Reddit reviews Faster Road Racing: 5K to Half Marathon

Read Pfitzinger's Faster Road Racing, have some coffee, go to the gym and get on an spinbike, swim and work on that core that always gets overlooked.

Pfitzinger has similar plans that are specifically for 5ks.

Do they have Faster Road Racing on Kindle?

Edit: It would appear as though they do

So first off (the basics) I'm assuming you're using a HRM given that you know your max HR, if not please find one or use the conversation test when running (i.e. can I hold a conversation at this pace as that tends to correlate very well to Z1 and Z2 running.

The reason you can't find most information is because all the best stuff is in books. Specifically, I think the first few chapters of Faster Road Racing by Pfitzinger or [Hanson's Marathon Method by Humphries would help you (I'm sure there are other sources but I've read these two ... I believe Jack Daniels' book also covers this ground). One other way to find this is to actually search for cycling tips as they seem to be the crew that first adopted the HRM methods, though the general ideas tend to carry over pretty well to running.

All that being said I'm curious what particular benefits you really are shooting for, off the top of my head the size of the left ventricle increases, allowing you to pump a greater volume of blood, the size and density of mitochondria increase as well as training primarily type I muscle fibers.

I'm not sure why you would need HIIT since your goal is a bit nebulously stated. I'm kind of assuming you lift or do something similar based on those CDC guidelines and therefore HIIT is a bit redundant but some strides would certainly improve your running economy.

The general rule that seems to be emerging for endurance sports is 80% easy running (i.e. your HR target) and 20% intense work per week (strides, sprints, tempo runs, fartleks, hill sprints etc.). Look for Matt Fitzgerald's book at the library for more information.


Regarding the slow pace... you will improve quickly as a not overweight 22 year old with no other major health conditions. Just be patient. For more information about HR aerobic training taken to an extreme where we still see a lot of progress, google "Maffetone method".

For better or worse I've become sort of a follower of Pete Pfitzinger. His book Faster Road Racing has become my go to resource for all things training. His break down of nutrition is only 1 chapter but I found it very helpful when I transitioned off of a Keto diet and into fueling my running. It also explains each type of run. The reason for each type of run. The proper paces and goals for each. I use the Half Marathon training plan as my daily schedule. Following this plan and the information in the book I've gone from a 2:20:xx half in May, to a 2:09:xx in July to progression runs under 2:00:xx a few weeks ago. I'm hoping to go sub 1:55:xx in 3 weeks but we'll have to wait and see on that one.

There are also some other books that come highly recommended on the nutrition front. Racing Weight by Matt Fitzgerald comes to mind first along with all of it's follow up cook books and web sites. I don't buy into all of his ideas but a lot of people do and some of it is really pretty sound advice.

Going from 17:20 to 16:30 is a much bigger jump than 19 to 17:20 but adding tempo and interval sessions to your week should help push you through 17 at least.

Take a look at Faster Road Racing which has some good plans and guidance you will find helpful.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00LPICJ82/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1

I liked this book and I know there is some chatter about style differences between Hal and Pfitzinger.

No, dont do that.

Buy this - https://www.amazon.com/Faster-Road-Racing-Half-Marathon-ebook/dp/B00LPICJ82