Running Intervals
Repeated fast running bouts with recovery between them, run well above the pace you could hold continuously.
How to do it
- Warm up with easy running until breathing has lifted and the legs feel loose.
- Set a target work duration and a matching recovery duration before you start the first bout.
- Accelerate into the work bout and settle at a pace you can only hold for the planned interval.
- Run tall with a quick cadence, driving the hips forward and swinging the arms straight back and forward.
- Ease down into the recovery and keep jogging or walking rather than stopping in place.
- Repeat the work and recovery pairs for the planned number of repetitions, then jog easy to finish.
Key technique cue
Don't blow the first rep — the last should be as fast.
Common mistakes
- ✕ Starting the first repetition far too fast, which makes every later bout slower than the first.
- ✕ Cutting the recovery short, which turns a set of quality intervals into one long moderate grind.
- ✕ Running every session as intervals, which stalls progress because easy aerobic volume also has to be built.
- ✕ Skipping the warm-up, which puts calves and hamstrings under near-maximal load from cold.
Benefits
- ✓ Raises VO2max through repeated bouts near the velocity that elicits it.
- ✓ Accumulates more time at high intensity than any continuous run of the same duration.
- ✓ Gives a clear structure to progress, since work time, pace and repetitions can each be adjusted.
Progression: from easier to harder
-
Step 1 -
Step 2 -
Step 3 -
Step 4 You are here - Running Intervals
About the exercise
Running intervals alternate hard bouts with recovery so total time at high intensity exceeds anything a continuous run allows. Common formats run repetitions of two to five minutes near the velocity at VO2max, four by four minutes among them, and one such session per week is enough during base building. The recovery is part of the prescription, not a pause in it. Beginner prescriptions use short work bouts with active recovery and keep effort inside an aerobic range at first, because the common failure is handing an untrained runner an elite interval structure.
Updated
A week of training and meals built for you
Workoutify plans workouts around your days, time and equipment — and a menu for your goal and macros.