advice to improve my 10k sub 34mins

hi all. im 15 and i am curreantily running a 34 minute 10k and am looking for some advice to further imnprove my 10k time to hoppfully sub 32 by the end of this seson. any advice welcome. thanx.

Hi Simon, I'm double your age and a minute slower...can you give me any tips?

In seriousness though, totally depends on what you're doing for your 34s currently...

Simon, you're on the wrong forum. This is for real runners not future Olympic athletes. Actually the best thing I could advise is gradually increase distances run and speed but also not to the point of getting really tired. Its a subtle increase in loading, a seven miler in place of an eight or an 800m track rep in 2:28 instead of 2:29. I believe its possible to race faster and faster off a certain level of training before having to increase the training levels. This is a long term process, at 15 years of age you have statistically another 12 years of improvement, so no need to rush things.

thanks for all your tips. stevie g. if your realy seroious about running then you should deffentily join a club or seek advice from a profestnail coach.the best way to imnprove though is to vairy your training. you need to have the edge on your compettors so you need both speed and endurance.without thease two components you can not imnprove any further. i would recomend throwing in a few sestions of speed work allong with the endurance work,no doboutly your already doing,to further improve your last streach and give you an edge over your competors. i would recomend doing reps of 400mx6 and 200mx8 a copple times aweek along with endurance work of say,a steady state run of 6 miles followed by core exourisesthen the following day a 10-14 mile run at a lower pace.every week i would advise you to increasse the speed or the durration of your traiming but only increasse the milage once your contofable with it. eventuaily you will imnprove it will take time but dont give up.

Simon - just to put some context to this, 34 mins would rank you No.4 in the UK for U17, anything below 32:31 would rank you No.1. And you're only 15!

Now I notice that you havent yet run a certified 10K, so that is probably your first priority.

Again to add some context, I could probably match your 1500m time but I cant get anywhere near 34 mins for 10K so I certainly applaud your ambition and it looks as though you have some excellent potential but 32 minutes at this stage means very little without knowing what your realistic starting point is.

Simon, ta fella, but i was just kidding.   ..i have the coach, the club and the training plan to squeeze the last possible improvements out of myself..i've been running for about 10years now...albeit it super casual in the early years.

however, at 15, with that time on the board you could be very fast. Maybe you shouldn't even be thinking as far as 10k at this stage...maybe you should really drill those short and middle distances while you can, and then move up a distance each year when you've extinguished the improvements...

i started with half marathons...and what is very clear is it's harder to go down the distances then up

parkrunfan wrote (see)

Now I notice that you havent yet run a certified 10K, so that is probably your first priority.

Again to add some context, I could probably match your 1500m time but I cant get anywhere near 34 mins for 10K l

Second that actuallly....the 2 times you have on your power of 10 record don't look in sync with your 10k time... when you say you're running a 34 10k, just to clarify have you done this in a race?or in training? and if in training, how's it been measured/timed?

is it 34:01 or 34:59? That's obviously a big difference too...

ive done this in an actual race once for school and once for my club

my actual time was 34.39

was that the school or club one?  Just need to match that on a UKA certified race and you could help yourself to the rankings parkrunfan mentions above...

that was a school compertion in which i compeated with 800 other comettors and came first

i have another race in september too so i can alos post my results then to and hoppfuly imnprove a bit.

do that it'll be interesting.

But maybe consider hitting the middle distance stuff tho....if you have a coach i'm sure they'd think that wise....then by the time you come back to 10k you;ll have even more speed to play with

your average teenager is a lazy bastardo...so work hard and you'll go from strength to strength

at the moment i focous my efforts on my 800m training with 10k on the side. is this wise?

well, you're doing well...but i'd say just do the 800 for now. work on that and get really fast for a couple of years. Then you can move up the distances.

think of it this way...the quicker you can get your 800s...the quicker your 10k pace will be later on...

so far my 800m time is 2.09 is this any good?

well it's a lot better than the 2.18 on your power of 10 record shows!

And it's a time that's guaranteed to reduce as you fuel your efforts into it under some good coaching...

to date in 2012 (obviously only in July so far...) that would get you 434th in the country for U17.

Clearly you have a whole year left in that category at least....and you're probably still in the throes of getting stronger..

i know 800 would do me better buut i enjoy the 10k more. would it harm me to do the 10k at an early age or would i be fine?

Stevie G . wrote (see)

parkrunfan wrote (see)

Now I notice that you havent yet run a certified 10K, so that is probably your first priority.

Again to add some context, I could probably match your 1500m time but I cant get anywhere near 34 mins for 10K l

Second that actuallly....

Third that.

There's a guy at my club who steeplechases, so he ain't no aerobic slouch either.  His 200 at u17 was a bit quicker than yours, but comparable.  His 10k even now is over 36 mins, and his 800 now is quite a bit quicker than yours.

There would be no harm in doing the 10k at an early age.  You would be fine.  But please try out either a 10000 on the track or a certified 10k distance to figure out why your times are so out of kilter.  Otherwise you might find yourself disappointed in your 10k time, when you really should be ecstatic about it!!

my times on the power or 10 have not been updated. my 1500 is 4.40 and 800 is 2.09.