Hitting target pace - Runna app or something else?

[Onewildandpreciouslife]

I try to follow various training plans - I ran my first half marathon in April, and have another half in September and have signed up for the Manchester marathon.

I find it difficult to run at a particular pace - eg I have a plan that says “10 mins at target half marathon pace”, but I usually go too fast and then exhaust myself, and then get grumpy. I can run based on effort (eg steady or tempo) but not sure that’s the best way to go.

I just use my Apple Watch for pace, and I was wondering if something like the Runna app would help.

If you use the app, do you have to use it for every run? I love my long runs without distractions so would prefer to do some runs without earphones

Running based on effort is hard even when you’re really experienced. People either drift into going too easy or too hard. Pacing is also difficult outside unless you have a flat area without lots of crossing roads. I find heart rate cutoffs (lower end and higher end) rather than pace targets are easier to use outside.

Personally, I do easy efforts using heart rate limits on trails and most of the specific pace workouts either on a track or a treadmill. Treadmill is easiest as you can just select the target pace and hold.

I’ve only ever used Polar and Garmin for pacing so can’t comment on Runna.

The Running Channel on youtube has a couple of videos about training with the Runna app.

I use the workout and coaching features on my Garmin and they are really useful, particularly for instructing through more technical runs to improve performance or measuring specific metrics such as target pace, distance or heartrate zone and it was a really useful tool for marathon training. On my long runs, I broke them up as out and back legs, so set a work out of measured distances so I just had to turn when the beeps went.

Live instructions/ data are definitely more useful than trying to remember a structure or guess at what you're doing.

I've just done an improvement 5k plan with Runna App - it was brutal!
The sessions sync with your watch (don't need to take your phone with you) and therefore should beep at you when you're over or under pace - so would probably work for you.
However the sessions were really really hard, so much speed and threshold work each week that I was so tired by the time I got to my target race that I bombed completely!

But I really liked the App in general and it's probably worth you having a go at the free trial.

Thanks everyone- lots to think about.

I haven’t run on a treadmill in years, but it will be worth re-thinking that over the winter!