Is Fartlek Dead?

Fartlek will never die!

Kipchoge died it once a week seems like it works

That typo is priceless in the context of this thread! 😂

Modern runners are too anal for true fartleks. In the mind of today's runners, if you can't quantify, document, and compare your workout directly with all of your other workouts, there's no point in doing it.

I do them during base blocks, but I'm just a mediocre age grouper

This is a very good point. I always thought that "artsy/creative" types did fartlek, and OCD (anal!) types (like me) didn't.

It is with my team, not for any big reason other than Im not sure what it does that more specific workouts do better? Easy runs should be easy, speed is speed, intervals are intervals, hill repeats...

I guess i could see it as a less stressful aerobic session if i don't think everyone is recovered yet, or I need to do 2 workout days in a row due to sunday meet.

Also i can see in newbies it might be a way to get them to shift gears and get a feel for running and training, before they are fit enough for actually benefitting from a specific VO2 session or threshold session?? IDK. New people sometimes can't run 3 miles without stopping, so 800-1000 intervals don't really do for them what we think they do.

I sometimes do it when it's workout day but I don't want the pressure of a structured session.

Fartleks better be anal. The alternative is queefleks.

I still make my team do fartleks, especially off season and early season. I see them as a great way to let athletes push themselves as hard as they feel they are ready for while being a great stimulus for aerobic development.

Did not know he was ill.

It is a great workout and can be as hard as a runner wants it to be. It’s important for the helicopter coach not be tagging along on a bike.

But isn't there a danger in this amount of freedom? Too hard? Too easy?

Hi skuj

I discuss your question about the fartleks popularity in my YouTube channel. It's video #27.

Youtube- Barrett dahl

It's not just the runners. The most meticulous coaches generally hate fartlek, because they can't really quantify it (beyond "35min fartlek"). They want more than that to put in their workout logs.

Same is true for change-of-pace reps, which have been shown to be the best way to build speed endurance. As soon as you put a watch on those, the athletes will revert to running them steady-and-fast, which defeats the whole purpose.

Yes. How do these people who need bike (or other) pacers for the simplest of track sessions and basic long runs learn to race, read their bodies, adapt to unpredictable developments, and so on?

That’s exactly what a fartlek workout is supposed to be. It means “speed play” and it’s a nice break from the countless different types of paces prescribed by modern coaches.

Did you ever run a true fartlek workout? I never ran one that felt too easy

True fartlek doesn't involve assigned paces or intervals

So many people do interval sessions and call them fartlek that those have basically taken over what the term means

Seems like Fartlek is the best way to instinctively learn threshold pace. Our coach used to put us on a cross country course that was a windy one and a half mile loop on a campus park. He would station himself in the middle of the park and have us jog and each runner would stop at a different spot on the loop. He used an air horn for stopping and starting. We never knew if we would be running thirty seconds or eight minutes before he would blow that horn... so you had to learn to run at a pace you were able to manage.

I did 90 minutes of fartlek instead of a long run. I got time on my feet without the additional stress of a long run.