Fartlek – Interval Training Without the Boredom!

If you want to become the best runner you can be, start now. Don’t spend the rest of your life wondering if you could do it

Priscilla Welsh

If you’ve followed my blog for any great length of time you’ll know I love running, I love the feeling it gives me, I love the comradery and sociability of being a member of a running club and I love the competitive element when running a 5, 10k or half marathon. Add to this the numerous health benefits and I hope you can see why I’m so passionate about running!

Let’s be honest though, everyday training can get a little boring, even with headphones to try and break the monotony you can spend some long hours on the road or trail, especially when you’re running on your own so, I read with interest a few weeks ago about a training phenomenon that has come from our friends in the Nordics. Fartlek is something I’d heard about but considered it just another form of interval training – I was wrong!

What we, as runners, choose to call ourselves, from joggers to elite athletes, is indicative not only of our experience and preference for specific distances and events, but also of what we perceive our ability and commitment levels to be. Some people call themselves plodders, other people will tell you they are athletes. The choice of words alone provides a wealth of information about the runner’s sense of self. Personally, I have a theory that, regardless of your speed or stamina, there are only really two types of people who run: runners and Runners.

For people in the first group, that would be me then, running is something they do. The same is true of those in the second group, but for them, the fact that they run is part of what actually defines them.

When you meet someone else who runs, it can be difficult to know at first which group they belong to. Are they a runner or a Runner? You could ask them their times or PBs, or how often they run, but such questioning is fraught with competitive tension, and can have the unfortunate effect of making either one of you feel inferior.

There is, in my opinion, one failsafe way to make the distinction. In order to find out on which side of the line a person falls, all you have to do is drop the word Fartlek into the conversation.

If they snigger, smirk or raise an eyebrow even the slightest bit, then you are talking to a runner – someone who runs, but is not defined by it. They hear “Fartlek”, they think “fart”, nothing like a little toilet humour to brighten the day!

If, on the other hand, they don’t so much as bat an eyelid, but instead nod seriously and perhaps ask you something about interval sessions, then you have a Runner on your hands. They’ve crossed the line, and running is not only what they do, it is who they are. These are people who could hear the word “fart” in any situation, and all that would pop into their mind is a particular type of training session first developed in Sweden in the 1930s.

Fartlek has “fart” in it because that is the Swedish word for speed. Lek means play, and so “speed-play” serves as a rough translation, although Fartlek (with a capital F) is how it’s always been known. It was developed by the national cross-country coach Gösta Holmér in response to the Sweden team’s poor performances against their Finnish rivals. Fartlek is not, in fact, a common word in Sweden; most non-running Swedes wouldn’t even recognise. But in running circles the world over it is respected as a tried-and-tested training technique with proven benefits for speed endurance.

Holmér’s innovation was to combine speed work and stamina training into one session, in which the runner makes multiple significant alterations to their pace during a run. Like interval training, it involves running at speeds far higher than normal for short periods. Where Fartlek differs from interval sessions is in the fact that these short bursts of pace occur within a continuous long run. The short, fast runs alternate with longer periods of easier running.

A Fartlek often occurs on trails or roads, rather than on a track, which means that it is commonly practised by solo runners. This independent element gives the runner greater control over their own session; there need not be a pre-determined schedule and the runner can instead feel their way through, gauging when and for how long to take the faster bursts.

This puts more responsibility on the individual: go too easy and the Fartlek will become nothing more than a training run, with little or no benefit to speed endurance. Go too hard, and you risk giving yourself too little time to recover between bursts. The key to getting a Fartlek right is to be both honest and wise, and, as a result, it is usually most effectively practised by runners (or should that be Runners) with more experience. That being said, Fartlek can also work equally well in groups, particularly if everyone is at a similar level, as the longer, slower portions of the run provide ample opportunity for everyone to catch up.

So, my first experience of Fartlek took place on Thursday evening. I’d glibly mentioned it to another club member who looked at me in surprise… “You’ve never heard of Fartlek…”, I had inadvertently confirmed my status as a runner! My friend went on to say, the club organise a Fartlek training session every Thursday evening around Greenwich Park so, I thought, why not give it a go! What followed was a session that was both testing and actually, reassuring. Naturally, I went off too fast on the earlier efforts, and by the end of the session was finishing the shorter bursts in a position far closer to the back than the front! But this didn’t bother me, as the benefits of this kind of training were immediately apparent, plus, it was actually, dare I say it, a lot of fun! So much so that I’ve changed my shift next Thursday so I can give it another go! (There was the added perk of a few of us going to the pub afterwards!)

What’s on this week!