Scotland the Wave

Hi Gary saw your question about doing a 10k and thought I would bore you with my thoughts

 I believe a max pace 10k is harder mentally than a 2k because it takes that much longer to complete.  Physically it is easier to about the 6k or 7k mark and then the pressure starts to go on, but from the very first meter you know it is going to hurt eventually, whereas with a 2k you dont’ have time to worry as it hurts right from the beginning.

There are a couple of ways you could approach improving your 10k time and a lot depends on your personality and time available.  You could mix a schedule of intervals sub 10k pace 1500m’s or 2k’s and 5k’s at relative paces and rests and ‘over distance’ rows of 15k or 16k at a slower pace.  The long stuff is building your aerobic base and the intervals are improving your AT as a % of that aerobic base, the intervals are also teaching you to hold pace/rate and technique when your tired and it hurts – this is important.  OK that is one way but not much fun, so here is another that will pick up some milestones along the way.

 This is something I did earlier in the year and it was fun, each day (you row) you are going to do a 5k, 6k, 30min, or 10k (all ranking distances) which all will build towards a max 10k on a day of your choosing.  So some days will be longer than others, some are short fast intense powerful and fun, others are slower and more demanding of aerobic endurance and will.  With each of them do the first one at a pace you know you can do comfortably I will use 10k as an example and just pick some numbers for the sake of the example, there is only one aspect that we will apply to all and that is we will negative split them.  So say your 10k PB is currently at 1:58 pace then we will do this first one aiming to end up around 2:02 pace.

So start the 10k averaging about 2:03 pace and work into it and then as you count down the k’s look to drop your pace to 2:02.5 then 2:02, then 2:01.5 …. you get the idea I hope and you may hold these paces for 1k or 2k but the goal is to have the average down to 2:02 with about 2k to go then hold it at that pace and then for the last 500 pick it up but NOT to the max.  This means you might end up an average of about 2:01.8, and next time you will start out maybe 0.5 sec per 500 faster and look to end 0.5 sec faster.  What does all this mean, it means you are going just a LITTLE bit faster each time (which is great mentally) and this means that over time you will arrive at your current PB and know that it is well within your capabilities to go faster as you have done it every other time you punched in 10k in the build up.  The DANGER is that during that build up your tempted to go faster and faster towards the end of your 10ks but what that means is that you get to your max to soon and as a result you start to struggle and fail session ….. not good.

The 5k’s and the 6k’s build pace and fun into your training, shorter sharper and PB’s just keep coming and you get to rank your times … they also allow some recovery when mixed in with days off.

 Hope this makes some sense, if not just ask

 George