Fartlek (speedplay) Training

[old] Ash · Post by **[old] Ash** » June 17th, 2004, 8:57 am

Checking out how much my recent bout of mumps has affected my fitness, did a 7k fartlek with 800m easy @ 1:58 @ 20 - 22 spm and the 200m hard at sub 1:40 and 30+ spm; last 2k was quite difficult but managed sub 1:26 for the last 200m and finished with 26:34.0 @ 24 spm, 1:53.9 This works out as the sprints were done at an average of 1:37.3, quite slow i feel for what seemed like quite a hard session, although obviously i'm not on top form, 1400m at 1:37.3 and 5600m at 1:58.0 would not be difficult at all on their own, and 7k at 1:53.9 wouldn't be too taxing either. Having a target pace for the easy sections means that the only way to go faster is to do the hard stints faster, p.b of 1:52.6 where each 200m was done below 1k p.b pace (1:30.3 av), perhaps if i hit sub 1:30 on all of them i can change the easy bits to 1:57 so that the session has an element of progression. How many people use this kind of training and what do you do? do you use the progressive overload principle or do you just take the easy bits as you feel? As you can imagine hitting a target pace after a hard stint can sometimes be difficult!!

[old] DougB · Post by **[old] DougB** » June 17th, 2004, 11:11 am

I do various fartlek workouts almost every day, primarily to avoid the monotony of rowing 30 to 40 minutes at a time. Lately, I've been breaking up 8000m rows into 8 different 1000m segments, rowing each at a different pace (for me, 1:55 down to 1:48). Sometimes I'll do a ladder, starting at 1:55 and ending at 1:48. Other times I'll go easy-hard, such as 1:55, 1:51, 1:54, 1:50, etc. As the season progresses I'll do the same with a 3 x 2500m workout, though at faster paces and using ErgMonitor to closely track my stroke rate and pace. Another fartlek workout I do once in a while is a "golf course row". Find a scorecard from your favorite golf course and row the meters corresponding to the yardage on each hole. I do par 3's at 100% effort, par 4's at 2K pace, and par 5's slightly slower. Take only as much rest time needed to change the meters between each interval. After 9 "holes" I usually take a 2 minute break.

[old] Ash · Post by **[old] Ash** » June 18th, 2004, 6:53 am

The golf course idea is very interesting, what is the average distance of each of the pars? Time to take a trip to the local golf course for some score card piking!!

[old] DougB · Post by **[old] DougB** » June 18th, 2004, 9:51 am

Par 3's are typicallly 150 to 200 meters, par 4's around 350 - 400 meters, and par 5's about 500 meters. A golf course usually has 4 par 3's, 4 par 5's and 10 par 4's per 18 holes. The problem with the par 3's is that they're practically over before I get up to full speed, so they almost don't count. (Doing them strapless is a challenge, too.) I've thought of switching the order to make the par 3's recovery intervals and the long par 5's the hard ones, but I haven't done that yet. One drawback to the golf course workout is that it's not as repeatable and measurable as other workouts. That's because each course has different yardage and the recovery time between holes varies (based on how long it takes to change the meters, and sometimes I take extra time to catch my breath a little). For those reasons I only do this workout once in a while, when I feel like doing something different. Give it a try - maybe you'll like it, and it will be different than other workouts you've done. FYI, it's been a while since I've done this, so I can't remember if I really do the par 4's at 2K pace or not. I will have to check my logbook, and I don't have it with me now.

[old] Ash · Post by **[old] Ash** » June 19th, 2004, 8:08 am

You could make it measurable with e-row as you can set each interval and rest period independantly before hand, just off to pester grandparents for old score card!!