Today was suppose to be a day off but being such a nice day and the thought of being stuck in the office from 2-10 I thought id make the most of it and ran a very easy 5 miles which was proberly better for my legs than a complete day off!! Legs did feel a lot better compared to yesterdays 10 miler which was a relief!

Was clearing out some old stuff the other day when I came across some old training schedules when I was at Frome College and seeing I have been asked a few times what training I did back then thought I should post an example of a week...

This was from 1998-1999 - Was 14-15 years old and at the time best for 5k was 17:07..

Monday: 4 miles easy with Frome Athletics club (junior night)
Tuesday: reps session 6-8 x 400 meters with 75 secs recovery.
Wednesday: Run with Frome seniors usually 6 miles.
Thursday: Rest.
Friday: 3/4miles easy
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: 8-10 miles very easy

Heres training when slightly older 16-17 when had a best of 15:44 over 5k.

Monday: 6 miles easy.
Tuesday: 10 x 400s off 1 minute recovery.
Wednesday: 8 miles with athletics club.
Thursday: 4 miles easy.
Friday: 5-8 x 3minutes hard with 1 minute jog.
Saturday: Rest
Sunday: 10-12 miles.

Was very fortunate in that when I was a junior I did all my training with my dad who also was (and still is) a runner and watched over my training making sure I wasnt doing too much too soon. Most of reps were all on grass aswell as a lot of the steady miles. Also I didnt run a half marathon until I was 21 as by then pretty much finished growing and developing and also had a good 8 years of running behind me so was strong enough to handle the training. Plus when you are under 20 in my opinion you really should be concentrating on 5km and under and also running local cross country leagues to build up the speed and strength. 13 miles of hard running on a tarmac (as well as the training for it) not good for a young growing/developing athlete. A lot of people have disagreed with me on this but your find these people usually have never ran that young themselves or ever coached any athletes that young. I had a lot of people used to train with while I was 15-18 and only one still runs and the rest got bad injuries from over doing it.