The running season kicked off with a bang this year, and it seems like I’m seeing more and more people training for their upcoming fall event. I’m excited about the prospect of many new running buddies, but am wondering how their training is going. There are plenty of free training calendars and programs for novice to elite runners available online, and then there are thousands of books and articles about how to train, when to train, and where to train. I remember starting out with my first marathon training routine and being completely overwhelmed with phrases like, mile repeats, 50m pickup, Yasso 800, and prehab stretching. It took me a few months to sift through all of the material, but now I can read a marathon training routine in minutes and decipher the matrix.

The running vernacular can be quite confusing, and it’s not always easy to understand how you’re supposed to follow a certain workout. Bart Yasso put together some great videos explaining some of the key workouts in a marathoner’s training book, and I’ve pulled together these resources, plus a few extra, to help explain what some of these challenging terms mean. Bellow you’ll find videos explaining:

  • The Yasso 800s
  • Mile Repeats
  • The Ladder
  • The Myrtl Routine
  • Fartleks

I hope you find these explanations helpful, and if you don’t then at least you get to watch one of the greatest (and quirkiest) runners talk about running. Bart Yasso has been running for decades, and is the Cheif Running Officer at Runner’s World. I was lucky enough to meet him at the NYC Marathon. He’s been writing about running for years, and I definitely enjoyed his most recent book, “My Life on the Run.”

Yasso 800s:

Mile Repeats:

The ladder:

The Myrtl routine:

Fartleks: