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The title of this post is a question I’ve been asked many times since I’ve been coaching athletes. And it’s a fair question. I mean, that’s the logical conclusion, isn’t it?

Well, it is logical, but counter-intuitively, it’s not strictly true.

While training slow and at low intensities all the time will make you good at going slowly and at low intensity, a critical mass of long slow training will actually make you faster in the end. Of course, that’s on the understanding that long slow distance isn’t all you - but more about that at the end of the post.

Among other things, long slow (or steady) training will do the following for you:

• Done right, it’ll teach your system how to become more dependent on fat for fuel rather than sugar - as you’ve got enough fat to fuel days of exercise, but only enough sugar for a couple of hours or so, this is brilliant news for endurance athletes.
• Long steady distance training accustoms your ligaments and tendons to the stress that your sport will place upon them. When you come to the part of your training where you want to work on speed or power, they’ll be less likely to become injured.
• If you’re training in cold weather (like winter), training at lower intensities makes you less susceptible to getting ill. Breathing cold air at high intensity over extended periods isn’t great for your lungs. And as endurance athletes are quite susceptible to upper respiratory infections, you need to keep this in mind.
• Slow recovery workouts help to loosen up your muscles and give your body a small training effect, thus avoiding the fitness losses associated with even 3 or 4 days of inactivity, while avoiding the kind of stress that’s likely to push you over the edge.

But as I mentioned earlier in the post, long slow training by itself will get you to your peak speed. You need to add small amounts of hill repetitions, speedwork, threshold intervals and other speed-enhancing stuff in order to get the most out of yourself. The key however, is small amounts at the correct time.

In the meantime, keep most of the training … slow.