9 Foolproof Ways to Get Faster

I hold within these sentences 9 fool proof ways to run faster...to subtract seconds from your average per mile pace. These secrets are so secret I had to close my eyes even to type them. All 11 of the Colonel’s herbs and spices can’t believe how secret these secrets are. The lost city of Atlantis just called to ask about these secrets and I told it (them?) I couldn’t say and then pretended they had they wrong number. To which they said ‘we’re cold and wet down here. Can’t you just help us?’ to which I said ‘maybe you should have thought of that before…’

But I’ll share them with you now.

I hate to disappoint those in the southern, non-snowy climates but these secrets only apply to us cold weather folk. Sorry. You don’t get mounds of snow and polar bears snowboarding by your windows for three months out of the year so….you can wear your bright colored clothing and go screw yourselves. These secrets are climate specific. These are for us northerners who prefer to dress in shades of brown, forest green, and blue and like our cars, and everything else we own, rusty.

Every year, about this time, my per mile pace starts subtracting seconds. It depends on the distance of the run, of course, but those gains can be anywhere from 15 seconds to 40 seconds per mile! Why? I’m not very bright so it took me four long years and lots of clinical research to create the following list. It’s obvious now to me why I get faster every spring.

Each one of these things, by itself, will shave some amount of time and it is notated to the right. You can apply all or pick a la carte to experience your own time gains. To standardize the secret list, I assumed a 10 mile distance. Get ready to find El Dorado!

Super Secret Get Fast Tips (close eyes before reading)

1. Melted snow leaves running paths flat, hard, and clear. (-15 seconds per mile!)
2. North Face thermal jacket finds a home at the back of the closet for the next 9 months. (-5 seconds)
3. Remove wind pants/wear shorts instead. (-4 seconds)
4. Remove YakTrak and/or buy new running shoes now that you are doing abusing your “winter” pair. (-3 seconds)
5. Replace Seasonal Affective Disorder with spring allergies. (-3 second net gain)
6. Panic sets in as race approaches. You stop missing runs. (-3 seconds but climbing!)
7. Rotting, ditched, recently uncovered animal carcass odor smells like creeping death on running path. (+ 3 seconds as you make crinkle face Ewww noise but still pause to gawk at the remains.)
8. You stop saying “fuck it, it’s too cold out” before skipping a run and returning to the couch, TV, and your stretchy, elastic-banded fat pants. (-2 seconds)
9. Re—hydrate with New Coke. (indeterminate but probably -75 seconds)

See how easy it is to get faster? Why waste your time with intervals? Take off some layered clothing, stop skipping runs and VIOLA!, you’re faster! Yasso can kiss my asso. I shaved a good 30 seconds off my 10 mile pace in the span of six weeks just by following those 9 rules without doing a single 800. (Okay, maybe I did a few 800’s but I didn’t need to and that’s really my point.)

This isn’t the only secret I have. Come fall, I can help you rake those pesky leaves TONS faster than how you are doing it now. (Hint: Rule #1: Wait for first snow fall.)

Now that I’ve shared them, please forget them immediately. They are super secret and thus, not to be known. Don’t make me send Jimmy Hoffa after you. (Yes, he’s alive and living in Atlantis with the cast of Mad About You. Paul Reiser says 'Hello'.)

Happy trails.