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Mile repeats with NCAA champion Morgan McDonald

Tackle this monster track workout with one of Australia's top 5,000m runners

Photo by: Instagram/morganmcdonald__

Ready for a long and hard track workout? If you are, Australian 5,000m specialist and four-time NCAA champion Morgan McDonald has the session for you. McDonald included the workout in a recent YouTube video, and it involves an almost 13K main set. You can watch the video yourself, but McDonald doesn’t speak much in it, and it instead shows him running his many laps of the track. One of the few things he can be heard saying in the video comes at the end of the workout. “That was fun,” he says. So there you have it — McDonald says it was a fun session, which is all you should need to be convinced it’s worth trying. 

Getting started

You might not be able to perform this workout on a track right now, but if you can find a clear stretch of road, you’ll be set. It should also be noted that while the main set features a total of 12.8K, you don’t have to run that far if it sounds like too much. McDonald split the workout into four parts, so you can run as many rounds as you like. When deciding how many rounds to run, you should also factor in your warmup and cooldown, which should be at least 15 minutes each. This will add several kilometres to your total mileage for the day, and while we know these are tiresome, they’re a necessary part of every workout. 

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The main set

The main set is pretty simple. It features four rounds of one mile plus 4 x 400m. McDonald notes that he had 90 seconds of rest after the mile repeats, 60 seconds between the 400s and three minutes of additional rest after each round. He also got progressively faster as he worked through this session, which is important to note. Whether you choose to run all four rounds or just one, you have to start conservatively so you save your legs for the later stages of the workout. If you don’t, you’ll certainly pay for it. 

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In Round 1, McDonald ran 4:46 for the mile and hovered around 65 and 66 seconds for the 400s. For context, McDonald’s mile PB is 3:54, so he’s running almost a full minute slower to kick this workout off. Adding his 400s together works out to a 4:22 mile, which is still almost half a minute behind his PB. Remember that you don’t have to crush these repeats. Run hard but steady. 

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In Round 2, McDonald was a bit faster, running a 4:37 mile and three 65s and a 64 for his 400s. Again, nothing too fast here, just a good and consistent effort. Next round, he went 4:32 and 64 down to 62. He closed out the workout with a 4:23 mile and 400s at 63, 62, 60 and 59 seconds.

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If you run this workout properly, you’ll have enough energy to kick it up a notch for that final round, just like McDonald did. It won’t be easy by any means, but it should be manageable. Once again, remember to have a nice long cooldown after this tough set. Your body will thank you for it. 

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