We're all guilty of it. If the coach tells us we should be running at 10km, 5km or 3km pace, it often ends up that we will run faster than that. Because surely, training is all about pushing yourself as hard as possible, right?

Wrong. Training our bodies for distance running requires discipline, and keeping even speeds throughout. If you're running 10 reps of 2 minutes at 5km pace, for example, you should aim to keep the pace even throughout the session. Running the first rep at 3km pace and the final rep at 10km pace is no fun and doesn't train the body as efficiently.

In order to help people pace themselves accordingly on the track, here's a spreadsheet translating 5km and 10km race times into paces and 100m, 200m and lap times, as well as the corresponding target distance at that pace for one, two , three and four minutes.

So if, for example, you know what you would be able to race 5km (parkrun distance) in, this will tell you how long it should take you to reach 100m and 200m (and the full lap mark if it's less than 2 minutes), as well as the total distance you should expect to cover in two minutes.

Happy (adequately paced) running!