Discussion: Standard Deviation

Mr Smith, I have a challenge for you.

Those times for the 400m intervals are pretty sweet. And the recovery periods show that you could still be fitter in order to sustain those repeated surges for longer. (Incidentally, I've heard it suggested that orienteering is particularly suited to interval training because of the way that orienteers may repeated push themselves and then slow the pace, for example when repeatedly crossing energy-sapping marshes.)

So my challenge is to try this workout again some time, and to aim to keep the efforts at the current speed (i.e. all of them between 71 and 79 seconds). But to reduce both the times and, importantly, the variance for your recovery laps. When you can run all of the recoveries in two minutes, you will be a superstar (and finishing the workout will feel unbelievably exhausting)!

That my recovery period continued to lengthen is a good indicator of my weak fitness. I plan to rotate through rep workouts, mainly because I don't want to run 400s every week, but I will revisit this workout in the future.