You have completed your Couch to 5K, maybe taken part in a few races and now you are wondering if you can improve your 5K time. Somewhere along the way, despite what you thought when you first started out, you have officially caught the running bug, and now you want to see just what you are capable of.
Your initial goal was probably to run the distance without stopping, but now you are looking at your watch, thinking about those minutes and seconds and wondering if you do better with some extra training. This is a pretty good indication that running has well and truly got under your skin.
Improving your 5K is a great next goal, but this is where many new runners can fall into the trap of believing that getting faster simply means running faster every time they train. Unfortunately, it is not quite that straightforward and some of the things you might think will help you improve your 5K could actually be holding you back.
If you want to run a faster 5K, forget about making every run harder or trying to beat your previous time every time you head out. Good 5K training is about developing different aspects of your fitness, including endurance, speed and running efficiency, while giving your body enough recovery to adapt to the training you are doing.
So, before you start running every training session as though it is race day, let’s look at six common mistakes new runners make when trying to improve their 5K time.
Mistake Number 1: Only Running 5k Every Time You Train
If your goal is to improve your 5K, it seems perfectly logical that you should practice running 5k more often, and there is nothing wrong with including regular 5K runs in your training. In fact, if you have only recently completed your Couch to 5K, simply running the distance regularly will make you a little faster to begin with because your body is still adapting to running and becoming fitter and more efficient.
So yes, it is possible that you will improve your 5K time simply by running 5K every time you train, particularly in those early stages of your running journey. You may find that your first 5K takes 35 minutes, then a few weeks later you are running it in 33 minutes without doing anything particularly different. Your body is adapting, your confidence is improving and running the distance is becoming easier.
The problem comes when this becomes your entire training strategy. If every run is 5K and you are running each one at roughly the same pace or effort, eventually your progress is likely to slow down because you are giving your body the same training stimulus every time you go out. You may get some initial gains, but if you want to continue improving your 5K time, you need to give your body different challenges.
Think about it like this: if you always run the same distance at the same effort, your body becomes very good at doing exactly that, but no more than that. To continue developing, you need to introduce some variety into your training so that you are working on the different components of fitness that contribute to a faster 5K.
This is where 5K training needs to become more than just running 5K every time. You need to vary your training in order to create challenges. Speed sessions, longer runs, tempo runs and yes, easy runs all help develop your running. Easy runs develop your aerobic fitness, longer runs can improve your endurance and give you the confidence to keep going when you become tired, while faster sessions can help develop your speed and your ability to sustain a stronger pace.
You are not just trying to run 5K faster every time you train. You are using different types of training to gradually improve your 5K time overall and become the runner who can run 5K faster when race day comes around.
So, if you are still relatively new to running, do not worry if you have been doing nothing more complicated than running 5K a few times a week. It has probably helped you improve already, and there is no need to suddenly turn your training upside down. As you become more experienced and your progress starts to level off, however, it is time to introduce some variety and give your training a little more purpose.
Mistake Number 2: Running Too Fast on Your Training Runs
This is another really common mistake, particularly in the early days of running, and it is something that many new runners struggle with because they genuinely believe they only have one running pace. They struggle with changing the gears up or down with their pace.
Again, this is completely normal when you are fairly new to running. You are still learning what different levels of effort feel like, and until you have spent some time experimenting with different paces, it can be difficult to recognise the difference between an easy run, a steady run and a hard effort.
The problem comes when that one pace becomes the pace you use for every run. If your normal pace is already quite demanding, running every session at that effort means you are constantly asking your body to work hard, which can leave you tired and make it much more difficult to get the full benefit from your other training.
One of the simplest pieces of advice we give runners is that your easy runs should be at conversational pace. In other words, you should be able to run and hold a conversation without struggling to get the words out. If you are running with someone and you cannot comfortably chat, that is a pretty good indication that you are going too fast and need to back off the pace.
Of course, if you are running on your own, it is a little harder to use the conversation test, but there are other clues your body can give you. If your breathing has become laboured, you are struggling to control your breathing or you feel as though you are working considerably harder than you should be on an easy day, there is a good chance you are running too fast.
This can feel strange at first, particularly if slowing down means running at a pace that feels ridiculously easy. You might even find yourself thinking that you could walk faster than this! But resist the temptation to speed up just because it feels more natural. You are learning an important running skill, and over time you will become much better at judging effort and controlling your pace.
Easy runs are there to build your aerobic fitness, increase your running volume and help you recover from harder sessions without placing unnecessary stress on your body.
As you become more experienced, you will also discover that you do not actually have only one running pace. You have a whole range of paces available to you, from very easy recovery running through to steady running, tempo efforts and faster intervals. Learning how to move between those different efforts will certainly allow you to understand how you can improve your 5k times.
Mistake Number 3: Avoiding Speed Work
Speed work can sound a little intimidating when you are a newer runner, especially if you don’t consider yourself to be naturally fast. You might hear the words speed session or interval training and imagine experienced runners sprinting around a track at a pace you could never hope to match, but that is not what speed work is about.
Speed is relative to where you are right now.
Basically anything below your normal pace is speed work. You are not competing with anyone else, and there is no magic speed that makes a session a speed session. It is asking your body to run a little faster than it normally does.
One of the easiest ways to introduce this into your 5K training is through intervals, where you run a shorter distance at a faster speed than your normal running pace, followed by a period of easier running or recovery before repeating the effort. The faster section might be 200 metres, 400 metres, 600 metres or something longer depending on your experience and fitness, but the principle remains the same.
You are asking your body to step slightly outside its usual comfort zone for a relatively short period of time, and then giving it time to recover before doing it again. This provides a different training stimulus and encourages your body to adapt and become stronger and more efficient.
The purpose is to gradually improve your ability to handle faster running so that, over time, your normal 5K pace starts to increase as well.
There is no need to go all-out, either. Good speed work should feel challenging, but you should still be able to maintain control and complete the session with reasonable consistency. If you are sprinting from the first interval and completely exhausted before you get half way through the session, you have probably gone too hard.
For a new runner, the aim is to introduce your body to running faster in a controlled way and gradually build from there. You are not trying to become a sprinter, you are teaching your body that it is capable of running faster than its usual comfortable pace and this will inevitably improve your 5K times.
Mistake Number 4: Ignoring Endurance Runs
Because your aim is to improve your 5K, you might think that you only need to run 5K in training, but being able to complete the distance and being able to run it faster and more comfortably are two very different things.
Yes, you need to practise running 5K, but you also need to build the endurance that allows you to maintain your pace when you start to get tired. This is particularly important if you are trying to improve your 5K time, because the goal now is not just get to the finish line, but to keep your pace as consistent as possible throughout the race so you can hit those pbs.
An endurance run is generally a longer, slower run where the focus is on spending more time on your feet rather than trying to run quickly. You are developing your overall stamina and teaching your body to keep working for longer without creating the same level of fatigue as a hard 5K effort.
Now, we are not talking about adding a huge amount of distance to your training. An endurance run could mean gradually building from your usual 5K to 6K, 7K or 8K at an easy conversational pace. You might start with 5K and add 500 metres or a kilometre over several weeks, depending on your current fitness and how your body responds.
For example, if you currently run 5K three times a week, your training might eventually look something like this:
Run 1: 5K easy at conversational pace
Run 2: 5K including some faster intervals
Run 3: 6-8K easy endurance run
You could then gradually extend that longer run as your fitness develops, perhaps building towards 8-10K if that suits your training and goals. On these runs, which we refer to as the Long Slow Runs (LSR), the key is to run these at a very comfortable pace, even slightly slower than your easy run pace. In fact, the whole point is to keep the effort controlled so that you are developing endurance without turning the session into another hard workout.
Another option is to introduce a time-based endurance run rather than focusing on distance. If you currently run for around 35 minutes during your 5K, you might gradually build your longer run to 40, 45, 50 or 60 minutes at an very, easy effort. This can be particularly useful for newer runners because it takes the focus away from pace and distance and simply gets you comfortable with spending more time running.
Building endurance also gives you a useful psychological advantage. If you regularly run further than 5K in training, your race distance starts to feel less intimidating. When you reach 4K during your next 5K race, you know you have the endurance to keep going because you have already run further than this many times in training.
So, don’t fall into the trap of thinking that because you are training for a 5K, every run needs to be 5K. The 5K is your goal distance, not necessarily your training distance.
Instead, gradually introduce a longer, easy endurance run into your week, building the distance or duration slowly and keeping the effort at a very comfortable conversational pace. This extra endurance will give you a stronger aerobic base and help you maintain your pace when you are trying to run your fastest 5K.
Mistake Number 5: Trying to Improve Your 5k Time Every Week
There is nothing wrong with wanting to see your 5K time come down, but expecting a new personal best every week is a recipe for frustration.
If you run 30 minutes this week, you naturally want to run 29:30 next week, and if you manage that, you want to go even faster the week after. Before long, every training run becomes a test of your fitness.
The problem is that your body does not improve in a perfectly straight line.
You will have good days when you feel strong and everything seems to come together, along with days when your legs feel heavy and your normal pace suddenly feels much harder than it should. Your performance can be affected by sleep, stress, nutrition, recovery, work, family commitments, weather and a whole host of factors that have nothing to do with whether your fitness is improving.
Trying to run a personal best every week can also lead you straight back to one of the other common mistakes on this list, which is running your training sessions too hard.
Your training should gradually improve your fitness rather than constantly test it.
Give your body time to respond to the work you are doing, and look at your progress over several weeks rather than judging yourself on one individual run. You may have a week where your pace seems slower, but that does not mean your training has stopped working.
Sometimes the improvements are happening beneath the surface before they become obvious on your watch.
Use occasional 5K races or parkruns to assess your progress and allow your regular training runs to do the work of making you fitter rather than constantly testing how fit you are.
Mistake Number 6: Overtraining
When your 5K time stops improving, your first thought might be that you need to do more, another running day, another speed session or a longer weekend run or just run harder.
Sometimes that is true, but very often the problem is not that you are doing too little. It is that you are not giving your body enough time to recover from what you are already doing.
Running creates stress within the body, and that stress is an important part of training because it gives your body a reason to adapt and become stronger. However, the adaptation does not happen as soon as you have completed the session. Your body needs time to repair, recover and respond to the training stimulus.
If you continually add more training without allowing enough recovery, you can reach a point where your legs never feel fresh, your easy runs become harder than they should be, your faster sessions are torture and niggles start to appear.
You may also find that your motivation starts to fade because running has changed from something you enjoy into something you feel you have to do.
Rest days, easy running, adequate sleep, good nutrition and sensible progression are all important parts of a successful 5K training programme. You become fitter when your body adapts to the training you give it, and that adaptation requires recovery. So before adding more training, look at your recovery and make sure you are giving your body enough time to absorb the work you are already doing.
So, How Do You Improve Your 5k
As coaches, we have to admit that we have made many of these mistakes ourselves. We were beginner runners too, and we fell into the same traps of thinking that running faster meant every run needed to be faster and that doing more running must automatically mean becoming a better runner. We continue to see new runners doing exactly the same thing, and it is completely understandable because, on the surface, it seems obvious that more running should equal better running.
But there is more to it than simply putting in more miles or kilometres but it doesn’t have to be too complicated either. Your training should include the following sessions:
- Long Slow Run
- Speed Session
- Tempo Run
If time permits add in some easy runs but make sure you are allowing for recovery days.
Your body needs the right stimulus to improve, but it also needs the space to adapt to that stimulus. When you introduce different types of running, challenge yourself appropriately and then allow enough recovery, your body responds by becoming stronger, fitter and more efficient. That adaptation is what ultimately allows you to improve your 5k time.
It does not happen overnight, though, and this is where that all-important word consistency comes in. You cannot expect your body to adapt effectively if you run six days one week, push yourself hard because you are feeling motivated, and then do nothing for the next two weeks. Your body needs regular, appropriate training followed by enough recovery to create those adaptations over time.
That does not mean you need to run every day, and it certainly does not mean that more is always better. It means finding a level of training that works for you and then consistently sticking with it, gradually building your fitness while giving your body the opportunity to respond.
So, if you have completed your Couch to 5K and caught the running bug, this is the perfect time to start thinking differently about your training. You have already achieved the hardest part, which was getting started, and now you can begin to explore what you are capable of.
At Achieve Running Club, we have training plans designed to give you that structure without making running unnecessarily complicated. If improving your 5K is your next goal, you can follow our Free 5k Maintenance Plan, or have a look at our 5k Improver plans. You will also have access to coaches and plenty of information to help you understand what you are doing and, importantly, why you are doing it.
We also have a range of running books which go into more detail on the different types of training runs, how to train for certain distances and much more including nutrition and running motivation.
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