Workout Pace Anxiety
Why Workout Paces are Often Slower Than Race Paces
The runner’s weekly ritual of skimming through the calendar to see what’s in store involves a mental checklist most runners can relate to:
Volume
Long Run
Key Workout(s)
Target Paces
That last one often trips off a series of questions that leave some runners full of anxiety and even doubt:
Can I hit the target?
How close was I to the targets on previous similar workouts?
Will I be able to run at the target pace on race day?
The reality is that a “Target Pace” for any given workout has too many parts to make or break the day. The myriad of factors influencing workout pace includes the usual suspects. Current health, weather, nutrition, real-life stress, and others–all play roles in determining what the IDEAL pace for the day should be. Many of the “Type A’s”–a significant portion of the running community–squirm at the thought of taking a lax approach to the “Target Paces” listed in a workout, instead viewing them as mandates rather than the introspective exercise it should be…but this digresses from the main question in runners’ minds during a prescribed workout: How will I be able to run today’s target pace when it comes to race day?
This question seems to rear itself during the intervals of a workout –and even afterwards–when the effort required to hit the paces seems difficult to imagine sustaining for the entirety of a race. The answer is fairly simple: The Taper
Tapering allows the body time to rest, recover, and–most importantly–absorb the training effects of the work we’ve been doing. While it takes the body 7-10 days to absorb the training effects of any individual workout, the extended time of lower volume during the taper allows the body to more fully absorb the effects of the umpteen weeks’ worth of work that’s in the bank.
While the race itself will be fraught with its own unpredictable variables (see the list of factors earlier in the article), all things being equal, the body will be in a much better position to perform faster than the workouts during the cycle. This is one of the primary reasons some coaches and athletes adhere to the RPE method (Rate of Perceived Effort) of training runs. Basing work on effort, rather than paces, helps quell workout anxiety.
Performing efforts at prescribed RPE’s helps ensure that the work will be consistent because it will always take into account the variables that both limit and enhance performance. Effort-based training and racing creates the consistency that helps maximize training, as well as racing, and increases the likelihood of not over or under working.
Most jubilantly, however, the same pace that seemed like an RPE 7 during a workout will often feel like a 5 or 6 on race day because the taper had time to set in. Keeping all this in mind during training will help ease anxiety and reduce the urge to workout at paces faster than the body should be for optimal training effects.