It’s funny. I’ve been running for years and I’ve never really been “THAT” consistent with my splits during training. Race day is a different situation as you find yourself surrounded by similar paced runners, but when I’m running during the week, I tend to be all over the place.
Let’s take a look at how I’m trying to FIX that.
Training Runs
I don’t necessarily start out “too fast.” If anything, I tend to start off “slower” for the first few miles until my legs loosen up. Then I’ll typically channel into a specific place and hold it there for the middle miles, then fade at the end. As you can likely guess, this is NOT the best way to prepare for race day.
Mixing Up the Speed
I’ve started working in some speed work in various ways. From tempo runs to track work, I’ve started taking a look at how I’m approaching each run. Rather than just heading out the door and logging a distance, I’m making a conscious effort to have a “goal” for that particular run, even if it’s 30-seconds faster on the average.
Laps, Laps, Laps
I obviously have not figured this out in a month. It’s a work in progress and it will likely take some time to develop my race pace and train my muscles to hold onto it. On Sunday, I headed over to the track to try to DRILL into my mind and legs what a 7-min pace feels like. No stop lights, no distractions, just me and lane 4.
6:52
A mile on a track definitely feels much longer than a mile anywhere else. I broke it down to 1:45 seconds each lap — run four of those, and that’s my 7-min. mile. Sounds simple enough, but it wasn’t. The first mile was at 6:52 and it felt fast. I knew that I was going too fast into the last lap and slowed down a bit. I probably would have come in under 6:40 if I held onto my previous pace.
7:04, 7:05
The second and third miles were pretty consistent at 7:04 and 7:05. Although it was above what my goal was, I should be happy with the consistency. The problem was that both of those miles felt completely different. The second mile I started off too quickly again and tried to slow it down the last lap, but pulled back too much. The third mile I tried to get it below or at 7 and ended up with the same time. Weird.
6:37
I made a conscious effort to get the number back below 7 and over-corrected too much.
6:30
If you want to go fast, then go fast. I was getting frustrated with my pace being up, then down and knew this was likely going to be the last mile with the sun going down and it getting colder, so I just let loose and ran. As you can see, I need to work on what 7 feels like.
The average is great, but I want to be able to hit 7-min splits by muscle memory when it comes time to race in Phoenix. That’s the goal.
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Do you keep a consistent pace on training runs?
I’m always all over the place during my week day runs. I need to set “goals” for myself more often. This is a great mindset for me right now too!!
Good luck getting your pace consistency on track.
Dude.. Lap AVG Pace on your watch. It’s not that hard.
I have an extremely hard time staying consistent… My first few miles always tend to be too fast… Fresh legs, excited to be running, etc and I just can’t seem to get it figured out…
During late summer and early fall, in my training for a late October half marathon, I was hitting my track workouts right where I wanted them. I ran by feel for the most part and used the stopwatch on my iPhone to keep track, and I was pleased. Now, I’m just running to stay in shape, and I’m not keeping track of the paces on my track workouts as much. But my gut tells me that they’re not as consistent. During my longer, slower runs I find myself running a little faster than I intend sometimes. Yesterday’s 7.5-miler started at 7:52 for the first mile and ended up at 7:38 for the last mile. I didn’t plan that at all.
I just started trying to hit actual paces on some of my runs (before, I went by RPE or heart rate) and have found it quite hard. I do love the workout function on my Garmin – I tell it what paces I want to hit, and it beeps at me when I get out of my target zone.
Definitely all over the place. Sometimes the gray area of training (where you’re not recovering and not getting any training benefits). That’s the worst! Thanks for this.
My long runs are a lot like yours…my first mile is fast then I slow it down and in the middle stay at a good pace. However I tend to die out in the final miles. Consistency is a hard one for me…you’ll get there!
Nice work, I usually start off too fast slow down in the middle then speed up at the end. Its a fun game…. not! :) Keep on at it you will get where you want to be!