5K Finishing Kick Workouts
By Rick Morris
The 5K is raced at pace that is well above your lactate threshold and just below your vVO2 max pace. That rather blistering pace makes accelerating to a sprint pace for your finishing kick a difficult proposition. Can you improve your ability to generate a strong finishing kick in a 5K race. You bet you can, but like everything else, practice makes perfect. You need to practice your 5K finishing kick to perfect it. Here are a sample of some 5K finishing kick workouts that are great for improving your 5K finishing kick. Be sure to warm up before attempting these workouts.
6 x 700/100 Meter Compound Sets with Fast Finish
This is a classic 5K track workout that includes a fast finishing kick. After your warm up, run 700 meters at 5K pace then speed up to sprint pace for 100 meters with no recovery. Repeat this 5 more times with 2 minutes of rest between each compound set. After your final compound set run 400 meters at fast as you can with no recovery.
5K Race Simulator
Here is a workout that will simulate 5K race conditions. Warm up and then run 5K at 10K race pace. Then, with no recovery run 1600 meters at 5K pace followed by 400 meters at sprint pace. Take no recovery during this workout.
12 x 300/100 Meter Compound Sets
This is a difficult 5K finishing kick workout that will challenge your ability to sprint when fatigued. Complete a full warm up and then run 12 x 400 meter repeats. Run the first 300 meters of each repeat at 5K pace and the final 100 meters at full sprint pace. Recover between each repeat with one minute of rest.
5K Progressive Run
You’ve probably done progressive runs before, but this one is just a bit different. Run 5000 meters at a progressively faster pace. Run the first 1000 meters at an easy pace, the second 1000 meters at tempo pace, the third 1000 meters at 10K pace, the fourth 1000 meters at 5K pace and the final 1000 meters as fast as possible.
2 x 2500 Meter Repeats with Fast Finish
This is a very challenging but effective workout for improving your 5K finishing kick.
Warm up and then run 2500 meters. Run the first 2000 meters at 5K pace and then speed up to sprint pace for the final 500 meters. Rest for 2 minutes and then repeat.
