When it comes to running, I’ve gotten injuries before because I have increased my mileage too fast. They say you should increase the distance and intensity no more than 10% a week. Right now, I’m at around 5 Kilometers per Week and I want to run a 16k (10 miles) race in May.

I’m terrible at math. Is that enough time?

Prompt: I’m running a race on the 18 of may. I’m only supposed to add 10% of distance every week of training. If I’m starting training in the first week of January with 5 Kilometers and add 10 Percent of distance every week, how much can I run on the 18 of may?

Answer:

By the 18th of May, after starting your training in the first week of January and increasing your running distance by 10% each week, you will be able to run approximately 30.58 kilometers. This calculation assumes you start with a distance of 5 kilometers in the first week.

ChatGPT

Prompt: Cool, the race is 16 Kilometers, so that should be plenty. How much do I need to add every week in percent and distance so I’ll be ready for 16 kilometers on may 18, if I want to even the increase out evenly until the date of the race?

To evenly increase your running distance to reach 16 kilometers by the 18th of May, starting from 5 kilometers in the first week of January, you should increase your distance by approximately 6.31% each week. Here’s the detailed calculation for each week:

1. Week 1: Start with 5 km.
2. Week 2: Increase by 6.31% = 5 km + (0.0631 × 5 km) ≈ 5.32 km.
3. Week 3: Increase by 6.31% = 5.32 km + (0.0631 × 5.32 km) ≈ 5.65 km.
4. Week 4: Increase by 6.31% = 5.65 km + (0.0631 × 5.65 km) ≈ 6.01 km.
5. Week 5: Increase by 6.31% = 6.01 km + (0.0631 × 6.01 km) ≈ 6.39 km.
6. (…) etc.

Neat!

By the way. With ChatGPT Plus there are plugins that connect the model to different apps. I used the smart calculator WolframAlpha plugin here to make sure to get proper calculations.