Keltraf the Konqueror 4/25/10

I did six-miles of hill fartlek today. What that means is that whenever I came to an uphill section along my route, I would pick up the pace, until I got to the top, then I would jog easily until the next uphill. It's a good way to practice the kinds of pace changes you find in races, and a relatively easy way to add some "quality" to my miles. It's a type of speed work that has a long history.

Fartlek, as I've mentioned before, is a Swedish word that means "speed play." It can be traced back several centuries, to the Vikings. The Vikings were long-distance sailors, and pillagers of great renown, not great distance runners to be sure. Their success was derived from making other people run- from the Vikings.

When the Viking ships would approach a defenseless village, say on the coast of Ireland, or Scotland, or Duluth, they would watch in great amusement as the locals would take off running away from the shore, and toward the hills. Their targets were not great runners, either. They had spent most of their time bent over, doing farm labor for 25 hours a day, every day. They didn't have time to run for fitness. So they were not in good enough shape to do the kind of running they would have to do to get away from the Vikings. They would have to stop after a few yards to catch their breath, then turn around and realize that the Norsemen had landed, and ever more frightened, turn and sprint again.

The cycle would repeat itself many times, with the townsfolk growing more weary with each burst, and the sacking Swedes advancing steadily, laughing so hard that their horny helmets fell off. Eventually the serfs would faint from exhaustion, the Vikings would catch them, and after their laugh-induced belly aches subsided, kill the luckless lumps of flesh about fourteen different ways, take everything they could stuff on their boats, and sell the rest on ebay.

Then they would sail for home, telling great tales of the battles they had fought with unconscious Duluthmen, and singing Viking ballads of villages burned to the ground. Those always made them homesick and sad. But only briefly. For then one of them would always cheer them up by asking them if they remembered how those Scottish saps would run and stop, run and stop, until they just gave out. And the Vikings would belly-laugh all over again. You see, it was speed play for the Vikings, and speed work for the villagers.

Thanks for reading.