Increasing the difficulty of your daily jog should not mean adding to the risk of injury. If you have built a base of several weeks of jogging and you feel ready to increase the difficulty, here are 5 Training Tips to add difficulty to your jog or run.
1. Follow the 10% Rule
2. Run at a 1% incline on a treadmill
3. Include Sprints
4. Attack those Hills
5. Tempo Runs
1. Follow the 10% Rule
For an experienced runner or a casual jogger, it is important not to go too far too soon. The 10% rule is highly recommended for new joggers as well as experienced runners. This simply suggests that if you are jogging 10 miles a week, only add 10% to that distance on the following week.
Adding an extra mile to a weekly 10 mile total could be an additional 8 to 12 minutes to your jog routine for the week (for an average runner). That equals 11 miles for the week. The next week, add another 10% or 1.1 miles, and in this scenario, that totals 12.1 miles for the week. The distance and time will grow and in a month's time, if you started at 10 miles a week, you will be up to 13.3 miles a week.
The important part is that you are increasing difficulty by adding distance, and you are making sure to prevent injury by following the 10% Rule.
The 10% rule is the most important rule to follow as you add difficulty to your jog or run!
2. Run at 1% incline on a Treadmill
If you run on a treadmill, then the general rule of thumb is to run at 1% incline to replicate the difficulty of running on the street. Again, the 10% rule should be followed here. If you are running 3 mile sessions, the following week add 10% to that treadmill session for a total of 3.3 mile run on the treadmill.
Sometimes just adding time and distance to your jog is enough difficulty you need to keep your session a challenge.
3. Include Sprints
Dedicate a day to sprints. Do a warm-up then include sprint sessions. An idea of sessions for shorter distances could be 4x100 meters. That's four 100 meter sprints. Do a 100 meter sprint followed by an easy jog for 2 minutes to recuperate. Follow this with another 100 meter sprint and easy jog for 2 minutes. Do that again two more times.
After doing 4x100 meter sprints that's a quarter mile run plus the time and distance on your recovery jogs. If you are accustomed to longer distances, do 4x200 meter or 4x400 meter sprint session.
Make sure to keep it in the range that your body can handle or you will risk injury! Again, the 10% rule is important here as well.
4. Attack those Hills
Hill training is fun. Okay, maybe not. But this is the attitude you need to take in order to attack those hills! Drive around different neighborhoods and find steady inclines, rolling hills, and steep climbs! Use the run/walk method to get to the top if you need to.
If you want added difficulty, this is absolutely the best way to make your running stronger, build stamina, and increase your cardio health!
Hills are a great way to train. Once you get back to a regular run or sprint session, you'll feel faster and a lot stronger! Running hills can get addicting- so beware. You may not want to do anything else but hill training!
5. Tempo Runs
A Tempo run improves metabolic fitness. This is important for running success. Casual runners have never heard nor used tempo runs and even seasoned runners have not added this to their repertoire. But if it improves metabolic fitness, this is the added difficulty you may be looking for to add to your jog/run routine.
A classic tempo run is a sustained, comfortably hard effort, for two to four miles. This training session is definitely for more experienced runners. But as you can see, the added difficulty of doing a tempo run will increase your metabolic fitness - and this is why we run - to get fit.
The basic routine is to do a 10-15 minute warm-up, then run two to four miles at faster than usual training pace, then follow that with a 10-15 minute cool-down.
* Added Tip *
Sign up for a 5K or 10K race to keep you motivated. Races are great ways to track your performance and keep you focused. Having a pending race day in your future gives you a sense of purpose and the 5 Training Tips above will have greater value to you and your run goals.
These 5 Training Tips are sure to provide added difficulty to your run or jog. The most important tip is to follow the 10% rule. Reducing injuries will allow you to run more and run longer. The worst possible scenario is to have an injury and to be sidelined for a few weeks to recover.
These tips will make you a stronger runner. And that's what you want to be every day you run - strong!
"Running is a big question mark that's there each and every day. It asks you, 'Are you going to be a wimp or are you going to be strong today?'" - Peter Maher, Irish-Canadian Olympian and sub-2:12 marathoner