How To Run A Faster 5k

5K love it or loath it it's an iconic running distance and I've got a pretty good history with it so before you ask no I'm not here to show off I'm here to give you inside access into what an elite level 5K training program might look like and one specific session in particular which hopefully I can show you and also tell you how you could incorporate that into your training to run a faster 5K so let me introduce you to what I'm going to call or rather what the production team wanted me to call the Andy because it's really pretentious and I talk about myself in the third person but basically this is one of the best and probably the hardest workout that I did as part of my 5K training for when I ran 1320 back in the day let me explain following an easy warm-up you run 1,000 M at 5K Pace take 60 seconds of rest then do 400 m at 1500 M Pace that needs to be faster than your 5K Pace followed by a 3 minute recovery period where you should be jogging you do all that four times before an easy cool down so if you're used to running intervals then that might sound straightforward enough but the beauty of this session is that the pace itself for the hard efforts is not just one Flatout Pace you need to dial between different intensities for 5K and 1500 met Pace to give you more Paces in your Armory that will help you ultimately run that faster 5K so now I'm here to literally run you through the workout I'm not sure whether my legs have still got it though let's go a quick disclaimer I'm not in 1320 shape in fact nowhere near it so please go easy on me so here we are on the warmup nothing particularly Elite about this just a gentle few kilometers to get the body warm the legs moving and the heart rate up from resting okay now let's get to those intervals so first up we've got our very first interval of 1,000 M at 5K Pace now back in the day when I was competing as Elite I would have done this rep at around 240 per kilm maybe even slightly quicker I'm not in anything like that shape anymore but the point of this workout isn't about the absolute Pace it's about the relative pace so as long as you can do this at your 5K Pace or your target 5K Pace then it will help you to get faster so it's not just for elite athletes so as long as you're working hard and at a sensible Pace then you're executing the rep well so at this point I'm trying to relax my arms relax my breathing keep my breathing relatively low down in my chest if I can uh and just set into that pace as early as possible so that I'm not going too hard in the first minute or so and then fading towards the end of the rep I normally would to done this on the track as I've said and doing on the road definitely feels different because I don't have the visual cues of the 100 met marks the 200 M marks and the lap markers to give me an exact time but I'm using my watch here as a gauge for my Pace ultimately the aim in this workout is that the reps are consistent so don't go so hard on this first one that you can't replicate it in the Thousand meter reps as you go forward and you also need to be giving yourself head room because ultimately those 400 met reps to come need to be faster than the 1,000 M efforts okay now the best bit of the Andy the 60 seconds recovery which is brutal probably the shortest recovery you'll ever have in your life so really slow We Go Again 400 m this time and that's at 1500 M pace so note the change it's really important that you can step up your pace here from those 1,000 M efforts so again as an elite I'd have been pushed this rep out at around 60 seconds or quicker 58 seconds per 400 met lap of the track which is inside 230 per kilometer today I'm running at closer to 3 minutes per kilometer which is still plenty hard enough and giving me that familiar burn of working at a really high intensity are you training for a 5k or even a 1500 M or just something faster than you normally would at the moment let us know in the comments okay so the key is is to keep moving if you can on these recoveries and now having completed one set is 3 minutes which will also go really quickly before we do it all again three more times so four sets in total so I shouldn't be too fatigued at this point basically just trying to keep good running form so I'm trying to stay nice and Tall keep my hips high and keep nice quick foot contacts directly underneath my hips these second and third interval sets are the toughest mentally because you know you got to get through all four of them the fourth one will take care of itself though so don't worry about that one because it's your last one this is where you just need to focus on being consistent keeping the pace nice and steady and not going over your red line in my training back in the day I probably would have repeated this session maybe twice during a season so it's not something I would have done all of the time all year it's once or twice throughout my summer season as I was approaching that big 5K PB attempt one of the keys to this workout is the fluctuating Paces the fact that the th000 m and 400 m intervals are at different PAC and I think something that I get asked a lot as a runner now is oh it's easy for you because you were really fast but actually I would have been running at my red line and so my hard effort would feel just the same as yours and it's just important to dial that in and learn where that is so you can push right up to but not beyond your red line interestingly I actually enjoyed the 5K it's it's a totally different kind of pain to the 1500 M I really enjoyed running the 5K because for me it wasn't my Race distance and that took the pressure off so that could be something that you choose to take into your racing if you're not used to running a 5k or a 10K or whatever distance it is you're trying to run a PB and then take the pressure off yourself because there's no expectations and just enjoy it and soak it [Music] up this is brutal I forgotten how hard it is okay so now it's time for an easy couple of K maybe 10 minutes or so of a cool down it's actually been raining on me a little bit during the workout which has been quite nice but I will say this workout is definitely harder in a park than it is on a nice perfect surface evenly measured 400 m running track but probably I'll get more benefit for that and yes I would have running quicker when I was a pro but that doesn't matter it's all relative so you can do this at your 5K pace and your 1500 pace which for most people is just going to be a little bit quicker than 5K pace and make sure you do get that differential and pace and that's how you'd reap the benefits from It ultimately from a science perspective what you're doing here is higher intensity training with very short recovery which conditions your body to improve from a cardiovascular perspective and it will increase your V2 Max as well so that's what we're aiming to do here and all of those things together will help you to run a faster 5K and if that wasn't enough then next I tell you should check out this video here where I tried to win my first 5k race in over seven years go and look at it now h

Channel: The Running Channel

Views: 143,257

Keywords: How to run, running, running tips, training for beginners, how to start running, running training, training advice, 5k run, couch to 5k, running challenge, personal best, best running watch, best running shoes, best running shorts, parkrun, how to run faster, best running videos, world record, elite athlete, world championships

Id: jw7YoHGOP7A

Length: 7min 1sec (421 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 19 2023