You may think that the track is only for fast people but I can promise you that anyone in any fitness state can benefit from a good track workout. No matter what distance run you are getting ready for the track offers you a flat area to work on your pacing and allow you to pick up your pace. Even if you can’t sustain that pace for very long it does not matter because you can always jog or walk a lap back to your car and call it a day. A typical track workout that anyone can benefit from would be doing a 1 mile warm-up (this is 4 laps) and then doing 1 lap (400 m) at a hard pace and effort so that you are breathing hard and then 1 lap easy walk or jog and then repeat. You can do 4×400 at a hard effort if you are a beginner or 8×400 if you are more advanced. Then do an easy 1/2 mile (2 laps) for a cool-down followed by some stretching. Wear your watch and time yourself on the hard efforts. What is your time?  Walkers and runners can both do this workout to see improved results.

Katie

I knew this would grab your attention. No, it’s not something my 5-year-old came up with, but it’s an actual word….in Swedish…meaning “speed play.”

In any good training program for running, you need at least 3 major types of workouts a week:  a long, slow run; a tempo run; and speed work. Usually, runners head to the local high school track to work on speed, timing themselves as they loop the track, etc. That’s great, beneficial, but can also be monotonous. If you’re looking for something to help you w/ your speed that is pure FUN, try fartleks!

My running buddy and I meet once a week early on Sunday mornings after a long hiatus from running together. We trained for a half marathon all last winter and those weekly runs were all about long, slow runs to build endurance. But since that half, we’ve both not really had a race goal and have just been winging our individual running plans. So when we finally started running together again a few weeks ago, we were lost. Were we training for speed, endurance, what?  Last week, we were bored and just not feeling it. She was talking about doing some speed work on the treadmill and how super-boring that was. That’s when it hit us. Let’s just sprint and run with wild abandon like we did when we were 10, racing toward the playground at recess. Just run and run fast!

And we did.

We’d pick a landmark and say “go!” and then run 200 meters or so at what ended up being a 5:02 minute mile pace per my Garmin GPS running watch. Man! Me? Running that fast? That was nothing but fun. That was a fartlek.

We jogged for recovery in between crazy all-out sprints and did it several more times.

This is the idea behind fartlek training. Change up your run, throw in bursts of sprints in between recovery jogs, and feel the burn. My muscles were like, “Huh?”… I was sore for two days after. But sore in a good way.

So if you’re wanting to build speed and are bored w/ the track or treadmill, try this. Here is a more informative article written by an expert.

http://ironman.com/training/17

Have a good run and don’t be embarrassed if you fartlek!

Scarlette

With the crazy hot temps and humidity recently, I decided to go for a late evening run. But I went too late, or too far… Either way, it made me want to share.

I don’t know about you, but typically, I like to get my run out of the way early in my day. In the heat of summer, the ideal time/temp to go is 6 or 6:30 a.m., but I can’t seem to make that work w/ my schedule and kids and such.  I hate pushing my workout to the end of the day b/c I’m usually so pooped that I can’t get motivated. But last night, I had no choice b/c it had been 2 days since my last run and I wasn’t going to get a chance to go this AM. Plus, I have a long run with a friend scheduled for tomorrow early AM.

So about 7:55 p.m. I headed out w/ a bottle of gatorade, a gel pack just in case, and some tunes blaring in my ear. I started around E. Lakeshore heading clockwise around the lake (the opposite route of The Ache), and felt so good that first 15 minutes that I decided to go all the way around. Now, as you know, some of those hairpin turns around the lake have little to no lighting w/ tall trees on all sides. That’s great during the daytime b/c of the shade relief. But, as the sun starting setting behind Hogback Mountain, I noticed those turns–while cooler–were darker. Did I wear reflective running wear? NO! Did I have a headlamp? NO! I thought I could make it back in time…

I crossed over the dam, peaked over to see if water was going over, and of course it wasn’t. That was just an excuse to stop for a few seconds. I continued on past the folks enjoying a meal at The Tea House…and saw boats cruising the lake w/ their lights already on as the sun sank lower. I had 2 more miles to go.

So, trying to complete this loop–heart rate in the 170s and sweat dripping from everywhere–I tried to run each and every hill to get home before that dreaded, ultra-dark 2/10s of a mile I have to endure to get home. It was getting darker still.

Loping down some hills at a nice pace…thinking, “hmmm…this is what 7 minute miles feel like,” I neared that last dark, tree-lined curve. That’s when my heart rate soared. Not because of my pace, but because I was cringing at the thought of Freddy or Jason jumping out of the woods. I turned up my music and hustled home. If they get me, I don’t want to hear ”them” coming….

The adrenalin of a scary night run did me good. I’ve lived here over 9 years and know that movie serial killers usually don’t dwell around our race roads, but the imagination and heat can get to you sometimes. Needless to say, since I’m writing this post, I got home and pushed through it.

Hopefully, your next lap around Lake Lanier won’t be a scene from an 80s horror flick. But if you do go out at night, be smart unlike me and have light and reflective-wear.

Stay cool….

Scarlette