Written by Laura from our Leeds, Headingley shop.

No time for training, bored of one pace running? Try mixing up your training!

There is a lot of research that shows varying training sessions aids quicker improvements.
Some go as far as to say that adding speed endurance can improve fitness despite a reduction in training volume (in already endurance trained runners. Journal of applied physiology). It will also avoid the boredom of long run after long run.

Types of training to interoperate

Hill training

Hill training is great for increasing strength and power. It works you hard in a shorter period of time and prepares you for any hills in races. Hill running requires a different technique; you stay more on your toes and drive harder with your arms quite often with a shorter stride length. Because there is a different technique it takes a bit of getting used to and can put a bit more pressure on the body. e.g. the calfs. Therefore as with all aspects of training it is important to progress gradually, not like a bull in a china shop.

Your event and ability level will determine what type of session you should do. I would never recommend running to exhaustion - you should always have a little left at the end of all your sessions.

Ability level: Starter aiming for 5-10k running:
150m hill, 8 runs of increasing pace, walk back down the hill recovery (should roughly take 3-4 minutes)

There are many ways you can increase the intensity of a hill session, you can extend the hill length making the session more endurance based or increase the number of reps keeping the recovery longer to improve speed endurance.

Half to full Marathon runners: if you are already at a good level of fitness or as you progress, try doing two sets of the above session but with a slow jog back recovery and walk back between sets.

Fartlek training

This is Swedish for 'speed play' and means what it says, you play with the speed that you are running. Putting in different paced surges for differing times or distances.

It's good because it's so variable and you can adapt it to how you feel during the session. Try using percentages of effort in your head as you run, with running flat out being 100%. Then find a land mark or set a time that you want to run at a set percentage of your maximum for.

Try to mix it up as much as you can i.e.
Walk for 3 minutes,
Light jog (40%) for 4 minutes,
Medium pace 60% effort for 2 minutes,
Light jog 40% for 3 minutes,
Striding out 80% effort 90 seconds...

Treadmill

Treadmill running has some pros and cons as with most training, it is not advisable to do all your training on a treadmill if you intend on racing on road as there are some differences in recruitment patterns. The first road run will feel different so you need to do a mixture of both to allow for adaptation to the road.

Treadmills are great for monitoring your progression with direct control over what pace and what gradient of hill you are running at.

I would recommend always keeping it on a slight gradient as it is more forgiving on the knees.

Treadmills normally come with some preset programmes that will vary your work intensity and will allow for gradual progression which is one of the most important considerations of training. Make sure you are working within yourself on the first session and progress no more than 10% effort/distance.

Interval sessions (speed endurance)

As the name might suggest this is a session of intervals, they can come in many formats and involve running at an increased intensity for a set time or distance, with an active or non active recovery. It has many benefits over doing a sustained moderate paced run.

Because the intervals are at a higher intensity than you could maintain for your longer run it is said to improve your lactate threshold, this will allow you to run for longer before you hit that nasty lactic feeling of heavy legs.

Some also think the efforts can be good for promoting weight loss by boosting you metabolism, however the research is split.

Interval training can work various aspects of fitness depending on recovery time and interval length, to fully understand this a basic understanding of energy syetems is needed.

Speed /anaerobic system
Anaerobic means without oxygen, therefore it depends on the stores of energy already in the muscles that comes at no cost, this can be realised quickly but does not last very long.

Speed endurance/ anaerobic lactate
When all the energy pre-stored in the muscles has been used the body uses glucose or glycogen to produce energy. This can be done in two ways, with or without oxygen, when using oxygen the process takes longer. If your pace requires more energy than can be produced at the rate using oxygen it goes without it, however this produces byproducts such as the dreaded lactate acid! Which slows us down.

Endurance/ aerobic (with oxygen)
When there is time for oxygen to be used there is no by products and this system can be used for a long time, but only at a slower rate because of the time it takes to break down the glucose or glycogen.

Speed intervals

If you want to improve your flat speed the interval session needs to consider the following: recovery time, length of repetitions, pace of repetitions.

Recovery time
Recovery is important as it will directly affect what system you use, if you are wanting to improve speed it is important to give a longer recovery to ensure the reps don't get slower.

Length of repetitions
10- 45 seconds of running can be classed as speed work if the previous points noted about recovery are abided by. This is still classed as anaerobic (without oxygen).

Pace of repetition
Speed sessions are very much about running fast and maintaining quality of the reps, if the times start getting a lot slower it's important you stop or give a longer recovery time.

Speed endurance, anaerobic lactate system training

These types of sessions create lactic pain, but they do wonders for your training, they help when you want to pick it up at the end of a race or if you just want to feel stronger while running.

The session used in the earlier mentioned journal was 8 to 12, 30 second sprints with a 3 minute recovery and is a good interval session to play with. Remember not to go flat out on the first effort if you have not done much speed before because by rep 8 it will catch up with you.

In my opinion there are two types of speed endurance, speed based speed endurance and more endurance based speed endurance.

Speed based includes sessions like 5*100m, 5*80m and involves running quicker over a shorter distance lots of times.

Endurance based is a more prolonged effort such as 4 x 1000m and a longer recovery with less repetitions.
Both will benefit your fitness, try one of each and see which you get on with best.

Endurance /aerobic (with oxygen) training

You will be stimulating this system with your long sustained paced runs so interval sessions will be best spent focusing on your speedier side.

Conclusion

Keeping training varied allows for quicker progression. Stimulating different energy systems using the different tools helps keep interest, makes you a well rounded athlete and reduces stress on the same energy systems allowing for better recovery.