First Day of the funny sounding: Fartlek training.

Well, in my training, every three weeks I rotate between Hills and Fartlek training on Wednesdays. Today was the first rotation. For those who do not know what that is. Fartlek training is, in my words, like an interval training, just with spontaneous intervals.

As you run, you pick two landmarks, such as a lamp post and a tree, during that stretch of run, run at a different pace, whether it is sprint, long stride, just a little faster, walk, etc. You continually do these landmark runs throughout the run.

As I went through the run today, I noticed that those runners that were a head of me, even though I might walk at times, never got further, but might have gotten closer. Throughout it all, my "speed" equaled theirs as over time I would sprint and catch up from my walking times.

Overall I liked the training. The point of Fartlek training is speed work. Most runners would like to pick up their pace per mile, but you have to train to do that. Hills and Fartlek are ways of doing that. So in your running routine, I highly recommend you do one of these to really boost your performance.