One. Single. Mile. For many, the distance is equally attainable and intimidating. When motivation is waning, it’s common to tell yourself “just do one mile” to get going. But when it’s time to race that mile? Well, that’s a different beast.
“The mile will take you to your threshold nearly the entire time,” says Ashley Paulson, certified iFit trainer and run coach. “You’ll feel your lungs burn and the blood in your legs pulsing.” But that doesn’t (and shouldn’t) stop us from trying to get faster at the 1600-meter distance. “As runners, we are always pushing our own boundaries,” Paulson says. “The mile is a great way to check your cardiovascular fitness, it’s a good tool to predict other race times, and it can serve as a baseline for programming other running workouts.”
So, to test your skills and have your best performance come race day, steal these tips on how to run a faster mile.
7 Strategies for Running a Faster Mile
1. Know Where You're Starting
“How can you know where you’re going if you don’t know where you are?” Paulson says. “Watching yourself improve is the biggest motivator.” That’s why she recommends doing a time trial before you actually begin training to run a faster mile.
You don’t have to wait for an organized event to establish your starting point. Yes, there are benefits to doing so—a mapped-out and timed course, plus the adrenaline and energy from the crowd—but there are also variables outside of your control at races.
When doing your own time trial, Paulson says, you can pick how soon you test, where you do it, and which weather conditions you’ll run in. (Feel free to skip a rainy day.) Paulson recommends doing your trial run four to six weeks prior to “game day” to give your body enough time to build up the power and endurance you’ll need to cross the finish line faster.
2. Kick Up Your Cadence
“Most new runners have a stride turnover that’s too slow,” Paulson says. But learning how to take Races & Places can help improve your pace, she adds. (Research shows it may also minimize your chances of injury.)
Your ideal cadence is personal—Paulson aims for 180 to 190 steps per minute. In general, though, research suggests that a 10 percent increase from wherever you’re at now can help reduce the impact on knees and hips, lowering the risk of aches and pains. If you don’t have a watch that determines your cadence, you can easily count how many times your foot hits the ground while running for one minute—double that to account for both feet—a test Paulson suggests doing once a week.
If you need to quicken your steps, Paulson suggests using a metronome app. You can set it to your ideal cadence and it’ll ping every time your foot should contact the ground. It’s also smart to search for songs featuring the beats per minute (BPM) you want to step to and create a playlist from those songs so you can run to the music. (You can also search Spotify for specific BPM playlists.) Another option: Hop on a treadmill, as experts have found treadmill runners typically have a higher stride rate when compared with those who run outdoors.
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3. Home in on Hills
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Research from South Dakota deems them worth it, too: After six weeks of hill workouts twice a week, runners increased their top speed—and held that faster pace for 32 percent longer. It’s best to incorporate hard hill workouts every other week as part of speed training, Paulson says.
An example workout: After your warmup, set your incline to 5 percent and run for one minute at goal pace. Then, recover for one minute, stepping off the belt. Repeat for three sets, slowly building to five or six sets throughout training. Not Sure What to Wear on a Run? This Tool Can Help The Case For Not Running.
Also, aim for significant inclines. In the study mentioned above, runners set their treadmills to a 10 percent incline—a fairly steep grade.
4. Take on Tabatas
Interval workouts The Case For Not Running can make or break your PR attempt. Regularly adding them to your (how much oxygen your body can use during exercise) and lowering your resting heart rate. They’re ideal because the working periods are just long enough to stress both your aerobic and anaerobic systems—both of which are used during a one-mile race—without putting you at risk of injury or overwork, says Danny Mackey, head coach of Brooks Beast track club.
Try this treadmill Tabata once a week: After a warmup, set your incline to 1 or 2 percent. Run at 10 percent above your mile goal pace for 20 seconds, then recover for 10 seconds. Repeat for eight total rounds (that’s four minutes). If you feel like you have more left in the tank after completing the above set, do another, Paulson says. Just take a two-minute recovery walk before beginning your next four-minute set. Then wrap up with a five- to 10-minute cooldown.
5. Add in Some Strength
Mackey says strength-training has a two-fold benefit: It not only helps prevent injury, it’s also great at building your power on the run, which ultimately increases your speed.
Science backs him up. Research in the Journal of Sports Sciences on more than 500 athletes found that runners who practiced jump training, or plyometrics, saw improvements in sprint performance. To get the most from your strength sessions, Mackey suggests plyometric routines focused on the posterior chain or back of the body and transverse abdominals (the deep ab muscles that wrap around you like a corset), as these muscle groups help keep your running form in check.
6. Go the Distance
Advertisement - Continue Reading Below long runs into your schedule to produce muscular and cardiovascular benefits that come into play on race day, including endurance. You’ll gain mental payoffs with longer distances, too. “If I’ve [done] three- to four-mile training runs, then I know I can smash one mile at a faster pace,” Paulson says.
How far you go in these long runs depends on your skill and experience, but Mackey says 45 minutes is a good starting point for most runners, ideally building up to 90 minutes. Aim to do a long run once every seven to 10 days and keep it easy, running at a conversational pace.
7. Pace Yourself but Push It
The mile puts an interesting flex on your brain power. Because the distance is so short, if you’re trying to PR, it’s going to feel tough. But how hard is too hard? How do you know you’re pushing enough at the start without ruining the finish?
Give A Gift breathing. “If you start getting to the point where you’re hyperventilating, you’ve pushed it way too far,” Mackey says. If your breathing is labored yet rhythmic, and it slows down as soon as you slow your speed, then you’re likely in a good, controlled position.
Check form, too. “At the very end of a mile—we’re talking the last 100 or 200 meters—you might look like somebody running on sand, uphill, into wind,” Mackey says. “But before that, you should have control over your form.” If someone were to tell you to run taller, you should be able to do so. If you can’t, you might need to reel in your speed.
For a gut check, Paulson says to track your 200-, 400-, and 800-meter workouts leading up to the race. That way you have reference material if a pace starts to feel unrealistic. “You’ll know the times you’ve been running your speed drills, so you can go [into the mile knowing what pace] is going to push you, but also what’s attainable if you fight for it.”
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Samantha Lefave is an experienced writer and editor covering fitness, health, and travel. She regularly interviews pro athletes, elite trainers, and nutrition experts at the top of their field; her work has appeared in Runner's World, Bicycling, Outside, Men's Health and Women's Health, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, and more.
