an Ironman with your buddies who are training for a 5k you might have to swallow your pride and watch them drop you. But that’s only because the goals are different. That’s why this sport requires discipline!

Cool Down

Pretty simple here. Your legs just need to detox a bit. They’ve been going pretty hard and you need to let them adjust and also bring your heart rate down. A mile (4 laps) around the track is a sufficient cool down and again, do this at an easy, social jog where you have no problem chatting with friends that are cooling down with you. If it won’t cause problems with other people using the track, I like to turn around and run the track the other way just to even out the legs a little bit.

Now you have all the tools you need to put together a track workout or series of track workouts to prepare you for your goal on race day! Sure, there’re a million other ways to come up with track workouts but now you have a great start! Happy running!