Distance drills — by age group

Distance drilling is layered, but the layers are slower than in any other track event group. Aerobic base first, threshold and tempo second, VO2 work third, race-specific and kick work last. Athletes who skip the order — usually because they want to chase fast workouts before they have built the base — plateau early and often get hurt.

How to use this library

Find your age group below. Form drills and strides are appropriate at every level and should be a daily or near-daily fixture. Easy aerobic running is the foundation that every other workout sits on top of. Tempo and threshold work layer in once an athlete has the base to support it; VO2 work comes later in the season and in smaller doses than runners often expect.

Each workout page covers the prescription, the pace targets relative to current fitness, the developmental notes for the age, and the most common mistakes. The most common mistake by far is running easy days too hard and hard days too soft — both errors blunt the adaptation. Distance training rewards patience, and the runners who hit their easy days easy and their hard days hard end up faster than the ones who run everything at the same comfortable middle gear.