Embedded Files
What's my R number? See below.
Track Season 2026 Workouts
Wed 3/18/26 4x400, 4x200 JH: A sunny speed day.
Tues 3/17/26 2-3xMile Tempo, 1x800, 2x400 HS: A great maintenance workout, done in 30 degrees and breezy.
Fri 3/13/26 Track x233 HS or x200 JH: This was a little harder than the x200s of last week. But the times were really steady and some people improved.
Wed 3/11/26 Track 4-8x400 JH: The second half of this was in the rain, to put it mildly.
Tues 3/10/26 Track sets of 2x800, 2x200 HS: A really great and valuable workout. Only a few times a season will you be asked to tackle something like this and we did well.
Fri 3/06/26 Track 6-12x200 HS & JH: 43 runners of both HS and JH ran a total of 346x200. Including 200m jog recoveries, that's 86.5 miles around the track today. 65 degrees and breezy felt good to finish a hectic first week.
Wed 3/04/26 1-4xMile Tempo HS & JH: A hectic first workout day of the season, but winter runners got their Tempos in.
Winter 2025-26 Workouts
Thurs 2/26/26 Road 1-3xMile Tempo, 1x800, 2x400: A very strong workout.
Tues 2/24/26 Track 6-11x400: Chilly and windy and sick don't make for the best workout.
Thurs 2/19/26 Road 8-11x200: We didn't take splits in the rain, but everyone seemed to be where they should be, despite the 41 degree temperature.
Thurs 2/12/26 Road 2-3x2K or 2xMile Tempo: HSers did 2K Tempo repeats and JHers did Tempo miles. Breezier and chillier than we wanted.
Tues 2/10/26 Road 3x800, 3x400, 3x200: Sunny and 45 degrees makes for an outstanding workout. Very impressive efforts all around. We ran a total of 100.25 miles today!
Thurs 2/05/26 Road 2-5xMile Tempo: Two workouts in a week! Oh happy day! This was a very good work day. It was chilly but we got the job done.
Tues 2/03/26 Parking Lot 6-10x400: After ten days of single digit temperatures and double digit snowfalls, we finally got a day we could do a workout on, but we had to get creative. This worked out!
Thurs 1/22/26 Leaf Lane 6-10x200: With the guest sprinters, 24 athletes did a total of 202x200. That's 25.25 miles of sprinting down Leaf Lane. We did these in the opposite-than-normal direction due to a breeze. Very good workout.
Mon 1/12/26 Road 3x800, 3x400, 3x200: A good solid workout.
Thurs 1/08/26 6-8x400 Track: This was a great workout! 50 degrees and on the track. Mason and Sophie earned the prizes for consistency and this was a great workout for everyone as we got back into speed.
Tues 1/06/26 1-3xMile Tempo, 1x800, 2x400: Twenty-one athletes, three distances, one stop watch! This went very well and everyone successfully picked up the pace through the distances. Awesome work. And we did the mile from the Hemlock start of the Car Wash Loop.
The last practice on Tuesday, 12/23/25 was cancelled due to ice. Some people ran a "3-2-1" workout of 1.5 miles, 1.0 mile, 0.5 mile on their own. Some people did 6-8x400 on their own over break.
Thurs 12/18/25 2-3xMile Tempo: 50 degrees and everyone ran very well.
Thurs 12/11/25 1-2 Mile Tempo, 4x400 Track: Cold and Windy, but the times were good. Very good pace control and effort. Just a pinch of speed for those racing next week.
Thurs 12/04/25 3xMile Tempo HS and 3x1200 Progression JH: It was cold, but a good start to the season.
XC Season 2025 Workouts
Mon 10/27/25 2-3xMile Tempo: For State Qualifiers and Friends
Wed 10/22/25 Track 4x400: A good final sharpening workout before Districts!
Fri 10/17/25 3-4xMile Tempo with 150m sprints: Very good work on our kicks.
Fri 10/10/25 2-4x800, 3-4x400, 3-4x200: A great effort day. Getting sharp! (The JH splits didn't make it.)
Mon 9/29/25 6-8x400 Baseball field BOYS:
Mon 9/29/25 6x400 Fox Hollow hills GIRLS:
Fri 9/26/25 3-4xMile Tempo HS, 3-4x1200 JH: A good work day to finish out a good week.
Tues 9/23/25 Lutheran Home Hill sets (788m, 200, 200): A very valuable workout. Great work.
Fri 9/05/25 3-6x800 Woods Race Pace: HS girls were perhaps 50m too long. JH maybe half that too long.
Tues 8/26/25 4x1200 Race Pace Woods HS: Very good pace awareness.
Tues 8/26/25 6-10x400 Baseball Field Grass JH: Great workout
Tues 8/19/25 3-4xMile Tempo road HS: Got changed to the road mile loop after some bee stings on the course!
Tues 8/19/25 4-6x800 Grass JH: Repeating this great workout for JH.
Wed 8/13/25 3-6x800 Grass: 75-80 degrees
Summer 2025 Workouts
Mon 8/04/25 2-3x Chase Miles: Great efforts in a fun type of workout.
Mon 7/21/25 2-4xMile Tempo: Cooler temps led to hotter times. Nice consistency.
Mon 7/14/25 HS 3x2K Tempo: Not so hot temp, but nice hot splits! Improved control from last week.
Mon 7/07/25 HS 3x2K Tempo: Hot but good work.
Thurs 6/26/25 Canal Basin Tempo Miles or 800s: 90+ degrees, but with help from some ice, we got the work in!
Track Season 2025 Workouts
Thurs 5/08/25 4x400 HS: The final sharpening workout for those going to D6 in five days.
Wed 5/07/25 3x200 JH: A good short final workout before Saturday's District Invitational.
Fri 4/25/25 Pain Sandwich 4x400 - 20:00 - 4x400 HS: An excellent Pain Sandwich workout! Everyone did really, really well.
Thurs 4/17/25 6-10x400 HS: Finally a beautiful day! These 400s went great for HSers not competing on Saturday.
Wed 4/16/25 8-10x400 HS: This was for HSers who are competing Saturday at Shippensburg. So glad today's meet got postponed. Windy but great!
Fri 4/11/25 Sets of (2x800, 2x200) HS: This was for HSers who didn't compete on Thursday. Very tough but good.
Mon 3/31/25 4x400, 4x200 JH: We did the last one in two directions at once and no one was injured!
Thurs 3/27/25 3x800, 3x400, 3x200 HS: This was for HSers not competing on Saturday and it went very well.
Thurs 3/20/25 2x (400, 200) & 800 Time Trial JH: We tried to squeeze this in before the HS home meet but were rushed. So we did an 800m Time Trial the next day. Great job!
Mon 3/17/25 4x800 HS LD: Pretty windy. These 800s were done in two sets of 2x800 with 90 seconds rest within the set and 7 minutes rest between sets.
Mon 3/17/25 4x400, 4x200 JH & HS MD: A windy day on the track. This was good work though.
Fri 3/14/25 6-10x400 HS: Another one bites the dust! The only thing falling harder than Reuben and Adalai is gonna be PRs and records with workouts like this!!! The goal today was for winter runners to run 2 seconds slower than their previous average.
Thurs 3/13/25 4-6x400 JH: Nice work. Faster than last season and faster than the road 400s of a few weeks ago for the few that applies to.
Tues 3/11/25 6-12x200 JH & HS: The temp was hot and so were the splits for this work day workout.
Fri 3/07/25 6-10x200 JH & MidD HS: A great first workout for JH for 2025! We got the work done.
Fri 3/07/25 1-2.5 sets of (2x800, 2x200) HS: A massive workout, done very well. In Week One!!!
Tues 3/04/25 2-4xMile Tempo: On the Porta John mile loop. 60 and sunny. A good day of work for the winter runners.
Winter 2024-25 Workouts
Mon 2/24/25 Track 6-10x400: It felt great to get on the track and the first split showed it! But this was an awesome workout across the board.
Tues 2/18/25 3x800, 3x400, 3x200: It was cold, sunny, and breezy. But everyone did well on this workout; most were a bit faster than on 1/23/25.
Mon 2/10/25 8-12x200 Leaf Lane: A great, valuable speed workout. A total of 1.5 miles of quality speed work.
Mon 2/04/25 2x2Mile Marathon Pace Tempo: We tried something new, running "Marathon Pace" which is 35-45 seconds slower than Tempo pace. It actually went unexpectedly well.
Thurs 1/30/25 6-10x400: A really strong workout on Hemlock loop. 45 degrees makes a difference! Maybe it was the special guest sprinters, but we ran really well!
Mon 1/27/25 3x2K Tempo: On a loop around the HS from the track. 40 degrees and sunny felt nice! Paces were really good and really consistent.
Thurs 1/23/25 3x800, 3x400, 3x200: On the Tree Streets. It was chilly, but this was a challenging workout that went well.
Thurs 1/16/25 2-3xMile Tempo: For those who didn't race yesterday. Snowy but worth it.
Mon 1/13/25 6-9x400: On Hemlock 400m loop. A solid day's work!
Thurs 1/09/25 6-10x200: On Leaf Lane. Cold but good work.
Tues 1/07/25 3-4xMile Tempo: It was cold, so this was a mixed bag. Though some folks slipped a bit, it was good to get the work in.
Thurs 1/02/25 6-8x400: On the *new* Hemlock 400m loop. These splits were great and very smooth and consistent! 15 runners!
Mon 12/23/24 3xMile Tempo: On the Beech Street mile loop. Very consistent splits. 30 degrees.
Mon 12/16/24 2xMile Tempo: This went well. Not too much before Wednesday's meet.
Tues 12/10/24 Track 3x800, 4x200: The rain held off and it was 50+ degrees! These 800s were very solid and then everyone successfully changed to a faster gear for some 200s.
Tues 12/03/14 3-4x1200 Tempo: It was cold but we did a good job jumping into our first Tempo workout of the season. Lots of people were really close to their goal pace and no one self-destructed! Very good work.
What's my "R number"?
This spring I will give you simple guidance each day of how much you should run. There will be four types of running days.
A race day - You will have a set warmup routine and cooldown after your races. The priority is running the day's race(s) well.
A workout day - Generally, with a warmup a cooldown and whatever the workout is, the total running mileage for this day will take care of itself.
A weekly Long Run - You'll most likely do this on your own on the weekend, Saturday is recommended. You and I can establish what your weekly LR should be, based on your past running experience.
A recovery day - Between all of these quality days, you will still be running. The priority is putting in work, while not being overly tired for the upcoming workout or race.
Your "R number" is the number of miles that you run on a normal (low week) recovery run. In a week when we want to be well rested, I will tell you at practice "Today is a normal recovery day," and you will run that number of miles. Or to put in a bit more work, I might say "Today is R+1" or "R+2" and you will add a mile or two to your normal "R" distance. Your R number will not change all season once you and I establish it at the start of the season. But as we run more throughout the season, you might get more R+2s. When we really want to rest before the final big meets, we could do R-1 to subtract a mile from your normal "R" distance.
So how do you establish your R number?
Mostly by what you've done in the summer training plans or winter training plans. Once you and I decide on your R number, I will write it down.
R = 2 miles - Beginner JH runners. Most beginners will want to get to comfortably running 2 miles as soon as we can. This might be a few days or a few weeks.
R = 3 miles - Beginner HS runners and experienced JH runners will comfortably settle on a recovery day of 3 miles. Good for those who have done the 200 miles plan.
R = 4 miles - Runners who have already done plans for 250 miles, 300 miles, or 350 miles.
R = 5 miles - Runners who have done plans for 400 miles or 450 miles.
R = 6 miles - Older HS runners who have already done plans for 500 miles or 550 miles.
Weekly Long Runs: A weekly long run is built into all summer and winter training plans. During the majority of the competitive season (XC or Track) it is still good to keep up your weekly long run. The length of your long run depends upon A) your weekly mileage total and overall training plan, and B) your past long run habits. Here are a few thoughts.
Just because you CAN do something doesn't mean that you SHOULD do it. With a little experience, you probably CAN run 10 miles or even a half marathon (13.1 miles) with your crazy aunt, but that doesn't mean that it is right for your training.
Don't do a long run distance this week that you are not willing to do again next week.
Doing a too-long long run not only risks being injured during that run, but increases your risk of injury for weeks afterwards. The stress that you put on your body by running too long remains in your body for a while.
You shouldn't add a mile to your current long run distance until you've done it 10-20 times. Generally you should add a mile only two times a year, between seasons, as outlined in the training plans.
To compare the winter training weeks to the same mileage weeks from the summer training, you can view the full summer training plans.
See this example four-year plan to see what is possible with slow, smart, and steady training.
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse