How to Run Faster

Type that phrase into Google and you get 43,000 hits (plus 48 videos). But who wants to go through all those agonizing drills? Here are 10 surefire ways to improve your speed.

1. Switch to the metric system. You’re running 5k and 10k races. Why are you telling people your mile splits? “Dude, I ran 6:12s the whole way!”
2. Join the Keystone Kops.
3. Change your apparel. While pasting wings on your heels will only make you look faster, stitching together a pair of bacon shorts and running past a pack of stray dogs will increase your pace significantly.
4. Try the Marion Jones program. The downside to this approach is that it could take you from the Fastest Woman on Earth to the Fastest Woman in the federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas.
5. Attach JATO bottles.
6. Use the Six Million Dollar Method. If running in slow motion made Steve Austin super-fast, why not you?
7. Suffer a freak accident. Unintentionally inhale “heavy water vapors” or stand too close to chemical beakers struck by lightning.
8. Buy the fine products of the Acme Corporation. You can try the Super Speed Vitamins or the Hi-Speed Tonic with vitamins R, P and M.
9. Chase a celebrity runner. Running just behind Anna Kournikova will get you down to the 7:15 range while hanging with Lance Armstrong will improve you to 6:30 or better.
10. Run faster by, uh, running faster. That is to say, you increase speed the same way you increase distance. When you first got off the couch, you didn’t go out and do a steady six miles, did you? If you’re like me, you ran about 200 yards and stopped to put your lungs back into your chest. The basis of all speedwork is to run short—even tiny—distances at a faster pace than you can currently manage over longer distances.

Just as your body got used to running further, it will get used to running faster. With patience and determination, you’ll eventually marry the two together, hopefully on race day.

If all else fails, just claim you are a victim of time dilation.

Written by Mike Antonucci · Filed Under Running is Funny