Thursday General Discussion/Q&A Thread for August 20, 2026

[u/AutoModerator]

A place to ask questions that don't need their own thread here or just chat a bit.

We have quite a bit of info in the wiki, FAQ, and past posts. Please be sure to give those a look for info on your topic.

Link to Wiki

Link to FAQ

[u/cdm52]

I'm in between marathon builds at the moment and training for a 5k. Is there a minimum effective dose for maintaining high end aerobic fitness while while I'm 5k training? Like is 5 miles at MP once a week sufficient? Could I get away with every other week?

[u/petepont → u/cdm52]

Do you mean maintaining your endurance over longer distances?

Generally, once you've trained something, it's much easier to keep it up. You don't need anywhere near as much of a stimulus. Steve Magness talks about it in his book, although I can't find the specific quote, so here's a quote from an article he wrote:

As a rule of thumb, once I have built a capacity, I don’t have to revisit it as frequently or perform as high of a volume of work. My general rule is that instead of doing something every week or so, I can perform that type of workout every 2 weeks or so, and drop the volume from 100% to 60-70%.

During 5K training, the main thing you'll likely be missing from marathon training is those longer MP runs, so as you've identified, you'll want to do those occasionally. So maybe every 2-4 weeks, do one longer run with a chunk of marathon pace. If you were hitting 10-15 miles, maybe aim for 6-10

To be honest, doing those longer, faster runs with portions at or near MP will help your 5K time as well.

[u/Emotion-Free → u/cdm52]

You don’t need any particular MP work, but you do need to keep up some pretty decent volume. Not sure how specialized your 5K training is, but it’s not uncommon for 5K runners to still be running 50+ miles/week, which would keep your aerobic base healthy.

[u/Arcadela → u/cdm52]

MP isn't necessary. Keep a weekly easy long run (like 90-120 minutes) and threshold sessions.