1600 meter intervals

So I’ve added interval training into my runs maybe a month ago or so….but..like much of my training..it has been extremely unstructured. As in…I had no real idea what I was doing. So last night..after reading *this* blog entry….and reading a few other things…I did my first REAL interval workout this morning. Now I don’t know if this is correct….and someone please give their two cents if it’s not…or you know something better…but I read that for longer distance running…as in anything over 10 miles….you want to do LOONNNGGG intervals…as in 1600 meters…or roughly a mile.
So I mapped out a mile stretch that was about 1.3 miles from my house…put out my gear..and went to bed. I also used *this tool* to figure out what kind of time I should be running these intervals in. Which basically for me broke down to maintaining a pace of 8.56 to 9.16 minutes per mile…with a half mile recovery time at whatever slow pace.


To make a 1hour 8 minute story short….these are tuff! It’s always been difficult for me to maintain a steady pace…..with the Garmin it’s definitely easier to track..but still hard for me to do. I did do it though…to the tune of 3-mile long intervals at target pace. They say intervals are the best way to increase speed…and with only 4 weeks till my half…I don’t know if these will even make a real difference….but…they are now a part of my weekly routine…and I intend to keep them there. Followed of course…by the dreaded Thursday pushups. I’ve now completed week two and am set to do another exhaustion test sometime in the next couple days to see if I am to stay in the middle range where I was…or drop down to the low one..which is what I’m thinking will happen. I plan to do this test either after or before my long run on Saturday.

Do you interval?