What's the toughest track workout you've ever done?

Question

I've been compiling a list of the toughest workouts I've ever done from xc/track throughout my high school career. I'm looking to add to my list and try out some new workouts. The toughest one I ever did was something we called and dedicated to our 800 meter champion Mike Miller. The workout consisted of hill repeats 5/4/3/2/1 after a set of hills 10 push ups & sit ups followed by a 2000 meter sprint. Which was repeated until it was completed.

Answer 1

The hardest workout I ever did was supposed to be a fool-around fun workout in High School track, but I don't fool around, and so I paid for it.

The workout was a twelve-leg, four-person relay, where each teammate ran two 400s and one 800, in any order. Well, the other teams go 400-800-400, but I tell my team to start out 800-400-400. I run first, and my team is in the lead when I hand off the baton because I just set my PR in the 800. When I get the baton, again, my team is no longer in the lead, but somehow we're only 150m behind. By the time I run my 400, we're at a dead heat again, because I just ran a race-pace 400. When the baton comes around again, we're two steps ahead, and we have over 100m of lead by the time I finish my last 400, because it was even faster than my first one; a personal record. I was able to stand long enough to watch my team finish, but after that I couldn't walk.

That said, this workout is not the least bit difficult if you don't run like a moron. I basically ran three races within a span of 20 minutes. It was fun, but I wouldn't advise anyone else to do it.

Answer 2

That's easy - one that was out of my league. If a track workout is too tough, you're doing yourself no good by doing it.

Way back in 1989 I had walked on to the University of Oregon's cross and distance squad. They let me in as a scrub for their depth pool because my high school times were fast enough. What I didn't know was I had been anemic for several months. I'd also suffered stress fractures and had averaged less than 30 miles a week, and was nowhere near the shape I'd been in a year before.
Noone really cared what I did, I was just a name on the roster like a dozen or so other guys. But to make it, you had to at least go through the workouts and be noticed by Bill Dellinger. There were intervals maybe twice a week in the afternoons I think, I forget...

so in terrible shape I show up and start the intervals, a series of 400's with 30 seconds recovery. The scorers, the real team, were in one group and Alberto Salazar was with them (I'll never forget that), and all the walk-ons did their intervals in a slower group...

It was all I could do to avoid finishing each interval 20 or 30 meters behind everyone else, nearly killed me... then on the last or second to last one, Alberto Salazar lapped me, breezing by with his marathon shuffle that looks like he's just walking.

The workout did me absolutely no good, it simply killed my form and made me struggle on exhausted and look like a chump in front of one of the most famous track coaches in the country.

The moral is, a workout should be exactly as tough as your physical condition warrants.
If you overdo it, you will not gain any benefit beyond what you would have by staying just within your limit, and you may do yourself harm instead.

Think of your workout in terms of effort - take long intervals at 80%, short ones at 90%. Save the all out stuff for the races and time trials.

If you go back and do those hills you mentioned again, and you can't do it, forget it. Work your way back up. If it's easy, add to it.

As for a 2000 meter "sprint," I'd assume you mean an 80% effort there. 90%, if you're crazy enough. Or else you're from Kenya. Sprinting generally means running your fastest, and nobody can do that for 2000m. Not even el Guerrouj himself.

Answer 3

One of the toughest we did was a 20 minute warm up. Then we ran a mile at race pace, then with 30 seconds rest we ran a 400 as fast as we could-it had to be faster than our mile pace. Then we had a five minute rest after the 400. This was Teaching our bodies that we can change gears in the middle of a race when we are tired. We did this 5 times, and followed that workout with 4 x 200 at race pace. Then a 20 minute cool down. This was so intense that we only did it once a season.

Answer 4

I was an 1:58 800m "club" runner, used to experiment with hill reps. a few years back. I'd say any hill running would rate right up there in ANY workout. A session I used to do was a hill run (approx 10% gradient) 60% pace for first half, sudden pace increase to 80/90% second half (total run time per rep 90secs)...jog back recovery down to 120bpm...repeat for 8 reps. Total recovery to <100bpm and repeat (total 16 reps). If I felt very strong, I'd do another set (rare!). The trick with this is ...don't slow down between the first rep and the last by more that 3 secs. This was a set I used once a week.

Answer 5

Some of the killers I've done:
- 4-5x1600 @ 5k pace w/ 400 recovery (or less depending on your base)- a good one if you're preparing for a long race like a 1/2 or full marathon

- pyramids/ladders- like 2/4/6/8/8/6/4/2 (mins) w/ 2 min recoveries...those are fun to do

-long hill repeats (2-3 mins each)

Answer 6

The best workouts we do consist of a 20-25 minute run at 80%, followed by 10-12 hill repetitions.

Answer 7

im a 13 yr old girl and the hardest workout ive ever done would either be 10 400's at 1:15 or A really steep 6 mile hill (three miles one way)

Answer 8

I ran sprints for a small D-III school in Ohio. Here's the toughest workout that I remember.

Warm Up
Stretch
Plyo's
6x400/ 30 sec. rest b/w reps
5x 200/ 30 sec. rest b/w reps
5x 50
Cool Down

Answer 9

Hmmm. I don't think my track team is as intense as some of these. During winter track this year we had to do 4 800's at 15 seconds slower than race pace... the thing that made it so hard was that it was raining and extremely windy... you could hardly walk, let alone run at one part of the track.

Answer 10

On the first day of XC practice this season, 1 mile warm-up, stretch, five 200m sprints 35s and under, ran a 3000m course, then eight 400m's, all under 75.