Speedwork

For some reason, speedwork scares me. I do a variety of weekly speedwork sessions (5x800m, 5x1K, 3x1M, etc) but somehow I get really anxious about it, and I feel it could be impairing my performance - ie, I don't give it as much as I feel I could. Long runs at an easy pace are no problem, it's just when I have faster runs to do (and it's not like I set myself targets that are too quick). Does anyone have any tips for making speedwork less daunting? THanks, PJ.

Comments

  • PJ, I can see where you're coming from. They can be quite daunting, especially longer reps like 1k.
    When I started my speed work this year, I wanted to do 4x1k, but allowed myself a few weeks build up. I started with 10x400 (which sounds alot) but did them at the 1k pace I wanted to build upto. I also alternated the rest period, 45s and 60s, so psychologically I was doing them in pairs and the pace wasn't very fast.

    Then the next week I bumped upto 600m and did 6 of them plus an extra 400. Again in my mind this didn't seem so bad as I wasn't having to do 10 like the previous week.

    After a couple of weeks I moved up to 5x800, still at same speed, and then finally got to 4x1000.

    As I run them, I concentrate on being relaxed as possible, and always try to think of them in small chunks.

    They're not all that bad really!
    :-)
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