The fartlek - what a difference!

Tonight was the run that sounds like a disease. A fartlek.

the fartlek is a workout that means speedplay. Basically it is a workout that builds speed and stabilizes pace.

We were meant to run a 2km warm-up run, which I ran at an average pace of 5:52/km.

After that, we were to run 48 minutes of fartlek, broken into 4 segments of 12 minutes. Each of the 12 minutes was to be broken up with 4 minutes of a slow pace, running at about 45 seconds slower than half marathon pace, 4 minutes at 15 seconds slower than half marathon pace, and 4 minutes at 5-10 seconds faster than half marathon pace. The redo the same pace cycles each of the next 12 segments.

We did the run in RBS on Dolev, which is probably the flattest course in Bet Shemesh, so it is good for pace training.

Last time we did the fartlek, I had no idea what I was doing, and I just ran as much as I could, as fast as I could.

Tonight the fartlek was a great run, and I kept a great and even pace with my running partner. We ran an expected half marathon pace of about 5:20 or so (though I thought 5:30 was more realistic), so our cycles were planned for about 6:15, 5:45 and 5:10.

Overall the 9km over the whole 48 minutes of running was at an average pace of 5:24/km, which is pretty good. The breakdown was pretty close to what we had planned, though just slightly quicker.
We basically ran the slow pace in the 5:50/5:55 range, the medium pace in the 5:18/5:20 range, and the fast pace in the 5:05 range, with the last fast circle of 4 minutes at a pace of 4:50!

So it was a good workout.

Half marathon is in two weeks!