Runpops.UK is a website for endurance runners providing COACHING advice on training and running road races and XC.

 I am a qualified England Athletics Coach and a qualified Endurance Official. I have been running for over 30 years  and have run  over 90 marathons with a best time of 2:48. In 2016 I ran for Team V65 GB in the European Masters Half Marathon Championships in Portugal (finishing 14th in the heat). In 2017 and 2018 I ran for England in the Masters V65 category Marathon International in Chester finishing 3^rd. and 2nd respectively, winning the BMAF Gold Medal on both occasions.

I love running and I love coaching others to run to the best of their ability whatever their standard or aspirations are.

 Dave Pettifer

 “We run, not because we think it is doing us good, but because we enjoy it and cannot help ourselves…The more restricted our society and work become, the more necessary it will be to find some outlet for this craving for freedom. No one can say, ‘You must not run faster than this, or jump higher than that.’ The human spirit is indomitable.”

-Roger Bannister

One of the hardest parts about constructing a great training plan is trying to figure out how all the pieces of the puzzle fit together. For each week or training cycle, you have a myriad of possible workouts to choose from — threshold runs, VO2 max, speed work, hill repeats and slight variations of all of these training elements. It can seem daunting to understand how each type of workout fits into a plan and how it helps you take a step toward your goal of running faster on race day.

Running coaches will often give different advice to runners based on their own experience and understanding and possibly because they want to try something new with their athlete to see "what works". On this website I provide details of the basic ingredients that should go into any training plan and offer my own suggestions for the amount of each ingredient. I am happy to discuss what may be correct for you or not and welcome feedback.

I provide a list of my favourite running books covering training methods, sports science, how to run faster and your racing weight (with a link to check your optimum racing weight), plus a book about the man voted Britains Greatest Athlete you have probably never heard of. 

For the older athlete, of which I am one, the WAVA Age Grading System is a great way of comparing yourself to similar aged atheletes. I have provided 2 WAVA Age Grade Calculators, that explain what WAVA Age Grading is all about.