Increase Jogging Speed

Question
I've been jogging off and on for years.  I always seem to get discouraged with trying to increase my speed and quit.  I can never seem to get any faster at a 5k than 5.5. My husband says I take very small strides.  When I try to increase my stride it doesn't feel right or comfortable. Can you give my any advise.  Thanks  Patty

Answer
Hi, Patty

I know how difficult it can be to increase speed.  It's tough and something I always have to work on.

When it comes to your strides, you have to find the point at which you are not taking strides that are so short that you might as well be walking, but not too long because a 5k is not a sprint.

One thing to do is to make sure you are landing in the middle of your foot.  Basically landing flat on your feet so that your not pushing off from the balls of your feet and you're not going through the "heel-toe" motion.  Both of those will fatigue you and contribute to injury.

The trick to getting faster is getting your body used to running at that speed.

You really only need to do speedwork once per week, but make it a good workout.  You can find a number of ways to increase speed at sites like http://www.runnersworld.com  

Remember, it's tough, but it's worth it.  Another thing you might want to check out is a book called "Run Less, Run Faster."  I think the training plans in there are pretty good and it only has you running 3x per week with one of those days being a speedwork day.

I hope that helps.