Long, slow distances = long, slow runners
Interval Session for Runners
British Olympic gold medallist Sebastian Coe once said, “I’ve always felt that long, slow distance produces long, slow runners.” To improve your run performance, you need a balance of easy days and hard, faster intervals.
So, if you have built up your base over winter and injury free its time to start to add some speed work into your programme. Adding these interval workouts to your running repertoire to boost speed and endurance.
In order to improve your performance you need to add training stress. Not only does this underscore the importance of adding interval training on top of aerobic miles, it also points to the fact that once you start these workouts, you must continue to up the ante from one session to the next. The great thing is that your body is able to evolve and adapt with added stress.
For this session:
Ideally on a track, otherwise find a flat quiet area up to 1km in length.
Warm up:
5mins clockwise on grass — easy conversational pace
Dynamic stretches:
- Calves
- Hip flexors
Drills and strides:
- Running man posture, lift up onto toes, into high knees skipping into easy stride: emphasis on faster feet
- High knees and pumping arms into high knees strides and loosen off 200m as accelerating into stride and decelerating
Main set:
2 x 800m with very easy 200m recovery
4 x 200m with easy 200m recovery (slower runners 3 x and 2 x)
2 x 400m with easy 200m recovery
Cool down:
5mins easy jogging and stretches — holding calf stretches for 1min at a time
