What's a fartlek?

Fartleks can be fun, but they can also be a pain. Fartlek is Swedish for "speed play". Here's a link telling you all about it. When I first started my training and Adam had me doing them I would run from light pole to light pole, but now I run for time or distance.

Today's run was a 4 mile run with fartleks. My fartleks consisted of me running 1 minute as fast as I could and then recovering at a slower pace for 2 minutes. I did it 5 times in the middle of my route. So, I did 1 mile warm up at a comfortable pace, my fartleks 5 times, and then finishing with 1.5 miles at a comfortable pace.

Well, I did everything as planned, until the last .43 miles. I turned the corner by the school parking lot and saw that Caleb's school bus was sitting in front of the house. I knew this would happen, Jason was upstairs stuck in bed cause his back went out this morning, and his momma was downstairs and had no idea the bus was on it's way. So, I sprinted to catch the bus before he took Caleb to our emergency contact. I got there and the bus driver (such a nice guy!) said it was no big deal, he was just about to go knock on the door. I got Caleb inside and went back out to finish the last .07 miles of my run. I did my 4 miles in 42 minutes!

When I went in and told Jason all about it he laughed and said that he was sure a year ago I wouldn't have been able to run that fast to catch the bus even if I wanted to. SOOO true! Today is a good day. I feel good, a little sore, but good. :)


How many of you could only get through reading the word fartlek once before laughing? LOL I thought I'd add it in there a couple times for you guys. I saw a shirt online that said "Who fartleked?" Hahaha!