More recently, a 2012 study of 22 nationally and internationally competitive Spanish runners (average 10K time 31:35) by Jordan Santos-Concejero and colleagues from the University of the Basque Country in northern Spain found that each 10 seconds per mile difference in v OBLA corresponded to a 70-second difference in 10K PR. They then asked their study subjects to do weekly 20-minute training runs at a pace they called v OBLA -the speed at which the treadmill tests had shown them to be experiencing an “onset of blood lactate accumulation.”Īfter 14 weeks of once-a-week runs of this type, the runners saw their average v OBLA paces drop from 5:43 per mile to 5:29-a whopping 4% improvement, roughly equivalent to seeing their 10-mile race times drop from 57:10 to 54:50. In that study, Sjödin and colleagues put eight experienced distance and middle-distance runners on treadmills and measured their blood chemistry at various paces, with a particular eye to their lactate levels. Scientifically, the concept stems from a June 1982 paper in the European Journal of Applied Physiology and Occupational Physiology by a team led by Bertil Sjödin of Sweden’s National Defense Research Institute. The Origins of the Tempo Run Photo: Andy Cross/The Denver Post/Getty Images To others it’s any long, fast run at a steady pace. To some, it’s practice at race pace-wildly different for milers and marathoners.

If you poll a dozen runners, you’re likely to get a dozen different answers. We’ve all heard of tempo runs, and have probably done many of them over our lives.

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