Enter one recent race and get your VDOT score, your five training paces, and your equivalent times at every distance. The same starting point Johnny uses with every new athlete.
Use a real, recent, all-out race effort. An honest 5K beats an optimistic marathon split.
| Zone | Per mile | Per km | What it's for |
|---|
What this fitness predicts at other distances, if you're trained for them. A 5K time predicts marathon fitness, not marathon readiness: the mileage still has to be there.
| Race | Predicted time | Pace per mile |
|---|
The easy range is the pace most runners get wrong, almost always by running it too fast. Live in it for about 80% of your weekly time. The threshold pace is your once-a-week "comfortably hard." And recalculate after every race: the number should move, that's the point. If a pace feels wrong on a given day, the day is right and the chart is wrong.
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A calculator gives everyone the same math. Johnny reads your training history, your recovery, and your week, then writes and rewrites the plan by hand. It starts with a free 20-minute call, no pressure.
Book a free intro callVDOT is a fitness score developed by coach Jack Daniels. It converts a recent race result into a single number that reflects your current running fitness, then derives your training paces from it: easy, marathon, threshold, interval and repetition. One honest race time gives you a full set of paces. The full explainer covers how a coach actually uses it.
The training paces are reliable if the race you enter was a genuine, recent, all-out effort. The equivalent race times assume you are trained for that distance: a 5K time predicts marathon fitness, not marathon readiness. You still need the mileage and the long runs before the marathon number is real.
After every race, or roughly every 4 to 6 weeks in a training block. Fitness moves, and paces should move with it. If your easy runs feel labored at the calculated pace, trust your body and back off: the number is a guardrail, not an order.