A little bookkeeping

 In the last posts, I gave enough information to devise a training plan, but it's not convenient. A couple guidelines will help.

If you consider percent effort as best time/ time of effort [run a mile in 8 minutes when a one mile race takes you 6 is 6/8 or 75%] Gardner and Purdy came up with the number of intervals one can do. Most useful:

90%  2-3 reps with 4-5 minutes recovery between 

85%  4-5 reps with 3-4 min.

80%  8-9reps with 2-3 min.

75% 12-15 with 1.5-2

For the volume of running in a week, as a typical maximum, what was generally done in the 1970s and 80s

Race.        Ave. Min/day.        Long run (minutes)

Sprint.        30.                          30

800.             35.                          45

1500.           40.                          60

5000.           50.                           90

10K.             60.                          120

Marathon   75.                          165

Today, runners typically do only 3/4ths of that mileage, but they maintain the same average effort per week,  so they run it faster. An old school runner would average a minute per mile slower than their Marathon pace (assuming a finish between 2:30 and 4:00, a bit slower beyond that) and a more modern runner about 30 seconds per mile slower than Marathon pace.