Tempo runs are hard. There's no doubt about it and I don't like them. I've decided to add more tempo runs to my schedule in an effort to get faster and train for the Boston Marathon. Last week was my first tempo run and while I didn't hit my paces, at least it went better than today. I'm wearing new shoes which make my legs more fatigued. My foot strike is in the center (which I guess is good) but I'm not rolling forward giving me a stomping feeling.
A tempo run is 10K pace effort for 20-25 minutes. That equates to 2-3miles. To see progress I'm going to keep track of my middle mile splits and have evidence that lightening speed is filling my legs with each run. I'll have to work on the lightening speed.
Today's pace was much slower and to put it into perspective, I should be running 7:26 but was striving for 7:40's. I was WAY off. Both runs were in the morning and with the same shoes. Today's run was 2 days after a long run where last week I didn't have a long run. Next week I'll try my old shoes and see if that goes better. Maybe I can talk John into running in the morning with me and chasing him will keep my pace up.
Do you run tempo runs? Do you like them?
Happy Running!
8 comments:
Way to go! I'm not good at anything that has to do with tempo or speed.
it's not the tempo it's the humidity
A lot of runners do a tempo run every week. I think tempo runs are useful because our body needs new challenges.
Running a tempo run challenges our cardiovascular and muscular system enough to maintain or improve our fitness.
I always try to run a tempo every week ... if I can :)
I love me the tempo run! I always feel like I accomplish something when I'm done! Keep it up, the pace will come!
I am not a tempo fan and therefore I avoid them way more than I should.
Actually - a tempo run is defined as the pace that stimulates lactate threshold - which is the hardest pace that you can hold for about an hour (typically 10K pace). An excellent discussion of lactate threshold/tempo pace is here .
tempo runs are ooof, hard. great pace on these, even if they weren't what you wanted...!
Tempos are great - even though I feel tired just thinking about them! Please write more about them, we might be more inspired to do them then.
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