Turnover running drill

As mentioned in the previous post, drills can help to improve your running form and overall economy of movement.

The drill below can help you to run faster by increasing the turnover of your feet and legs. It can also lower your ground posture (make you less "bouncy"), while improving your running efficiency and stride length. Moreover, in the long run (no pun intended) your running will feel easier, so you can burn more calories with the same level of effort.

Turnover Drill
1. Choose a safe, level, traffic-free stretch of trail, track, or road to run.
2. Slowly warm-up for about a mile or so.
3. Run at a constant speed and count the number of times your right (or left) foot strikes the ground for thirty seconds.
4. Recover for a minute, then repeat the drill for another thirty seconds but this time try to increase the count by one or two foot strikes.
5. Continue to repeat the drill four to six times after recovering with walking or lightly running for about a minute.

Intervals or Fartleks?

Since no one was able to make the interval run/walk at Tryon Creek State Park yesterday, I took the opportunity for a solo run. I ended up doing two fartleks and one interval around the Big Fir Trail. As I ended my run (and thinking of you all as I so often do) I thought it would be good to address the difference between intervals and fartleks.

Fartlek (pronounced fahrt-lek) is a Scandinavian word that means "speed play." It is an informal training method that involves intense activity interspersed with low effort. Basically, fartleks are a change in speed for a short and undefined period of time or distance. This allows the runner to experiment, and keep things fresh while increasing performance. You decide when to begin and end your high and low intensity periods based on how you feel (via introspection) or by picking a landmark to race to. Run fast for as long as you can, then recover as long as you need or based on another landmark.

For runners, fartleks are a great way to increase overall speed and self awareness. Walkers who want to begin running can use fartleks by running as long as possible then walking for recovery.

Intervals, on the other hand, are more formal in that they are timed. Periods of high and low intensity have definite start and end times. Runners should build a foundation of easy paced, continuous running for 30-60 minutes before doing intervals, or speed work. Walkers transitioning into running can use intervals to increase their time spent running versus time spent walking.

Ratios for intervals generally begin at 30 to 60 seconds with a 30 second to 1 minute recovery time. On the high end, it is not recommended to do intervals lasting longer than 5 minutes since the goal is to push your anaerobic threshold (in simple terms, pushing your maximum and out of breath).

Check out these websites for more info:

www.coolrunning.com
www.slowtwitch.com
www.runnersworld.com

Keep moving, keep learning!