Speed work - Page 2 - Training

andy the deestrider

12/10/2012 at 21:17

I agree with what people say about Tempo run. I think there better as a bread n butter session in general year round training but in the weeks leading up to a runners "A" race I think intervals have a place in training as long as they are relevant to the race distance. Also when myself and training partner were doing them I looked forward to them as an alternative to just plodding along streets endlessly mile after mile. Variety really helped break up my training week and it kept motivation high as ever.

steven hayes

12/10/2012 at 22:11

i think its fair to say andy that the interval session is like the icing on the cake.with the combination of easy runs,tempo and a weekly long run.i defo agree tho that to get half mara time down longer tempo runs are the key

andy the deestrider

12/10/2012 at 22:22

Ste Hayes to be honest I want to get our intervals going again A.S.A.P because next year I wanna get some good (for me) tomes at shorter distances working up the distances over the year so I have a series of targets to aim at for the whole year. so after Helsby I hope to get a PB at the mile (sub 5mins) to start with.
Also see ya tomorrow at the 5k

babyhermes

12/10/2012 at 23:59

It is all relative depending on what distance you're racing. If you're focusing on your first marathon or ultra, I'd leave the speedwork focus in favour of increasing your aerobic endurance, maybe incorporating some marathon pace tempo within long runs.

For half marathon/10milers however - tempo runs are great. 25-40mins at race pace - hard, but you need to be able to sustain it for the length of time without breaks. Faster than steady running but not so fast you get lactate buildup and hav e to stop after 10mins. You can also incorporate blocks of tempo into longer steady runs.

10k, 5k, cross country - intervals will make all the difference. Repetitions ranging between 2-5mins generally with short recoveries of 30secs-1min. The recovery should never be quite enough and these are to be run at a hard pace. For 5k and cross country in particular the total reps time will be longer than your race, but you won't have the recoveries in between.

andy the deestrider

13/10/2012 at 07:10

Baby hermes- fair comment in the first 2 paragraphs but for 5k's I'm not sure I'd agree that the session distance of intervals would need to be longer though otherwise the pace of the intervals would need to slow down. if the session was say 12x400m the runner could do these at 5k or faster pace. If a runners 5k pace is 6min/mile pace (90secs/400m) I dont see how doing say 4m of intervals at an inevitably slower pace would help get a pb. Speed work atleast has to be at race pace in my opinion.

just_anothr_rnr

16/10/2012 at 12:05

Hi, read Steve Smythe's feedback to a reader in this month's RW to achieve a sub-3hr marathon and one of the days was Interval training of 6 miles maxing out at 5:30miles for the last mile. I tried this on a treadmill at the gym (don't have a gps watch to monitor my pace in the real world) but it wasn't clear to me whether I should have been taking breaks between mile intervals or whether the 7:40miles were the rests.....I didn't stop at all for the 6 miles so went with the latter but I certainly felt the burning closing in on my final mile and I struggled with stiffness for 2 days after taking out my planned long run Sunday. Maybe its just my first interval session that hurts the most after? Anyone able to read into what was expected by Steve's suggestions? thanks Jon

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