I look back at my time in the Marine Corps when I was a young stud and PT'ed with the best of them always getting around a 300 PFT score. Now I'm 40 and holy shit.......the body doesn't quite work the way it did while we were young.

I'm still running the 1.5 mile for my job in the LEO field at a quasi-non embarrassment standpoint of 13.30. I am attempting to tryout for our SRT in the next 2 months and need to have the time down to under 11 min however 10 min and I would feel very confident. Aside from running more and/or longer distances and throwing sprints in there once a week or so, any of the fitness gurus on here have any idea how best to achieve this goal?

Thanks all, stay safe out there.

CK0311

i financed part of my education with a D1 track scholarship, but i am now about your age and 20 pounds heavier, so that is the angle i am coming at this from.  We aren't 22 anymore and have to train a bit more carefully.  

here are my two cents:

1) It takes a few weeks for the results of most workout to move the needle, so time is of the essence.  start with a tempo run today.  
2) You need tempo runs and long runs of varying distances, not the same distance every day.  i would suggest something along the lines of a one mile tempo on tuesday, a 2 mile tempo on thursday, and a long run of 4-5 miles on sunday.  Do some gradual pickups (near sprints that you slowly move into) on saturday in addition to a couple miles.  Fill the other days in with recovery runs of 2-3 miles, biking or swimming.  just something to get you moving.  do this for a month then increase everything slightly for two weeks.
3) two weeks-ish before, the big day, cut back.  no need to risk injury.  shorten your distances, and replace one of your tempos with pickups.  
4) during the last month, losing weight (if you are over weight) will be more important than gaining strength in workouts because that performance will not manifest in time.  
5) ice baths are your friend after workouts.  Yes, it sucks plopping big oscar and the twins into 40 degree water, but trust me on this one.  
6) keep your back and hamstrings stretched and loose.  toe touches with weight (i just use the bar) seem to do wonders for me.

I was always an on again off again runner. I'd go for months running every other day and then a few weeks of nothing at all. 6:30 mile was my usual "best" without really pushing myself too hard....cause I really really hate running.

3 months ago I just started running whenever feasible, and by that I mean I'd from the parking lot to the office, from my office to my truck, from one of our office buildings to the other, from my parking space to the grocery store...if there's more than 50 yards of space I'm running. Not jogging, not sprinting, just running at a good clip. I'd say 80%. Haven't even ran distance since then. But it seems to have worked. Yesterday I ran a 5:52 mile.