If training phases are the building blocks of your training plan, then individual workouts are the building blocks of the training phases. With your high-level plan sketched out, you’re now ready to schedule your weekly workouts.
Each training block is focused on a particular training effect, which means each training block uses a specific type of workout to achieve that training effect. This lesson details those workouts and illustrates how to schedule them in your training weeks.
Two workouts are used across all training phases. These are the recovery workout and the endurance workout, summarized below.
Recovery Workout
- Effort Level: “Easy”
- If using Borg 10-pt scale: 4-5
- If using Friel HR Zones: Zone 1
- If using Stryd power zones: Zone 1
- Total Time at Intensity: 20-60 minutes
- Interval Time: n/a
- Work to Rest Ratio: n/a
- How Often: 2-3/week during all training phases
- Purpose: To aid recovery days from hard days and add to your aerobic base.
- Sample Workout: 20-minute recovery run
Recovery workouts are central to balancing the application of training stress and recovery; and these are your default workouts. If you find yourself too fatigued to execute a key intensity workout that’s scheduled; then default to a recovery workout. After a recovery workout, you should feel refreshed. You can always shorten a recovery workout or nix it altogether if you simply need to rest that day.
During the aerobic base conditioning phase, drills may be integrated into one or more recovery workouts each week.
Endurance Workout
- Effort Level: “Conversational”
- If using Borg 10-pt scale: 5-6
- If using Friel HR Zones: Zone 2
- If using Stryd power zones: Zone 2
- Intensity at or below your aerobic threshold (AeT)
- Total Time at Intensity: 30 minutes to 6+ hours
- Interval Time: n/a
- Work to Rest Ratio: n/a
- How Often: 2-6/week during all training phases
- Purpose: Used more than any other training zone to build the aerobic endurance base, which allows the athlete to better metabolize fat and spare glycogen (stored carbohydrate) as a long duration energy source.
- Sample Workout: 90-minute endurance run
Although the duration of the endurance workout will vary across your training phases, you will generally include at least one per week throughout the plan.
The endurance workout is the key workout during the aerobic base conditioning phase, whether on its own or with alactics added to the workout. As discussed earlier, “alactics” are short bursts of speed less than 10 seconds in duration with ample recovery in between. They are especially important in helping runners develop the body’s supporting structures (e.g., muscles, ligaments, tendons) that need to be in place for higher intensity aerobic and anaerobic work. Integrate 4-12 alactics into one or more endurance workout during the aerobic base conditioning phase.
The endurance workout is also one of the key workouts during the endurance training phase. During this phase, you will be increasing the duration of one or more endurance workouts each week — the weekly “long run” for runners. Ultrarunners might use back-to-back long runs — that is, long runs scheduled two days in a row — to achieve greater volume in preparation for longer events. When stacking back-to-back long runs, do the harder/longer run on the first day.
The endurance workout in other training phases will remain relatively constant in duration. The exact length will depend on your event and goals.
A second key workout during endurance training is the sub-LT tempo workout detailed below.
Sub-LT Tempo Workout
- Effort Level: “Comfortably Hard”
- If using Borg 10-pt scale: 7
- If using Friel HR Zones: Upper Zone 3
- If using Stryd power zones: Lower Zone 3
- Intensity below your lactate threshold (LT) for sustained durations
- Total Time at Intensity: 30 minutes to 2 hours
- Interval Time: 20-60 minutes
- Work to Rest Ratio: 5:1 to 8:1
- How Often: 2-4/week during endurance training phase
- Purpose: Used to build intensive aerobic endurance and improve lactate tolerance and to simulate marathon-distance race pace.
- Sample Workout: 90-minute endurance run with 30-minute tempo in the middle
These are aerobic tempo sessions below your lactate threshold, but above your aerobic threshold. So they are “comfortably hard” to sustain over the duration of the interval, which can range from 20-60 minutes. You can integrate these into an endurance workout or do a sub-LT tempo workout on its own after an easy warmup and before a cooldown. The progression for these workouts is to increase your time at intensity and then decrease the recovery time between the intensity bouts. You’ll typically want to schedule at least one recovery day between these workouts.
The key workout during lactate threshold training is the LT cruise interval workout detailed below.
LT Cruise Interval Workout
- Effort Level: “Comfortably Hard”
- If using Borg 10-pt scale: 8-9
- If using Friel HR Zones: Zones 4-5a
- If using Stryd power zones: Upper Zone 3 to lower Zone 4
- Intensity nearing or just crossing over your lactate threshold (LT)
- Total Time at Intensity: 30-60 minutes
- Interval Time: 6-20 minutes
- Work to Rest Ratio: 2:1 to 5:1
- How Often: 2-3/week during lactate threshold training phase
- Purpose: Used to raise the lactate threshold by improving lactate tolerance and decreasing lactate accumulation, which allows you to stay aerobic at faster speeds.
- Sample Workout: 60-minute run with 4 x 8-on/2-off cruise intervals
LT cruise intervals are shorter in duration than the sub-LT tempo intervals and are done at a higher intensity that approaches (and may cross over) your lactate threshold. The progression for cruise intervals is to increase the length of the interval and then to decrease the recovery time between the intervals. You’ll typically want to schedule at least one recovery day between these workouts.
The key workout during VO2max training is the VO2max interval workout detailed below.
VO2max Interval Workout
- Effort Level: “Uncomfortably Hard”
- If using Borg 10-pt scale: 10
- If using Friel HR Zones: Zone 5b
- If using Stryd power zones: Upper Zone 4
- Intensity at your VO2max
- Total Time at Intensity: 12-24 minutes
- Interval Time: 1-6 minutes
- Work to Rest Ratio: Equal to or slightly less than work interval
- How Often: 2-3/week during VO2max training phase
- Purpose: Used to increase the maximal rate of oxygen transport (aerobic capacity or VO2max), build lactate tolerance, and increase anaerobic endurance.
- Sample Workout: 60-minute run with 3 x 3-on/2-off VO2max intervals
VO2max intervals are short but intense. These are “uncomfortably hard” and require more recovery between the intervals and between the days when you do these workouts. You’ll typically want to schedule 1-2 days of recovery workouts between VO2max interval workouts (two days with three sleep cycles is ideal).
With these key workout types in mind, let’s take a look at some sample weekly training schedules in each of the training phases.
