- Now then, what if I was to tell you
that you could run faster
on as few as three run sessions per week.
How so, I hear you asking?
- Well, by stripping away those needless extra miles,
making your training more specific
with these three key workouts.
Amazingly, you can actually gain far more
from your training.
- Yeah, now this is something
that we have both done for years,
as well as most pro triathletes and runners.
So, we're gonna run you through
those three workouts
and how they'll benefit you.
(upbeat music)
(electronic sounds)
- We all know that you need a bit of variety,
when it comes to running,
if you want to improve,
but sometimes it's also easy
to head out for that run,
and just stick in your comfort zone,
and if you do that for all of your training,
you're gonna struggle to get out of your comfort zone
when it comes to racing,
and that's not gonna help you get any faster,
and ultimately, the reason we train
is because we want to run faster.
- Exactly, so on that note,
there are three key workouts
that we should all be doing as triathletes and runners
to avoid falling into that trap,
and personally, I believe these workouts
are must do workouts,
and any extra mileage merely serves
as a purpose to kind of further build upon
our aerobic fitness and base.
So, these three workouts are your speed workout,
we also have a tempo or threshold workout,
and then finally, we have your long run.
- We're going to be going into detail in each of those,
but first, let's take a look at the speed session.
(upbeat music)
- Yeah, a speed session is as it says on the itinerary,
it involves running fast,
and we tend to do these kinds of sessions
in intervals at, near, or above our VO2 max,
which for most runners equates
to around 3-5K run pace.
- Obviously, we are all different
so it's going to depend on your current fitness,
the pace you usually run at,
and also your race goal,
so it really doesn't matter,
if say you're running three minute Ks,
or seven to eight minute Ks,
as long as you're feeling like you're working hard,
then you know it's gonna be working.
- Exactly, and by running faster
is actually enabling us to tap into
these top end speeds,
and essentially,
unlocking this greater speed range within ourselves,
and actually, by running fast
it can also help to improve our efficiency as runners,
and we all know that efficiency
is what we're striving for,
by being more efficient we can run faster.
- Well, the key as you say Mark,
to these sessions,
is actually hitting those top end speeds,
so in order to do that,
to get the benefit from it,
we're actually gonna break it down into intervals, or reps.
One example workout is the minute hard, minute easy session.
As the name suggests,
after warming up,
just start to run harder,
but not quite flat out,
for one minute, followed be an easy minute.
Repeat this four to six times to start with
and then gradually increase the number
by one or two reps each week.
Another example workout is the old favorite, K repeats.
These are beneficial no matter what distance
you're training for.
You can do few repeats at a faster pace,
so for example, four lots of one kilometer
at 3-5K pace,
or more repeats at a slower pace,
such as eight lots of one K,
at your 10K to half marathon pace,
and then take somewhere between
one to two minutes recovery between each rep.
So, the question is,
when in your week would you want to fit in
these speed workouts,
and also, how would they fit
in that overall training plan?
- Well, that is a very important questions, actually,
and you can do speed workouts anytime throughout the year
relative to when you'll be racing,
but in my experience you really don't want to start
these speed workouts too soon,
or too far out from that target race,
or your first race of the season.
So, I'd suggest starting around three
to maybe even four months out from that race,
and then building them up
so that you got your more challenging,
and meaty sessions,
in the sort of last six weeks before the race.
- Yeah, I mean that works well
to sort of prevent you from hopefully getting
that stale feeling you can
if you start training too hard,
too far out from your race,
and ideally, it's best to try
and do this session once a week,
and a good time of the week would be,
say a Tuesday,
is often when I do my key sessions
cuz you've had hopefully enough time
to recover from your long run
that you might have done on the weekend,
and then left all that time to recover
from that actual session
before you've got your tempo run,
later in the week.
(upbeat music)
- And that leads us nicely onto the temp run,
which as the name suggests is at a pace,
that is by no means flat out,
but is significantly faster
than our normal average run pace.
- Yeah, you might also sometimes
hear it called threshold pace,
but ultimately it's comfortably hard,
and running at that pace for long periods of time
will just help you get used to
that challenging, uncomfortable feeling,
and adapt it to your run.
- Exactly, and this tempo pace fits
just a fraction below our lactate threshold.
Now, our lactate threshold is the point
that which we start to accumulate lactic acid
in our bloodstream at a faster rate
than we can shunt out
and remove it from our bodies.
So, by running at tempo pace
just below that limit,
and never tipping over into that red zone,
we can sustain longer durations at that pace,
ultimately pushing our fitness up,
and that lactate threshold up to a higher run pace.
- Yeah, so basically this session is designed
to improve your speed endurance,
which basically means that you can run faster,
for longer.
So, to ensure you're running to tempo pace,
it should be around an eight out of 10 intensity
on the rating of perceived exertion scale,
you'll be able to say a few words
to a training partner,
but you definitely won't be able
to hold a full conversation.
Your heart rate should be somewhere between 85-90%
of your maximum,
and to work at your pace,
you can add 30 to 40 seconds
per kilometer to your current 5K race pace,
or 15 to 20 seconds per kilometer
to your current 10K race pace.
- Now, the length for these sessions
is obviously all relative to what you're training for,
and your current fitness level,
but let's say you are training for a five or 10K run race,
or a sprint or Olympic distance triathlon,
then you might want to do a 15 to 20 minute block
of tempo work,
obviously sandwiched between
a good warm up and cool down.
Now, that could work really well,
but if you're doing slightly longer distances,
above 10K, and above Olympic distance triathlon,
then you might want to build this up
to tempo blocks of around 30 minutes, and more.
Now, these can obviously be split
and broken into slightly smaller blokes,
if you need to.
Now, one good example would be,
three by five minutes at tempo pace,
with one minute jog recovery between each rep.
You can then build this to four or five reps
of five minutes with the same jog recovery,
and then increase the rep durations
to something like two by 10 minutes,
with one to two minutes jog recovery,
or if you're targeting the longer events,
then I like to do something like
three by 10 minutes,
or two by 15 at tempo
with one to two minutes jog recovery between.
- Well, I normally put this session in
at least two days after my speed workout,
so I've fully recovered from that
and then I can really make sure I focus well
on the tempo run.
So, for example,
if I choose to do my speed workout on a Tuesday,
then I look at doing this
somewhere between Thursday and Saturday,
and this is actually a type of session
that you can start to build in a little earlier,
so even six or seven months before the bulk
of your race season.
(upbeat music)
- And then we have the long run,
which is the slowest of the three,
but just as important for our overall fitness,
and for our running progression.
Now ultimately,
it's there to improve our endurance
and to build our base on which to work from.
- Well, the key to getting the most
out of your long run
is hitting the correct pace.
So, it needs to be at a conversational pace.
Basically, entire aerobic,
and you should be able to find
a pace that you can start with,
and carry on for the whole of the run,
and potentially even a little bit further.
If you work to heart rate zones,
then it should predominantly be zone two,
but touching into the bottom of zone three,
or even the top of zone one,
is also okay,
and then on the RPE scale,
it's around a three to four out of 10.
Sticking to an exact pace is not essential.
Especially, if you're running off road,
but to give you an example,
my long runs,
I run at a pace anywhere between
eight to eight thirty minute miles,
or five to six minute kilometers.
- Now, how far you should be doing
for these long runs is a little bit dependent
on the distance of the race that you're targeting,
and also how much running your legs are used to doing.
So, let's take a 5K, for instance,
or a sprint distance triathlon,
you needn't be doing much more
than an hour for those long runs,
but if we step up to a half marathon,
or a Ironman 70.3 distance,
then you can start to look at
around an hour and a half your long run,
maybe even up to two hours,
but as we start to go beyond that
for a marathon,
or an Ironman distance event,
you can start to go even up to three hours,
but I'd say cap at the three hours
because actually extending beyond that,
and increasing your long runs too fast
without the necessary mileage behind that
can actually start to accumulate too much stress,
and that stress can outweigh
the physiological advantages,
so I say save that for race day.
- Yeah, exactly,
and if you're wondering
what distance you need to run,
then think of your normal run
and do one and a half to twice
the length of that,
but another option would be
to split your long run into a double run day.
So, say you don't have time
to fit the whole long run in in one go,
then you can do part of it in the morning,
and then have at least four hours rest
before doing the second part.
It's ideally if you do a slightly longer part
first thing in the day,
and then the shorter, second half of it later on,
and it's also a great way to prevent injury.
- Okay, that is the three key run workouts
that Heather and myself have been doing for years,
and it really does hit all aspects
of fitness for running,
particularly for triathlon overall distances.
- Yeah, well let us know how you get on
with any of those sessions,
and give us a thumb up like,
if you've enjoyed this video.
Hit the globe to subscribe
to make sure you get
all of our videos here at GTN,
and more importantly,
if you're into running
you wanna check out our run week content,
and we've got a playlist for you,
just here.