You (Only Faster): McMillan’s Training System

Why study training

Jim Rohn’s idea applies here: if you want results, study the craft — don’t leave it to chance. I spend hundreds of hours per year training. Treating that as “just go run” is laziness with a Garmin.

So I’m doing the obvious thing I avoided for years: studying training systematically. Right now that means two books in parallel — Jack Daniels’ Running Formula and Greg McMillan’s You (Only Faster). This post covers McMillan.

The core problem McMillan attacks

Running is simple. Training looks complicated because there are too many plans and too many confident opinions.

McMillan’s starting point is blunt: distance running is not one-size-fits-all. The “right plan” depends on individual traits:

experience and injury risk
response to different workouts
recovery speed
adaptation rate (how quickly you get fit from a given stimulus)
time and life constraints

Generic plans can work “to a point”, but they fail whenever your body doesn’t match the plan’s assumptions.

Personal Running Evaluation (PRE)

PRE is McMillan’s tool to stop blindly following a plan and start running the plan. It’s three questions that force real self-knowledge:

How do I respond to training?
How do I recover from training and racing?
How do I adapt to different types of training?

This is not motivational fluff. It’s a debugging model. If a workout keeps going badly, PRE asks: is it because it’s a weak zone for you, because your recovery is too slow for the schedule, or because you need a different distribution/timing of that stimulus?

Response: types, strengths, weaknesses

McMillan uses a coarse but useful classification:

Speedster
Endurance Monster
Combo Runner (with a speed or endurance bias)

The point is not the label. The point is operational: which workouts are ST (strength) and which are WK (weakness). Then you mark your plan accordingly.

Recovery: recovery rate trumps the calendar

This is the line I underlined twice.

Most runners schedule training based on the week layout (“Tuesday speed, Thursday tempo”). McMillan’s argument:

different workouts produce different recovery costs
different runners recover at different rates
and those rates change over time

So you classify workouts in your own history as quick recovery or long recovery. Then you space hard work based on your actual recovery, not the template’s calendar.

His example of a runner whose tempo sessions became inconsistent after age 45 — not because tempo suddenly became a weakness, but because speedwork recovery slowed — is a clean illustration: the calendar stayed the same, biology changed.

Adaptation: fast vs slow adapting zones

McMillan separates two often-confused things:

adaptation rate: how quickly you get a noticeable fitness boost from a zone
adaptation extent: how much improvement is available in that zone before returns flatten

Operationally:

some zones “click” after only a few sessions (fast adapting)
others need more exposures and earlier placement in the cycle (slow adapting)

This directly supports planning: slow-adapting work tends to be scheduled earlier and repeated more; fast-adapting work is used more sparingly and placed closer to race day.

This is how you stop peaking at the wrong time: you stop treating all workouts as interchangeable “hard days”.

ST/WK labeling: fixing the plan

A practical exercise I’m stealing:

Print the plan.
Mark each specialized workout as ST or WK.
Then look for failure patterns: too many WK workouts in a row, WK workouts too close to the race, or “WK + high mileage” stacking at the wrong time.

McMillan’s examples show the same template plan becoming two different plans with a few surgical changes: omit a WK element when it clusters badly, swap an end-of-plan confidence-killer for an earlier workout that fits the runner, adjust the final week so it supports the race, not ego.

This is coaching logic, not plan worship.

Training Phases, Zones, and Workouts

I’m keeping these together on purpose. Phases (sequence), zones (physiology), and workouts (execution) are one system. Splitting them would be like separating TCP from congestion control: possible, but it breaks the mental model.

Training phases: why they exist

The core idea is simple:

“Do the training so you can do the training.”

Race-specific work is potent but expensive. Phases exist to make you capable of absorbing that cost without getting injured or burned out.

McMillan’s phase taxonomy:

1) Basic fitness phases (preparation)

Injury Resistance — Non-running work: strength, mobility, tissue capacity (tendons/ligaments/bones), general robustness.
New Runner — Introductory structure: learning effort/pace, form cues, gentle quality.
Mileage Base — Building weekly volume toward a personal “sweet spot.”
Workout Base (Lydiard vibe) — Aerobic work plus foundational quality: leg speed, aerobic threshold/steady-state, long runs.
Prep – Hills — Conditioning the legs and tissues for the stress of faster running.
Prep – Speed (Rosa vibe) — Developing speed before entering a stamina-heavy block (e.g., marathon training).
Prep – Stamina — Developing stamina before a speed-oriented block (e.g., 5K/10K).

2) Race-specific phase

Typically the final 5–8 weeks. The goal is to train the specific demands and limitations of the target race.

3) Peak phase

Last 1–2 weeks. Balancing freshness with a small amount of sharpening. Too much = fatigue. Too little = flatness.

For me, the non-negotiable insight is this: phases are not a moral requirement. They’re a readiness ladder. If I’m not ready for the next rung, the calendar doesn’t get a vote.

Mileage: sweet spot, not ego

McMillan’s mileage take is refreshingly non-dogmatic.

Most coaches classify runners by weekly mileage. McMillan argues days/week and time-on-feet often matter more than raw distance, because mileage is a function of pace.

He also emphasizes the idea of a sweet spot: enough volume to drive adaptation, not so much that injury risk and fatigue accumulate. And critically: your sweet spot is not static. It shifts with experience (often up), age (often down), and life stress (high stress → lower sustainable mileage).

This framing replaces moralizing (“run more”) with engineering (“what load can I sustain repeatedly without breaking?”).

Race pace relativity

This is one of the most practical concepts in the book.

If a plan says 5 × 1 mile at 5K pace:

A 15:00 5K runner does ~24 minutes of hard running total.
A 30:00 5K runner does ~50 minutes of hard running total.

Same written workout. Completely different physiological load.

A better prescription is time-based, e.g.: 5 × 5 minutes at 15-minute race pace with 2 minutes easy. Now the training stimulus is comparable across abilities.

The four training zones

McMillan maps training intensity into four zones, defined by time-based race pace:

Endurance — easy aerobic work; low lactate; conversational effort.
Stamina — threshold territory; “comfortably hard”; lactate/ventilation thresholds live here.
Speed — VO2max-focused work; high stress; limited frequency.
Sprint — neuromuscular + lactic tolerance; short, controlled, high quality.

He uses six variables to define them: effort, ventilation (breathing), pace, heart rate, VO2, and lactate. In real training you mainly control effort + breathing + pace, with HR as a secondary check.

No Man’s Land

Endurance and Stamina do not touch. The gap is the classic “gray zone”: effort rises, fatigue cost rises, but the adaptation is not proportional.

In practice: if your “easy” drifts too fast for too long, you live in this middle zone and recovery starts to fail over weeks.

My translation: if I’m “easy-running” with clearly elevated breathing/HR, I’m leaking into no man’s land and paying for it later.

Workouts per zone

Endurance zone workouts

McMillan splits Endurance work into three distinct intentions:

Recovery runs (recovery jogs): very easy; purely to promote blood flow and tissue recovery. Typical duration: 15–45 minutes.
Long runs: time-on-feet; durability and aerobic depth; steady effort, no hero pace. Typical duration: ~90–240 minutes.
Easy runs: the bulk of training; build/maintain aerobic base and running economy.

Stamina zone workouts

McMillan divides Stamina into three sub-zones based on proximity to lactate threshold:

Below threshold (1:15:00–2:15:00 race pace, HR 83–87%):

Steady-state runs: 25–90 minutes continuous at medium effort. The underused workhorse — not as sexy as tempo, but extremely effective. This is roughly Garmin’s green zone.

At threshold (40:00–75:00 race pace, HR 85–90%):

Tempo runs: 15–40 minutes continuous at “comfortably hard” effort. Rhythm and control. Speedsters should keep these shorter (15–25 min); Endurance Monsters can go longer (30–40 min).

Above threshold (25:00–60:00 race pace):

Tempo intervals: longer repeats (6–15 min) with longer recovery (2–5 min jog). Like tempo runs broken into chunks.
Cruise intervals: shorter repeats (3–8 min) with shorter recovery (30s–2 min). Popularized by Daniels. The trap: running them too fast and turning Stamina work into Speed stress.

The challenge with all Stamina workouts: keep from running too fast. Better to go longer at a given pace than faster. These are moderate efforts — running faster just shortens time in the correct zone.

Speed zone workouts

VO2max intervals: repeats 1–6 minutes; goal is 10–30 minutes total time at VO2max; recovery jog roughly ½ to 1× the repeat duration.

Key warning: VO2max intervals are among the most stressful workouts for the musculoskeletal system. “More” is rarely better here.

Sprint zone workouts

McMillan splits Sprint into two distinct goals:

Lactic acid tolerance intervals: repeats 30–70 seconds; recovery long (often 2–5× repeat time); flood the system, clear it, repeat.
Neuromuscular (leg speed) strides: repeats 10–30 seconds; recovery 30–90 seconds; coordination, relaxed speed, clean mechanics. These should not become “heavy breathing” workouts.

Why this classification matters (personal)

This solved a problem I kept creating for myself: I was running “Speed” workouts at repeat-level pace and repeat-level pain, with Speed-style recovery.

Result: race-like stress, multi-day fatigue, HRV down, cycle dead.

The fix is embarrassingly simple: if the goal is Speed, I respect Speed constraints. If the goal is Sprint, I keep it neuromuscular-clean. If the goal is Stamina, I don’t drift into Speed.

The McMillan Running Calculator

The Calculator is McMillan’s tool for translating a recent race result into (a) equivalent race predictions at other distances and (b) precise training paces for each zone and workout type.

How it works (theory)

Unlike Daniels’ VDOT (which is VO2max-driven), McMillan’s calculator uses lactate threshold pace as the primary physiological parameter. His argument: lactate threshold has been shown to be the most important determinant of distance running performance.

The other key difference: most prediction models (Purdy’s RunningTrax, Daniels’ Oxygen Power) fit all data to one equation applied across all distances. McMillan uses proximity weighting — your half-marathon time is a much stronger predictor of marathon time than your 800m time. This creates more accurate predictions for the specific distance you care about.

The calculator provides pace ranges (not single targets) for every workout type. The range accounts for day-to-day variation: if you feel “on,” run near the fast end; if sluggish, stay near the slow end. As long as you’re in the range, you’re training optimally.

McMillan also provides Speedster vs Endurance Monster toggles — slightly different pace ranges for speed/sprint work depending on your runner type.

Coach’s notes from the book:

Re-calculate paces every 3–8 weeks as fitness improves.
If you’re easily running faster than the fast end of the range on all runs, update your race time by 1–2%.
Some athletes are “fast trainers” (always at the fast end), others are “slow trainers” (always at the slow end). Neither is better — they’re just different.

Pace ranges are useful — and still not sufficient

One thing I initially disliked: McMillan often sounds like “stay in the pace range and adaptations will come.”

That is directionally true, but incomplete for runners like me: I can turn “easy” into no man’s land for weeks without noticing — until HRV drops, resting HR rises, and the whole cycle collapses.

From my McMillan calculator sheet (based on ~21:48 5K), the Endurance paces are:

Recovery jog: 5:43–6:09 /km
Long run: 5:04–5:52 /km
Easy run: 5:00–5:39 /km

If I execute “easy” with bad discipline — e.g., drifting to ~160 bpm because Garmin still shows a friendly green zone — I’m no longer doing Endurance. I’m farming fatigue.

So the rule I’m adopting is blunt:

Pace is the target. HR + breathing are the governor.

McMillan himself gives HR guidance inside Endurance work (e.g., recovery runs kept very low). The book isn’t anti-HR — it’s just pace-first. For my physiology, pace-first without governors becomes self-harm disguised as training.

Practical rules that actually work:

If pace says “easy” but breathing isn’t calm / HR drifts up early → slow down.
If I’m stacking stress (work, sleep debt) → treat the same pace as a harder zone.
If I do a hard Speed session → I do not add a Stamina session the same week “because the plan says so.”

The Finer Points

This section covers the operational details that make or break a training cycle: how to adjust when life interferes, how to peak properly, and how to reality-check your goals.

Seven lessons for adjusting your plan

McMillan’s core message: you designed the perfect plan, now get ready to change it. Weather, illness, work, life — something will interfere. The question is how to adjust without destroying the cycle.

Lesson #1: Respect the rhythm of your schedule

“Rhythm” = the flow of stress and rest across the week. When you move workouts around, don’t compress the stress. If tempo was Thursday and long run Saturday, moving tempo to Friday means back-to-back stress days. Better to skip one workout than to stack them.

McMillan’s bottom line: err on the side of more rest rather than compressing stress.

Lesson #2: Don’t sacrifice recovery after a race

A race is the most stressful training you do. Add EXTRA recovery after — not just the normal post-workout rest. If you normally do a workout Tuesday but raced Sunday, move it to Wednesday or Thursday.

(My note: I expected longer recovery — he’s saying 3–4 days and then back to normal training. This is more aggressive than I assumed.)

Lesson #3: Maintain your long run

Over the course of your running career, the long run is the single most important workout for developing endurance. When adjusting your week, protect the long run first. Skip speed work before you skip the long run — even if it means moving the long run to midweek.

(My note: This is a gap in my training. I’ve always done very few long runs — off-season I rarely hit 10km. For 5K training this felt optional. Maybe it’s not.)

Lesson #4: Maintain your frequency

Keep the number of running days per week constant, even if you have to skip key workouts. The body likes routine. Even a short jog on a “missed” day keeps the rhythm intact.

Lesson #5: Err conservative — don’t squeeze in workouts

“Squeezing in” = forcing a missed workout into a slot where it doesn’t fit (e.g., doing Thursday’s tempo on Friday before Saturday’s long run). This rarely works. Better to skip the workout and maintain frequency with an easy run.

Lesson #6: Sacrifice anything to get to the line healthy

Being the fittest spectator sucks. When adjusting, never increase injury risk. Compressing stressful days is the usual culprit. One workout or race doesn’t make or break a cycle — but one injury can.

Lesson #7: Never try to make up a botched workout

If a workout falls apart mid-session, don’t repeat it later that day or the next day. There was a reason it failed — usually insufficient recovery. Move on. The next workout will likely be exceptional.

Tune-up races and training modules

McMillan covers how to insert tune-up races into a plan (adjust workouts before/after, respect recovery, use the race as a stamina stimulus) and how to extend a 12-week plan using modular blocks (Mileage Base, Workout Base, Prep-Hills, Prep-Speed, Prep-Stamina).

These are useful for plan construction but not core theory. The key concept: modules can be stacked to build out a longer cycle, and the order matters (e.g., Mileage Base → Hills → race-specific). Adjust based on your PRE profile.

The fine art of peaking

McMillan explicitly rejects the word “tapering” — he calls it “peaking.” His argument: traditional tapering (large volume reduction + intensity increase over 2–3 weeks) is hit-or-miss. Peaking is more precise.

Secret #1: Don’t change your weekly running routine

If you run 4 days/week, keep running 4 days/week. Reducing frequency makes you feel flat.

Secret #2: Reduce volume, but not too much

Two weeks out: reduce daily volume by 10–20 minutes. Race week: reduce by 20–30 minutes. Combined with naturally shorter long runs, this drops total volume enough to freshen up — but not so much that you go stale.

McMillan’s opinion: more runners fail from tapering too much than too little.

Secret #3: Keep the engine revved

Reduce volume, but do NOT reduce intensity. Some fast running in the peaking phase brings body and mind to peak condition. Don’t race workouts, but don’t back off either.

Secret #4–6: Mental game

Plan your race strategy and stick with it. Reflect on tough workouts where you gutted it out (builds toughness belief). Reflect on your best workouts (builds confidence). Have fun — you’re not going for Olympic gold.

(My note: This confirms my experience. When I did traditional tapers — cutting volume hard — form collapsed. The body went flat. The key seems to be: reduce volume modestly, keep intensity, maintain routine. Don’t overthink it.)

Can I achieve my goal?

McMillan’s research on improvement rates:

New runners: 3–10% improvement per year until experience catches up.

Switching to a new distance that matches your strength: 2–7% improvement for first 2–3 years, then plateau.

Switching to a new distance that doesn’t match your strength: 0–4% improvement for 1–2 years, then plateau. Depends on how “extreme” your type is — pure Speedsters struggle at long distances no matter how much stamina work they do; Combo types can overcome weaknesses with smart training.

Older runners new to sport: can improve like younger runners, but may plateau faster.

Older runners with years of experience: unlikely to see significant improvement; better to create age-graded PRs and focus on slowing decline.

(My note: I’ve been running 5K for 3 years and assumed I hit plateau. But then I did one proper McMillan cycle — Feb to May 2024 — and dropped from 23:27 to 22:03. That’s 1.5 minutes off my PR in one cycle, after a 3-month winter break. So it’s not a distance plateau. It’s that most of my training cycles were broken — overtraining, wrong paces, no structure. The one good cycle produced massive gains. This reframes the question: I don’t need to escape to 10K. I need to execute another clean cycle on 5K and see what’s actually possible.)

The off-season question

One thing McMillan doesn’t address directly: winter breaks.

My pattern: 3 months off-season with minimal running (3× per week, ~5km, no intensity). A friend argues this kills continuity — he trains year-round and says the rebuild time I spend could be progress time instead.

Open question: am I protecting myself from injury and burnout by letting the body rest? Or am I wasting months every year rebuilding instead of building? No clear answer yet. Worth tracking.

Specialty workouts

McMillan describes four types of specialty workouts that sit outside the standard zone-based training: predictor workouts, goal pace workouts, hill workouts, and combo workouts.

Predictor workouts

Predictor workouts test whether your goal time is realistic. For 5K:

5K Predictor: 2 × 1.5 miles at goal pace, 400–600m recovery jog between.

Do this 10–14 days before the race. If you can hold goal pace for both reps, you’re fit enough. If you can’t maintain pace, adjust expectations.

(There are also predictor workouts for 10K, half-marathon, and marathon, but I’m focused on 5K for now.)

Goal pace workouts

These are workouts at your exact goal race pace — not zone-based, but pace-specific. The purpose is to “groove” the pace so your neuromuscular system knows it cold before race day.

McMillan inserts these progressively through a training cycle: shorter goal-pace reps early, longer and more challenging ones later. By the 5th goal pace workout, the pace should feel automatic.

Important: these are strong stressors. They replace another quality workout in the week — they’re not added on top. And you need a solid fitness base before attempting them; beginners should just train for fitness first.

Hill workouts

McMillan considers hills one of the best training tools: cardiorespiratory stimulus, lactic acid buffering, leg strength, leg turnover practice — all with less pounding than flat speedwork.

Types of hills:

Long hills: gradual slope, ~2–3 minutes, medium-hard effort (~30:00 race effort). 4–8 reps. Jog down to recover.
Medium hills: moderate slope, 45–60 seconds, hard effort (~15:00 race effort). 8–12 reps.
Steep hills: steep slope, 10–30 seconds, very hard effort (~5:00 race pace). Full muscle fiber recruitment.
Hill circuits: Lydiard-style — run up strongly, recover at top, do strides, run down strongly, recover at bottom, strides again.
Long hill climbs: 30–60+ minutes of continuous climbing (if you have access to mountains).
Hilly runs: just run hilly routes and attack the ups/downs.

No hills? Use a treadmill with incline, or parking garages/bridges.

(My note: My local hill is ~45 seconds, which makes it a Medium Hill. When McMillan’s plans say “hills 6-8 reps” without specification, medium hills are typically the default. The progression in his 5K plans — 6-8 → 8-10 → 10-12 reps — is about building volume on that hill type, not switching between types.)

Combo workouts

Combo workouts cross multiple training zones in one session. Useful because races do the same — you don’t stay in one zone from start to finish.

Types:

Progression runs: continuous run that moves from Endurance to Stamina or Speed over the course of the run. Fast finish long runs are the marathon version.
Alternating combos: bounce between zones within one workout (e.g., 10 min Stamina → 4×1 min Speed → 10 min Stamina → 4×1 min Speed).
Cut-downs: like progression runs but with rest intervals between reps. Each rep gets shorter and faster (e.g., 1 mile at Stamina slow end → 1200m Stamina fast end → 800m Speed slow end → 400m Speed fast end or Sprint slow end).

These add variety and race-specific stress. Use them sparingly and adjust based on how taxing they feel.

The 10 Rules of Running

These are the fundamentals — lessons distilled from 100 years of coaches and athletes experimenting (sometimes with crazy ideas like 300 miles/week or daily speedwork). McMillan recommends re-reading these before every training cycle.

Rule #1: Obey your stress/rest cycle

Optimal Stress + Optimal Rest = Optimal Progress.

Every training stress must be followed by appropriate rest. Too many runners focus only on the stress side (workouts, mileage, races) and ignore the rest side (days off, easy running, sleep, nutrition). The greater the training stress, the more rest required.

This is why we labeled workouts as “quick recovery” or “long recovery” in PRE — to ensure enough recovery after each session type.

Rule #2: Beware the Rule of Too’s

Push too hard, too soon, or too often → injury and overtraining.

Running adaptation is gradual (weeks, months, years). The musculoskeletal system especially needs time. Don’t crash train. The right training level is usually a bit less than what you could do.

“Running isn’t always about what you can do but more often about what you should do.”

Rule #3: Endurance is paramount

McMillan’s Pyramid of Performance: basic fitness (endurance + stamina) forms the base; speed fitness sits on top.

Over a running career, the greatest improvement comes from expanding the base. Speed can improve, but only a relatively small amount. Endurance and stamina can improve massively over years.

Example: Brett Gotcher ran 4:33 mile as a high school freshman. By graduation from Stanford, he could run that pace for a full 5K (14:04). Later, he could hold his high school 5K pace for a full marathon.

Build the base larger → stack speed on top → faster races.

Rule #4: Learning effort (calibrating your inner GPS)

Pace and heart rate are tools to learn effort, not replace it. The goal is to calibrate your internal sense of effort across all training zones.

Why it matters: when conditions change (weather, terrain, fatigue, “one of those days”), you can adjust based on feel and still deliver your best performance.

Stamina zone is especially good for this — the ventilatory and lactate thresholds are physically noticeable. You feel when you’ve crossed them.

Rule #5: Become a complete runner

A complete runner isn’t just someone who does varied workouts. It means building overall athleticism: core, strength, mobility, balance, and injury-prevention exercises.

How much ancillary work you need depends on inherited athletic ability and history. Some runners are naturally robust and need minimal extra work. Others need a lot more to stay healthy and run faster.

Rule #6: The body and mind like variety

Include workouts from all four zones. Varied stress → faster adaptation.

Example: if you need to build stamina, don’t just do tempo runs for 6 weeks. Rotate through tempo runs, cruise intervals, tempo intervals, steady-state runs. Same zone, different stimuli. More effective and more fun.

Rule #7: Basic fitness vs race-specific fitness

Two types of training across the year:

Basic fitness (60–70% of year): consistent mileage, long runs, endurance/stamina focus with sprinklings of speed/sprint.
Race-specific fitness (30–40% of year): workouts targeted at your goal race demands.

As you get more experienced, the race-specific phase can shorten — you know how long it takes to peak, and shorter phases reduce injury risk and burnout.

You can still race well on basic fitness. One strategy: do basic training until race performances plateau, then shift to race-specific work.

Rule #8: Find your sweet spot

Sweet spot applies to both volume and intensity.

You’ve hit it when: consistently good workouts, positive races, training feels challenging but sustainable.

Signs you’re outside it: struggling workout after workout, failing races. Fix: reduce volume 10–20%, reduce intensity 10–20%.

The challenge: your sweet spot constantly moves. Life stress lowers it. Low stress raises it. Experience shifts it. You must keep evaluating.

It’s okay to push outside your sweet spot occasionally to find your limits — just accept some bad workouts/races and raise injury-prevention focus during those periods.

Rule #9: Design for success

Set up your training so workouts have the best chance of success. This doesn’t mean easy — it means using PRE to avoid failure patterns.

Strengths mostly, weaknesses sparingly. No weakness workouts during high-stress life periods. Adjust on the fly. Never hurt momentum, motivation, or confidence.

Positive workout → confidence → more positive workouts → motivation wave → breakthrough.

Rule #10: Respect that you change

You’re not a robot. You change from cycle to cycle.

Positive: benefits accumulate across seasons, you can handle more volume/intensity over time, experience teaches you what works.

Negative: life happens — injury, illness, family, work. You won’t always train the way you want. Accept it and design around current reality.

Training is not a straight upward line. It’s an upward sine wave — periods of rapid ascent, periods where improvement stalls or reverses. This is normal.

(My note: “Respect that you change” is the rule I’ve violated most. I kept expecting linear progress and got frustrated when cycles crashed. The sine wave framing is more honest — and more useful.)

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You (Only Faster): McMillan's Training System