1

The FIRST 3Plus2 Training Program

Our running and coaching experiences prior to 2003 led us to the conclusion that many runners had goals, but that they did not have a defined pathway for achieving them. We regularly encountered runners who were frustrated in their futile attempts to get faster without any specific practical plan. Often, they assumed that they just needed to run more. Our motivation for founding the Furman Institute of Running & Scientific Training (FIRST) was to design a plan that non-elite runners could use to become healthier, to improve their running performance, to meet their challenging (but realistic) goals, and to avoid injuries. Further, we realized that most runners had a limited amount of time to train, so the training program had to fit into their way-too-busy lives.

Many runners have shared with us how the FIRST program came to their aid as they tried to find a path to meeting their goals and reaching their potential. No message captures that fulfillment and success better than the following email, received from Jo Linnane.

While I was sitting in my office in NYC, where I was an art director for a television show, a friend walked in and told me that she was running a 5K. I had been practicing karate for 20 years, but I was not a runner. The 5K promised a T-shirt and a beer at the end; I was in. I downloaded the “Couch to 5K” app. It took no time for the running bug to bite.

Soon I entered the NYC Marathon lottery and received one of the coveted spots. My goal, like that of many first-time marathoners, was to finish. With that goal accomplished, my dream running goal quickly changed. How could I get fast enough to qualify for Boston?

As a set designer and art director, I did not have a normal 9 to 5 schedule. I worked full time on a TV show and regularly designed 4 or 5 regional theater shows a year to satisfy my love of theater. That meant a lot of travel on top of a busy workweek. How could I fit marathon training into my busy professional endeavors?

After several marathons and lots of shorter races, I was getting faster. I targeted the Chicago Marathon for a Boston qualification. I trained very hard, using a five-days-a-week running plan. I approached the race with confidence, but crossed the finish line 6 minutes and 50 seconds short of qualification.

I pondered what I should do to reach my goal. I knew many people who ran even more miles than I did in a week. Should I? However, my body felt like it was in a perpetual bonk from training. I was either tired or injured. How could I tolerate even more?

A Facebook posting about my training and failed Boston attempt led another runner to tell me about a three-days-a-week training plan called FIRST. I wondered if actually running less might be the answer for me. It would fit with my busy professional life and maybe reduce my overall level of fatigue.

I decided to try the FIRST marathon training plan. I enjoyed the variety of the three demanding run workouts, and the recovery days provided relief from feeling perpetually pooped. Also, I avoided any serious running injuries while getting faster. I decided that the plan was a smarter way for me to train. The training fit well with my travel. I easily fit the cross-training part of the FIRST training plan into my daily routine by heading to the gym before work or on the rare early day riding my bike in.

During the marathon preparation, I became more attuned to how my body responds to training. The test for the new approach to training came in Indianapolis. I was ecstatic when I crossed the line with a 10-minute PR and a Boston qualification.

Thank you, Bill and Scott.

Jo W. Linnane

Ogden, Utah

The core principles of the FIRST 3Plus2 Training Program value quality over quantity, with individualized training goals for every run. Because many runners are not able—physically or logistically—to run more than three times per week, the FIRST Training Program, based on three quality runs per week, have many adopters and endorsers around the globe.

We have received thousands of messages from runners who followed the FIRST Training Program for 16 weeks exactly as it was intended with remarkable results. They comment that they are now “believers,” even though they were skeptical when they adopted the program. Usually, they add that their running friends told them that they would never improve while running less.

Our programs provide structure and specific paces tailored to each runner’s current fitness level. The program, described later in this chapter, is grounded in a sound philosophy and scientific principles. Is it for everyone? We don’t think that any single training program is for everyone. Each individual responds differently to training programs. History tells us that even elite runners have achieved their greatness with vastly different training methods. Is the FIRST Training Program the optimal way to train? We have never made that claim. What we have said is that it is an effective training program that works for many runners. The evidence of the program’s success was solidly proven by studies that collected and examined physiological data, but also, and perhaps more importantly, by the thousands of Boston qualifications and other racing successes that runners who follow the program have earned.

Runners ranging from 2:40 to 6-hour marathoners tell us that the FIRST Training Program was central to their achievements. Many of the runners who say that they found success with the FIRST program had been injured in the past by following programs that required running daily or almost daily, or focused on high mileage. The FIRST program provided them with a means to participate injury-free in the sport that they had come to believe they could no longer enjoy. A large number reported to us that they have busy professional lives that do not permit them to run more often than the three Key Run workouts (an essential part of the FIRST Training Program) and, furthermore, that they were able to achieve their goals—typically, a Boston qualification—following the FIRST Marathon Training Program. Numerous clubs around the country have written us to say that their club uses this program because the specific structure of the workouts makes it easy to provide each club member with an individualized goal for each workout. We have learned that runners are disciplined and dedicated; they like structure and accountability. The FIRST Training Programs are designed to give you a specific distance and pace for each workout, based on your current level of running fitness.

The FIRST Training Programs are designed to produce optimal results with limited running. We have compressed our collective knowledge, experience, and research into a training method that provides specific workouts, laid out in 12- and 16-week training schedules for races from 5Ks to marathons (see Tables 6.1–6.5 beginning on this page in Chapter 6). These efficient and effective training programs have been tested with runners of wide-ranging abilities. Along with the training schedules, we include answers to many of the most frequently asked questions that we have received from runners around the world.

This book is based on the FIRST training philosophy of Training with Purpose. The chapters provide the essentials for becoming fitter and faster. We realize that it is unlikely that anyone has time to devote to an extensive regimen of strength training, flexibility, and cross-training. That’s why we developed “The 7-Hour Workout Week,” shown in Chapter 16, “Putting It All Together with the 7-Hour Workout Week.” We offer a practical, detailed, and comprehensive training program that will keep you strong, flexible, and fit while not requiring much time. This basic program will enhance your running and contribute to keeping you a healthy, injury-free runner.

Likewise, we know that lengthy chapters on the complex topics of nutrition, environmental factors, and injuries can be more daunting than helpful. We offer simple nutritional guidelines and believe that you can become a healthy eater and a well-fueled runner by following our advice. Similarly, the information we share about training and environmental challenges is essential for coping with altitude, heat, cold, pollution, and other factors. Most importantly, we wish to help you stay healthy. All of our workouts and exercises are designed to help you avoid injury, while recognizing that running is a physical activity that requires repetitive movements of impact that contribute to overuse.

What Is the FIRST Philosophy?

 

At the heart of the FIRST philosophy is the belief that most runners do not train with purpose. When runners are asked to share their typical training week and the objective of each run, many are at a loss to explain why they do what they do. Not having a training plan that incorporates different distances, paces, and recoveries means that runners don’t reach their potential. Nor do they garner maximum benefits from their investment in training time. The FIRST program makes the run workouts clear and specific, limits overtraining and burnout, and substantially cuts the risk of injury, while producing faster race times. By focusing on efficient, purposeful training, FIRST enables runners to meet their goal of running faster without sacrificing their job, family, friends, or health.

The FIRST 3Plus2 Training Program and Its Components

 

Three quality runs each week, plus two cross-training workouts, are the foundation of the breakthrough FIRST approach. Functional strength training and stretching are also essential parts of FIRST Training Programs. The three runs—the track repeats, the tempo run, and the long run—are designed to work together to improve endurance, lactate threshold, running pace, and leg speed. For each run, FIRST prescribes specific paces and distances that are based on the runner’s current level of running fitness. The three quality runs, including prescribed paces and distances, are described in detail in Chapter 6.

Echoing our philosophy of Training with Purpose, having a specific goal for each training run is another of the program’s innovations. If you don’t know what you’re training toward, how can you possibly get there?

FIRST’s prescribed paces are usually reported by runners as being faster than their normal running speed. Generally, this is because our Training with Purpose philosophy favors quality over quantity, intensity over frequency, fast running over the accumulation of miles. If you want to race faster, you need to train faster. In addition to running less, what sets the FIRST program apart from other training programs is that it emphasizes a faster pace for the long runs than what other training programs typically recommend. In our studies, we’ve discovered that focusing on a designated, demanding pace for the long runs prepares runners physiologically and mentally for racing, particularly for the marathon. Studies in various sports show that competitive practices produce more focused competitors in games and competitions. The focus necessary to complete each FIRST Key Run workout makes runners stronger mentally in races.

The physiological value of this faster running is that it increases the muscles’ ability to metabolize lactate. Why is this important? An accumulation of too much lactate inhibits the aerobic energy available for muscular action. By training at a higher intensity, the muscle adapts to the increased energy demand by developing the ability to use lactate as an energy source, rather than having it accumulate in the muscles and blood.

The FIRST Training Program also builds in more recovery time between running workouts than typical running programs do. Without sufficient recovery, it is difficult to complete quality run workouts. Muscles need time to recover from the stress of hard workouts. Stressing specific muscle fibers repeatedly, day after day, in the same pattern causes accumulated fatigue. In other words, running six miles five days a week results in muscular fatigue, not muscular adaptation. However, using those same muscle fibers for a different type of activity will permit recovery and recharging of the muscle’s energy stores (glycogen). You can engage in another aerobic activity and reap the cardiorespiratory benefits while the muscle fibers used in running are recharging for the next hard running workout. Chapter 8 explains further the importance of rest and recovery.

Most other running programs ignore the benefits of cross-training in favor of running more miles. FIRST’s cross-training workouts not only enhance fitness but also add variety, which ultimately reduces vulnerability to overuse injuries. Plus, your training will be more interesting. Cross-training workouts at prescribed intensities increase blood flow around muscles, which in turn increases the muscle’s ability to utilize oxygen and fat as energy sources for exercise. Using fat as an energy source spares the limited stores of carbohydrates (glycogen). Therefore, cross-training provides the same benefit as the additional running miles of other typical running programs. In Chapter 7, the cross-training workouts that are an essential part of the 3Plus2 Training Program are described in detail.

Functional strength-training exercises for runners and stretches for the development and maintenance of good range of motion are shown in Chapters 14 and 15. To avoid injury while becoming a fit and fast runner, strength and flexibility are necessary. In Chapter 16, “Putting It All Together with the 7-Hour Workout Week,” we show how to incorporate exercises and stretches in as little as 10 to 20 minutes per day.

Where’s the Proof?

 

In 2003, when we established the Running Institute, we were convinced from our own experiences that these three running workouts, coupled with vigorous cross-training, would help runners improve both their race times and their overall health. We were eager to conduct training studies with a variety of runners to test our 3Plus2 Training Programs. We had designed the training programs to help runners train effectively, efficiently, and to avoid overtraining and injury. But could we prove that they were, in fact, doing all these things?

Exercise science studies that test the effectiveness of training regimens are typically conducted in laboratories where potentially confounding variables can be controlled. We stewed over how to design our studies. Many research studies use male college freshmen as subjects because professors have easy access to them. We wanted to test our programs on “real” runners—fast, slow, male, female, young, old, novices, or race veterans—performing their training without direct supervision. Our goal was to test a program that would enable us to generalize the results to the typical runner. That required our giving up control. We also wanted to find out if our program worked under the conditions that runners using our program would face—finding an accessible running track, having a measured running course for tempo and long runs, and being able to maintain a specific pace for a workout.

For three consecutive years, we conducted studies with 25 participants each, male and female participants from all over the country, ranging in ages from 23 to 63, who agreed to follow the FIRST Training Program for 16 weeks. Each study began with the participants being tested in the laboratory to assess their fitness. After following the 16-week training program, they returned for repeat testing. In addition to the laboratory assessments, in the latter two studies, the participants also ran a marathon. In all three studies, the runners showed significant improvement over the 16 weeks of training. All three variables critical to running performance—maximal oxygen consumption, running speed at lactate threshold, and running speed at peak oxygen consumption—improved by following a three-quality-runs-per-week training program. We now had data to support our personal experiences. And, most important to the runners themselves, each improved on at least one of the running performance variables. A summary of the studies’ results is reported later in this chapter.

The three-quality-runs-per-week training program enabled all the first-time marathoners to finish, very much satisfied with their performance times. More impressive were the personal best times recorded by more than 70 percent of the veteran marathoners. Running only three days a week, coupled with two cross-training workouts each week, enabled even veteran marathoners, who were accustomed to running five or six days a week, to improve their physiological profiles from the laboratory assessment, as well as improving their marathon performances.

Although the studies supplied strong proof that the training programs were effective and led us to write Run Less Run Faster, we believe that the evidence provided by the many successes reported over the past 15 years is even stronger proof that the FIRST training approach is effective. Having runners follow the program on their own, rather than having us monitor their workouts and provide them with feedback, is a strong endorsement that the program can be used by runners without direct coaching. Receiving reports from runners who describe how they followed the program, as laid out in the book, and subsequently ran a personal best time or achieved a Boston qualifying time indicates that the programs not only have the key elements needed to get fitter and faster, but that runners are able to self-coach with the training programs in the book. Further evidence for the effectiveness of the FIRST Training Programs is that those reporting success represent a wide range of abilities, ages, experience, both female and male, from six continents.

Training with Purpose means having workouts designed to specifically target the determinants of running performance. These studies and the countless success stories indicate that our 3Plus2 Training Programs are not an empty promise. Runners tend to have more confidence in methods that other runners have used successfully. The FIRST Training Programs also provide the structure and accountability that runners like by specifying both distance and pace for each workout, so there is a clear measure of performance for each training run. Running six miles is one thing; running six miles only 30 seconds slower than 10K pace is quite another.

Can All Runners Benefit from the FIRST Training Programs?

 

Our research studies say yes for age-group runners; however, we have not tested it with national and world-class runners. These training programs were designed for regular runners aspiring to improve their running. The FIRST Training Programs have been used to improve running performances by five-hour marathoners and sub–three-hour marathoners, by runners preparing for their first 5K or marathon, and by beginning runners in their early 20s as well as veterans in their 70s and 80s. In addition, the 3Plus2 Training Programs are extremely flexible and can be adjusted to fit the needs of all types of runners, from those who have limited time to train, to those who make training a major focus in their lives.

Results of the Three Studies

Pre- and post-training, three variables were compared to determine the effects of the 16-week training program: (1) VO₂ max (maximal oxygen intake), (2) running speed at lactate threshold, and (3) running speed at peak VO₂. The results are displayed in the summary table (Table 1.1). You can see that, as a group in all three studies, the runners showed improvement over the 16 weeks of training on all three variables related to running performance, all statistically significant. Individually, all runners improved on at least one of the running performance variables.

TABLE 1.1 Summary of Results from Three FIRST Studies (Runners in the 2003 study did not run a marathon at the end of the study. They were assessed only in the lab.)
	2003	2004	2005
Females	7	10	8
Males	15	12	9
Ages (years)	23–63	25–56	24–52
Average Age (years)	F = 41.7 M = 40.1	F = 34.8 M = 36.7	F = 35.0 M = 35.4
% Improvement of VO2 max	4.8	4.2	5.4
% Improvement of Running Speed at Lactate Threshold	4.4	2.3	5.6
% Improvement of Running Speed at Peak VO2	7.9	2.4	2.1
Range of Marathon Finish Times for Females		3:56–4:44	3:41–4:49
Average Marathon Finish Times for Females		Median = 4:17:02 Mean = 4:20:42	Median = 3:56:18 Mean = 4:02:22
Range of Marathon Finish Times for Males		2:56–4:51	2:27–4:19
Average Marathon Finish Times for Males		Median = 3:46:19 Mean = 3:49:23	Median = 3:42:51 Mean = 3:35:24
Number of First-Time Marathon Finishers		8 (3F, 5M)	3 (2M, 1F)
Average Time of First-Time Marathoners		F(3) = 4:03:07 M(5) = 3:48:49	F(1) = 4:03:34 M(2) = 3:46:22
Number of Personal Best Times (for those who had run a marathon previously)		7 of 13 (53.8%)	12 of 14 (85.7%)

REAL RUNNER REPORT

Dear Bill and all at Furman,

I have emailed you over the years in praise of your marathon plans, so I hope that you will indulge me another, slightly longer email.

In 2014, at the age of 50, I ran 3:09 at the Nottingham Marathon, after following your Run Less Run Faster plan. I was delighted with this run, with a negative split and my best marathon time for 5 years (all my marathons have been via your plan). Some of my running companions said that with higher running mileage, I would be able to run under 3 hours, even at the age of 50. Unfortunately, I succumbed to their suggestions. I gradually began replacing my cycling workouts with running workouts to increase my running mileage over the winter of 2014–15. I developed terrible pain in my left hip. I continued training but, during a 10-mile run, the pain was so bad that I had to walk the final 4 miles. The next morning I could hardly get out of bed. I took a few days off and tried again, with the same result. And this became the pattern of my running until I could stand it no longer. I went to see my doctor, who diagnosed trochanteric bursitis. I was prescribed some strong NSAIDs, but stopped taking them after a few days as I did not like the side effects.

I decided to stop running altogether and took 4 months off and picked up with cycling again—a sport that I have done since my teens. In the summer of 2015, with no more hip pain, I started a run/walk programme to see if I could get back into running. I found that I could run 10–15 miles a week, but any more would cause pain in my left hip. Oh well, I thought, such is the state of the aging runner.

This is where your Train Smart, Run Forever comes in. I read a review of the book in Runner’s World and ordered my own copy, which I read from cover to cover. Some of the runners’ anecdotes matched my own experiences. So I started following your 7-hour workout week. I realised that what had been missing from my running was properly structured strength training. Gradually, I found that I was able to increase my running mileage and felt stronger and faster than I had done since my hip injury. I ran a hilly 10K in 42:04, took care to recover and had no pain. I decided to follow the 10K plan from your original Run Less Run Faster, replacing the KW1 with the Tuesday run from TSRF. I ran the Boxing Day 10K in 41:04, a full minute quicker in only 2 months. Again, I took care to recover properly. I decided to follow the full RLRF 10K plan, including the KW1 track repeats—but I kept to the structure of the 7-hour workout week.

Last week, I competed in the Northumberland Coastal Trail Race. This race is 6.5 miles along coastal trails and beaches, with plenty of hills. I have to tell you that, thanks to your plan, I won this race outright in 44:41. There were 200 competitors; and maybe the quality of the field was not up there; and I have always been strong over cross-country.

But I have to say thank you, thank you, thank you for your running plans. I had reached the stage of retiring from running altogether, but now, in my 55th year, I know that your plans will help me to keep running forever.

Jonathan Fish

Head Teacher

Lancaster, United Kingdom