How to Optimise and Improve Your 5k Time

Running 5km is a solid test of endurance and fitness, however one that many athletes might plateau or struggle to improve over time.

As a CrossFit athlete, you’re most likely off to a good start in the 5,000m test; WODs challenge your aerobic engine and many last around the same duration as it’ll take you to run 5km, so you’re used to working hard for this amount of time.

Whether you enjoy it or not, running is an essential part of CrossFit; drop on your endurance and you’ll have a gap in your fitness. Running a 5k race is not only a solid test of endurance but will also elevate your VO2 max, improve your stamina and see you perform better in a broad range of workouts.

Read on to find our expert tips to improve your 5km time.

EXPERT TIPS ON HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR 5K TIME

Work on your aerobic engine 

Running 5k is predominantly an aerobic activity – almost all of your energy comes from burning fuel in the presence of oxygen. In contrast to this, most CrossFit workouts can be done by relying more on your anaerobic metabolism (burning fuel without oxygen).

“Because athletes cannot rely on anaerobic metabolism for very long, the vast majority of the energy used to run a 5k is a result of aerobic metabolism,” says endurance training coach, Josh Sambrook. “This means that building a strong aerobic engine is the single best thing you can do to improve your 5k performance.

“Most athletes will be limited simply by the rate at which they can deliver oxygen to the working muscles, and subsequently burn fuel in the presence of this oxygen.

“A bigger aerobic engine, regardless of how this is developed – for example through swimming, cycling, running or rowing – will result in a faster 5k.” Josh continues. “This is due to the cascade of positive responses that occur within your body as a result of any form of aerobic activity; from increased mitochondrial density to increased heart size (left ventricular hypertrophy).”

This means that, as long as you are doing exercise that forces you to sustain a heart rate (HR) of around ~60-90% of your maximum HR, this will help you become faster over 5km, even without running.

Any exercise above ~60% of your max HR will have benefits, however, the lower the HR percentage the longer you’ll have to do the activity for in order to see the same gains.

Run further than 5km

Running further than 5km will help you to train your mind as much as it will help you train your body.

If during training you usually only run in short bursts of around 1km, you’ll struggle mentally when it comes to running the full 5k at top speed.

“Mental training is just as important as physical training,” highlights Josh Sambrook. “Although both the mental and the physical can be trained in the same workout, it’s all too easy to work out in a way that trains your body but not your mind, and this should be avoided.

“Workouts that push you hard and hold you there for as long as possible, preferably without any rest, are great ways to train your mental strength.”

Mental toughness is a challenging skill to develop and it is best trained through continuous workouts. Workouts that prescribe recovery time between sets mean you are working hard for a short time, recovering and then starting again. However, a continuous workout forces you to work hard for the whole duration – much closer to the challenge your body and mind will face during a 5k.

Running further than 5km will also adapt your body to the impact and strains of a repetitive activity. During your longer (albeit slower) runs you will increase your bone density, which reduces your risk of injury.

Physiologically, bone resorption (the process of bone breakdown when a bone is loaded) happens when running. This means bones are broken down a little to build back up stronger, just like muscle hypertrophy.

Additionally, all of the systems that limit you when running a 5k are trained when running, this includes your lactate threshold, aerobic capacity and cardiac output.

By running further than 5km, you’ll develop the strength, stamina and mental toughness that you’ll need when setting a personal best (PB). So, when it comes down to it, your body and mind know what to expect and what they’re in for.

Keep track of your performance

Monitoring progress is a key part of training for any sport, after all, it’s the single metric that defines your ability and whether you’re improving. Keeping track of your progress will give you hard numbers, not just a feeling.

“There are lots of ways to keep track of how your running performance is progressing,” says Josh. “The most obvious is to simply run a 5k time trial on the same course every month, monitoring your performance over the months. Or you could keep a record of your average pace during a workout you repeat often.

“At the high-tech end of performance tracking, you can track how your running speed at a given heart rate changes with training.” Josh S continues. If you’re able to run faster at the same heart rate you were sustaining previously, you have a clear metric of progress.

If you are training hard but find that your performance is not improving consider if you are getting enough rest and recovery, alongside adding more variety to your running training.

Vary your training if you plateau 

It’s easy to stick to the same tried and tested workouts. When running, this is compounded by the fact it can feel like there are less options available to add variety compared with CrossFit and its myriad of movements and equipment.

However, without variety in your running workouts your performance will plateau. Josh points out that: “There are many ways to add variety to your running workouts, and using your environment is a great way to make this feel more natural.

“For example, you may have a hill nearby that you can use for hill repeats. This can be as simple as running at as fast as possible to the top of the hill and jogging or walking back down. Repeat this for around 20 minutes for a great workout.”

Running can take many forms; from intense sprints to longer runs. Running a mile as fast as you can is very different to going out for a steady 15km and even a 400m rep is different to a 200m sprint. Add hills, turns, stairs or obstacles and you’re not only varying pace but also environment.

Don’t overthink your technique and form

When it comes to running, your technique and form are much less important that many athletes think.

“As adults, each of us have spent many years running and our bodies have all adapted to the specific way in which we run.” Josh S explains. “That means that changing your technique will most likely result in either picking up an injury or burning more energy to move at the same speed.

“A great example of this is your foot strike. For some time the prevailing viewpoint was that runners should aim to land on their forefoot or midfoot for optimal efficiency and to reduce their injury risk, however this view has been challenged recently, with lots of data suggesting that elite runners show a variety of foot strike patterns.”

Unless you’re about to become an Olympic athlete, there’s little point in trying to change your technique and form. As discussed before, there are many other areas that are more important than form and technique. These are the areas you can first optimise to improve your 5km time.

Three workouts to improve your 5k performance: 

PROGRESSIVE 1KM REPS

For time 5 reps of:

•       Progressive 1km runs

90 seconds rest between reps

Reps one and two should be slightly slower than your current 5k PB pace, your 3rd rep should be at your current 5k PB pace, and the final two reps should be slightly faster. Try adding a 6th rep to make it extra tough.

This workout is scaled automatically, as pace will be relative to each athlete’s time.

10,000 METRES

For time:

• Run 10km

Pace yourself to run a little slower than your 5k PB pace

Try to avoid stopping or variations in your pace. During this workout you should be running at almost the same speed as your 5k PB speed.

The goal with this workout is to get you to around 80% of your max HR and hold you there for 10km, so try to keep your speed as consistent as possible throughout.

Find a 10km route that allows you to run uninterrupted for the full distance; parks are great for this as they generally avoid road crossings.

PYRAMID

For time (and quality)

Run:

• 200m
• 400m
• 600m
• 800m
• 1000m
• 800m
• 600m
• 400m
• 200m

120 seconds rest between sets

Each of these reps should be run at the same intensity, so they should all feel similarly hard. This means both 200m reps should be the same pace, but faster than any other reps, and the 1000m rep should be the slowest rep but you should still work hard for it.

WHAT IS A GOOD 5KM TIME

There’s no “good” or “bad” time to run 5kms in, it’s all relative to yourself. However, if competition is something that drives you, you can calculate your age grading, which uses your 5k time and compares it to the world record time for your sex and age to create a score.

This way, you can roughly compare your personal performance against other people’s performance even though they might be a different age and/or sex to you. The higher the score the better the performance.