There I go thinking again..... (Read 601 times)

.....and again, I'm wrong. I'll ask my question first, then do what seems to be a customary introduction to the masses. What IS tempo training? I guess I foolishly thought it was a short run at near max capacity. The internet is telling me otherwise, but i guess I still don't fully understand it. I did two runs today since i was busy making up for my procrastination on tax day. The first was about a one mile warm-up, then a pretty hard 1.1 miles. In my log I called it a tempo run, but I'm pretty sure that is incorrect. I'm also starting to think that there is no point in runs like these. HELP!!! Me? Thanks for asking. Entered my 30's last fall. Haven't run seriously since probably 2001. Didn't do any races then, just ran. Soccer player in HS, then somehow/someway ran XC my freshman year of college. Worst guy on the team, and in most races. But I enjoyed it. I think my best 8K was 32:30-ish at Indiana's Big State Little State meet. Just started about two weeks ago when some friends and I decided that we needed to counteract our recent relationship woes with a goal. That goal chosen was running, which I was really quite excited about. The Los Angeles part of our group is doing a 10K in early June. I have yet to find a race here in Indy that works with my work schedule. We chose RA because of its ability to do groups, what seems to be pretty good work out logging, and the fact that we are strung out across 8 time zones. So far so good. I'm excited about running again. I wasn't sure if it would recognize me after such a long absense. But its coming around. Not sure where it will take me, but I think/hope I'm back in for the long haul. See you on the streets, Chuck

Short answer: Depends on who you ask. Generally speaking, a tempo run is performed at or just under what is called your LT pace. LT pace is usually the pace you can hold for about an hour or so, so it tends to fall around your 10-15K pace. When first starting out, the usual recommendation is to warm up, run at your given pace for about 20 minutes, and cool down. If you're not sure what that pace is, then you probably don't need to worry about doing tempo runs yet. I'm surprised Globule hasn't jumped on this one yet. He's usually all over the tempo run questions like his mom is all over a piece of cake.

"Tempo" running is a pretty vague term. Basically, it's a run at a set pace (usually but not always including a warmup and cooldown at a slower pace) and that set pace tends to be faster than an easy pace but slower than a race or interval pace. http://news.runtowin.com/2007/05/28/what-is-a-tempo-run.html If you just started running again at 2 weeks ago, I recommend against running a mile all out. I'd spend at least 6 to 8 weeks running at an easy pace to give yourself an opportunity to adapt to running again. Your cardio-pulmonary systems will adapt faster than your musculoskeletal systems, which basically means that you'll feel that you can run faster, longer or harder than you are actually ready to because your skeleton isn't going to give you the same immediate feedback that your lungs will. That's why runners get stress fractures within a few months of starting to run again. You can vary your easy and hard workout days by changing the distance, but still maintaining the same easy pace. Run 3 miles one day, 1 mile the next, or 4 miles and 2 miles, or 5 miles and 2 miles. Give yourself a little stress, then plenty of rest to recover, up your mileage slowly, and after a couple of months you are probably ready to start increasing the pace a few times per week.