I had to do a 300m sprint (53 seconds) then had to do a 1.5 mile run (13:30). Those are not good times and I thought I was in good shape, but apparently not. I almost died out there, and felt like throwing up.

I think I need to do 1 or 2 days a week of HIIT just to keep my cardio vascular in check. Today was hell, but I passed even with those garbage times.

A nine minute mile is decent. :tu:

To really run and sprint well, you got to be running and sprinting every week all week.

Didn't you have a pulled quad? Was it better?

Ouch. Starting off strong always makes it harder to "last long".

9 minutes for a mile isn't all bad :)

Yeah, I carbed up for two days and had plenty of rest. Then come the morning of the runs, I didnt get a twinge or a nasty pain, just some tightness. And today my legs are sore everywhere.

I ran a mile in 5:48 in High School so to run 1.5 miles in 13:30 is kinda discouraging.

I really need to do some HIIT twice a week besides doing my low intensity cardio, I was really laboring out there and felt like a moron.

While HIIT will help you, I'd recommend just sticking to interval sprints and racing the clock supplementary to long distance endurance cardio to get faster.

I had to do a 300m sprint (53 seconds) then had to do a 1.5 mile run (13:30). Those are not good times and I thought I was in good shape, but apparently not. I almost died out there, and felt like throwing up.

I think I need to do 1 or 2 days a week of HIIT just to keep my cardio vascular in check. Today was hell, but I passed even with those garbage times.

Low intensity cardio will not help you at all in a race of any sort. That is why people talk about a "fat burning" zone and a "cardio" zone in percentages of your max heart rate. If you want to lose fat, you excersize with a lower heartrate in the "fat burning" zone. If you want to train for competition and increase cardiovascular endurance, then you have to train at the higher heart rates in the "cardio" zone. Especially for long distance running. Sprinters will work in the gym to get stronger legs to be able to have more power and quickness. A long distance runner will not spend much time in the gym at all, and will instead spend most of their time running, at a high heart rate, for extended periods of time. That is why the best long distance runners (Kenyans and such), are very small.

Just out of curiosity, was this for a law enforcement physical fitness test?

Sprinters will work in the gym to get stronger legs to be able to have more power and quickness. A long distance runner will not spend much time in the gym at all, and will instead spend most of their time running, at a high heart rate, for extended periods of time. That is why the best long distance runners (Kenyans and such), are very small.

As a former runner who used to spend lots of time in the gym when I ran, I'd add this caveat - a 1.5 mile race isn't "long distance." It's "middle distance." You're not really dealing with "long distance" unless you're talking about at least a 10K. If you want to improve your times in the middle distances (the 800, 1000, mile, 1.5 for law enforcement, 2 mile, 5K), you should definitely spend time in the gym and strengthen that lower body (and upper body, too). You should really be going pretty much all out in a mile run the whole time - a mile is too short to "save some for later," and you never have to worry about stuff like lactic acid buildup or "hitting the wall." A marathon is much more different from a mile than a mile is from a 100M dash.

I too used to run a good mile in high school (5:11 was my PB), and I'll tell you, some of the best milers I knew were pretty diesel guys. Sure, the world champions tend to be on the slim side, (although they're shredded as all get-out and probably have more LBM than most people on this forum, when you compare anybody to an Olympic sprinter, it starts getting ridiculous) but they don't look like marathon runners.

Sure, the world champions tend to be on the slim side, (although they're shredded as all get-out and probably have more LBM than most people on this forum, when you compare anybody to an Olympic sprinter, it starts getting ridiculous) but they don't look like marathon runners.

Olympic gymnasts also try to stay relatively shredded, but for them it is extremely important to maintain their weight before a contest because gaining as little as a pound can throw off most of their routine, especially on the suspended equipment. I'd imagine it's similar for a sprinter.

Shredding is an intended advantage as it lowers an athlete's overall weight, so they have the most amount of muscle and strength for the smallest amount of excess bodyweight.

By shredded, I mean bringing that BF% down ultra-low.

Olympic gymnasts also try to stay relatively shredded, but for them it is extremely important to maintain their weight before a contest because gaining as little as a pound can throw off most of their routine, especially on the suspended equipment. I'd imagine it's similar for a sprinter.

Shredding is an intended advantage as it lowers an athlete's overall weight, so they have the most amount of muscle and strength for the smallest amount of excess bodyweight.

By shredded, I mean bringing that BF% down ultra-low.

Interesting stuff. I never thought of that, but it makes a lot of sense.

Makes you think more baseball players oughta be watching their weight; it might help them keep that swing consistent and keep them out of slumps.