Fartlek

Yer what? Quite! What is fartlek?

(a) A character from a Tolkien novel;

(b) An enemy of Doctor Who;

(c) A Swedish term meaning 'speed play'.

Well, the correct answer is (c), a Swedish term meaning 'speed play' - otherwise there wouldn't be much point introducing it into my training regime.

It's time to increase the schedule to four runs a week. My extra run will be a fartlek session.

"Here’s how a typical fartlek session would work. After a steady warm-up, simply pick a landmark – for example a tree, lamp-post, or phone box – and run to it hard, then jog until you’ve recovered. Then pick another landmark, run hard to that, recover and so on."

"If you want to add an unexpected element to fartlek training, run with a friend and take it in turns to call the next fast leg."

Anyone want to be my friend? I promise you a great night out!

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