This is Ask Coach Parry, and today we have a short, sweet and simple question in from Alex Flemming. He says he is tired after his speed session, he can’t run properly for the rest of the week. Please can you help?

Brad Brown: This is Ask Coach Parry, and today we have a short, sweet and simple question in from Alex Flemming. He says he is tired after his speed session, he can’t run properly for the rest of the week. Please can you help?

Lindsey Parry: That is a very basic question with very basic information. But it does lead me to believe he is running his speed session way too fast. We know that we recover much slower from high intensity sessions than we do to running easy.

But even really long easy runs which do take their toll, take less out of you than a really hard high intensity session. He is doing those intensity sessions way too hard for his current level, and that is why he is struggling for the rest of the week –either, but probably not limited to, fatigue and being sore.

I'm guessing he’s not able to run properly because he is probably very stiff, and again that is a sign that he has over done it. Whenever you do a speed session, you must always make it relative to something – some kind of known quantity.

How do you avoid really sore legs on speed sessions?

The easiest way to do that is to do a time trial, 4km,5km or 8km time trial and when you do your speed sessions, you run your 1km repeats at 3 to 4 seconds per kilometre faster. If you’re doing a 400m, a short session, you would run it at 8 to maybe 10 or 12 seconds per kilometre faster.

That way you prevent yourself from getting really really sore legs from doing a speed session.