6  Benefits and Monitoring

6.1 Pros

• Physiological: Delays the onset of acidosis, expands aerobic capacity, shifts lactate curve rightward.
• Performance: High sustainable training load potential, leading to consistent PBs across various distances (especially 5k-HM).
• Sustainability: Reduced injury risk and burnout compared to traditional high-intensity or VO2max-focused plans (assuming intensity is properly controlled).
• Practicality: Effective for time-crunched runners (5-9 hours/week often cited), repeatable and relatively simple structure.
• Demographics: Notably effective for masters athletes seeking continued improvement.

6.2 Cons

This approach requires discipline to control intensity, it can be monotonous for some people, it places less focus on top-end speed/VO2max (may need occasional strides/races), the adaptation takes time, and it may involve plateaus.

Around 8-9 hours per week, you might find that you’re running out of low-risk headroom with this approach. Running three easy runs per week for more than an hour each starts raising the injury risk, as does running more than 40-50 minutes or 10-12k for quality intervals. To spread out the risk, doubles might be a safer approach versus adding more time or distance to single runs.

6.3 Monitoring

Use regular (4-8 weeks) races or time trials (e.g., 5k) to gauge fitness and update training zones/paces. Track CTL to monitor load progression relative to your history. Listen to your body for signs of excessive fatigue or needing to adjust intensity down (RPE, motivation, recovery between sessions, sleep quality).

If training by power, executing regular critical power (CP) tests can be done in place of races. To get a valid CP representing your current fitness, testing in the 2-3 minute, 8-12 minute, and 20-40 minute domains is recommended. Common tests are the 3-min/12-min CP test and 20-min time trial. An increased CP over time is evidence of progress.