RUNNERS LINGO

As someone who has been part of a running group for almost 20 years, I consider myself well and truly immersed in the running community, the culture and unique lingo that comes with it.I’ll often find myself talking about running with my ‘non runner’ friends, only to be met with blank looks. This could be due to the fact that surprisingly not everyone finds ‘running’ to be much of a Saturday night topic or that some of the words used in our world of running, only exist in our world.
If you’re relatively new to the running scene, I’ll give you a crash course on a few common ones…

Minutes instead of Hours - I’m not sure at which point a runner decided that they had run for 75 minutes rather than 1 hour and 15 minutes. Maybe it was to be more efficient with their words, maybe 75 minutes sounds more impressive than 1 hour 15?
A recent Run Rabbit social media poll showed a pretty even split between ‘75 minute’ and ‘1hr15’ people, with most ‘75 minuters’ being long time club runners, so there ya go.
Note: If we start talking about race results over ‘90 minutes’, then you’re not going to get a funny look in a running store if you say you ran 2 hours 10 minutes, rather than 130 minutes. It’s a bit like saying your baby is 36 months old… mate, your baby is 3. 

Threshy - Short for ‘Threshold’ run, the actual specifics of what constitutes a ‘threshy’ is often debated amongst distance running diehards. For most people out there, a threshy is a medium to hard pace that you can comfortably hold for a sustained period of time. The word threshold relates to lactic threshold, which is the point before your legs get heavy from building up too much lactic acid.
So the next time a runner says ‘I did a threshy’, you know that they ran quicker than a jog but not so hard their legs felt like cement.

Pick Up - Could also be known as a progression run. As the name suggests, it’s a run where you’re picking up or progressing the pace throughout the run. You may run for 30 minutes and aim to run a bit faster every 10 minutes. This is often a staple of our Run Rabbit program. 

Off 60 - The full phrase may be ‘I did 4 x 1 kilometre efforts off 60’. The ‘off 60’ generally means they had 60 seconds recovery between 1kms. Once again, using 60 seconds instead of 1 minutes… don’t ask for an explanation on this part.
Keep in mind that ‘off 60’ isn’t to be confused with ‘4 x 1km off a 5 minute cycle’. This would mean that they would start a 1km effort every 5 minutes, leaving any extra time for recovery. For example, if you finish your 1km in 4:30, then you have 30 seconds to recover.

Negative Split - Completing the second half of a run quicker than the first half.
A positive split is completing the second half of a run slower than the first half.
What are some of the top distance running coaching tips you’ll hear...  ‘pace yourself’, ‘go easy at the start, go hard at the end’. Nailing a negative split isn’t easy but when pulled off can lead to good race results and an awesome feeling as you cross the finish line.


That’s all for this weeks episode of ‘Runners Lingo’ and I hope this will see you through your next chat at the local running store or being able to navigate Strava more confidently, finally cracking some of the codes to the language of our running subculture.