Running Plan Review 80/20 Running 10K Level 3

Does it build you up smartly?

In outline, yes. In the details, less so.

Training tends to work best in blocks, each with its own job: a base of easy running, then harder work that builds on it, then race-specific sessions and a taper. Changing the emphasis from block to block tends to work better than holding one kind of training constant.

This plan follows that shape. The book names each of its 3 phases and says what each is for, and the hard running changes character as you move through them. The first 3 weeks mix short, fast efforts with longer stretches at a moderate to hard effort. Tempo runs and hill repeats arrive in week 4. From week 7, harder interval sessions take over from the hills, and every week of that last stretch before the taper carries the kind of hard running a 10K asks for.

But the schedule tells you what to run, not why. A typical entry lists only the minutes in each zone, say 5 very easy, 25 easy and 10 moderate, and nothing more. The reasons are in the book, in its tables describing each workout. A runner who has read them has what they need. A runner who hasn't is following a recipe.

Does it protect you from injury?

Partly. The overall build is careful, but three gaps leave more of the protection to you than they should.

The first is timing. Two weeks bring new kinds of hard running at the same moment the week itself gets bigger. Week 4 introduces both a tempo run and hill repeats, with about a quarter more running than week 3. Week 7 brings the first set of very hard 90-second efforts, with nearly 30 percent more running than week 6. Both weeks follow a lighter one, so the miles alone aren't reckless. But mileage alone doesn't measure your load: a new kind of hard running stresses the legs in ways the week's total doesn't show.

The second is strength. The book leaves strength work to you, with none on the schedule, so you'll need to add it and fit it around up to 10 runs a week. That's a real omission, because strength training substantially lowers the risk of sport injury.

The third is warning signs. The book has no chapter on injury: nothing on what to watch for, what to do when something hurts, or how to come back. That leaves you to judge the small aches yourself, and on 10 runs a week there are more chances for one to start. Many runners find that a niggle that lingers between runs may grow into a full injury, though the research on this so far comes from other sports. Even so, a runner on this plan does well to take an extra easy day when one shows up rather than waiting to see if it passes.

The rest of the plan protects you well. The hard days never fall back to back, and every hard session opens with 10 minutes of easy running. Every third week, in weeks 3, 6 and 9, the running drops by close to a fifth and Monday becomes a day off. Training load that keeps building with no relief tends to raise the risk of injury and illness, and lighter weeks written into the schedule give you that relief without your having to judge when.

Weekly mileage and the long run both build steadily to week 10, then ease off into the race. Built gradually like this, a high-mileage week is less of a worry than it looks, because higher, steady weekly running is generally linked to fewer injuries, not more. That evidence comes from watching runners rather than from trials, and not every study agrees.

What happens when you miss a day?

Twelve weeks at this volume is likely to include a few days you can't run. The plan's answer to them is short.

It offers one tool: any easy run can become cross-training. On paper, a week could shrink to three runs and a pool, and the key sessions would still be there. That covers a sore morning or a day the road isn't an option. But a missed hard session, a lost week, or a return after time off gets no guidance at all. And the cut order is only implied. It's clear the three key sessions outrank the easy runs, but the plan never says which of the three to give up first when only two will fit.

Where the plan helps a great deal is in how hard to run. Every stretch of every run is set by one of five zones, and the book's method for finding them is clear and complete. Zones anchored to your own thresholds are how intensity is best set.

Training by effort also keeps up with you as you improve. When you run a new best, the book has you redo the test, so your zones move up with you.

Will it get you ready for race day?

Yes. This is the plan's strongest area.

Picture the start line of the race this plan is aiming at. You want legs that know hard running, an engine big enough that 6.2 miles at a hard effort feels short, and enough freshness to use both.

The hard running is there from the first week to the last, and it grows toward the race. Early on it's a few short efforts and a moderate block or two. By week 10, the hardest week of the plan, it has more than tripled, topped by a 70-minute session that runs through every gear, from very hard efforts to hard repeats to a moderate block and back again.

The engine gets built too. Weekly running peaks at 67 miles in week 10, and the long run climbs from 7 miles to 12, nearly twice the race distance.

Then the plan backs off over the last 2 weeks, and race week holds well under half the running of week 10. A planned drop in training before a race improves race performance.

Are the workouts varied enough?

Mostly easy running, with the hard part coming in several different forms: that's the mix that tends to build endurance a little better than long stretches of moderate running, and it's what this plan delivers.

Fitzgerald states each week's split himself, near 90/10 in the base weeks and closer to 80/20 later, and this plan follows it. By distance, about 9 of every 10 miles are easy, and that easy running is the base that carries the harder training. The hard days come in 5 kinds: runs that finish faster, tempo runs, hill repeats, short very hard efforts, and longer hard repeats. Even the long runs vary, some easy throughout and some with surges or a faster last mile. Across the 12 weeks, the efforts come in more than a dozen different shapes, so very few hard sessions feel like a repeat of last week's.

But short, fast running for leg speed is thin. The 30- and 60-second uphill sprints appear only in weeks 4 to 6, and there are no strides on the easy days anywhere in the plan. Short, fast efforts like these can make runners more efficient, though the research is mixed and strides themselves haven't been tested directly. Adding a few strides to the end of an easy run once or twice a week is the usual coaching fix.