Welcome to the wonderful world of REPEATS!!! All throughout November we’ll be hitting repeat workouts that are designed to get you moving smoother and faster.
This week is an intro to that style of workout that you can tweak to suit your fitness levels.
WHAT?
10x 1 minute @ 3k to mile effort (adapted to suit your needs)
Recovery: 1-2mins easy jog (as required).
Terrain: Flat to undulating.
Feels: Fast and free!
Repeats get their name because you should be recovered enough between efforts that you can express the same good technique and speed for each rep, on repeat. If you can’t, you’re going too fast and/or not recovering fully.
Use the unstructured nature of this workout to get a feel for repeats and what speed and recoveries work well for your fitness right now.
WHY?
For most runners, technique and speed are the mains things we’re looking to get from repeats. They’re fast enough that the require you to very dialled into to the movements of your body and for keeping them efficient. And they’re short enough and the recoveries long enough that you’re not accumulating massive amounts of fatigue between reps.
HOW?
We’re doing this workout by feel in order to ease us into repeat sessions. The remainder of the month we’ll be doing set distances, but for this week you’ll be able to adjust the speed based on how much faster running you’ve been doing and where you are in your training cycle. For example, if you have just had a big race, you might keep these efforts really light or just do the session on the bike or deep water running in the pool.
THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK:
Could I have done another rep?
In a world where accumulating workout after workout and weeks and months without injury is the best way to fitness, it’s important that we’re able to answer the all-important question: Could I have done another rep?
If you’re competitive, you can switch into race mode in a harder training session like repeats, and just end up going as hard as you can until you can’t go anymore. This might be appropriate in a key workout before a key race, but it’s not sustainable every week—your body will just break down.
Instead, aim to finish every repeats workout this month with that feeling that, although it was tough, you could have done another rep if you had to. This means you’ll bounce back quicker and be fighting fit in a couple of days to another good workout or long run.
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