The Mona Fartlek
I recently sat down with Australian Olympian Steve Moneghetti to discuss his training, career, and values. Read on for a description and history of his now-famous Mona Fartlek, or follow this link to listen to my interview with him for free.
I know just three Swedish terms: fartlek, Ikea, and Mondo Duplantis.
And while vaulting poles and blending a furniture shopping experience with some meatballs and DIY are both things that I would happily write about, fartlek – a term loosely translated from Swedish as “speed play” – is the topic of today’s article.
Developed just under a century ago by Swedish Olympian Gösta Holmér, a fartlek run is most simply described as a continuous run comprised of alternating periods of faster and slower running. A well-designed fartlek session can touch on all energy systems, providing a great deal of conditioning in a natural, often undulating setting (anyone who regularly performs fartleks on a track is free to close this tab now).
While Swedish in its origin, the simplicity, effectiveness, and adaptability of fartlek training meant it quickly found its way to neighbouring Finland, where it contributed to the success of Paavo Nurmi and his band of Flying Finns. The global fame Nurmi attained (yes, in the 1930s distance runners somewhat regularly achieved household name status) led many to study his training methods, which quickly saw fartlek training funnelled out to the rest of the world.
The Birth of the Mona Fartlek
So, by the time a 20-year-old Steve “Mona” Moneghetti called his coach Chris Wardlaw in 1983 to discuss his training for the coming weeks, the fartlek was a staple of almost every serious distance running program.
“Tuesday night, do a bit of fartlek,” Wardlaw informed his protégé, offering no further explanation to a man who would never do something so ambiguous as “a bit of fartlek.”
“That’s not going to work in my world; we need to have it a bit more structured than that. How long?” Mona responded.
“Oh, I don’t know, about 20 minutes?”
Satisfied he’d provided enough guidance, Wardlaw moved on to discussing the long run while his pupil scribbled out the session that would come to be known as the Mona Fartlek.
The workout became Mona’s Tuesday night ritual (one he still observes), forming part of a training regimen that would guide the Australian to three top-ten Olympic marathon finishes, a world championship bronze medal, four Commonwealth Games medals, wins at the Tokyo and Berlin marathons, and no less than 11 World Cross Country teams.
The Session
2 x 90 seconds hard with 90 seconds float between reps
4 x 60 seconds hard with 60 seconds float between reps
4 x 30 seconds hard with 30 seconds float between reps
4 x 15 seconds hard with 15 seconds float between reps
The “float” refers to a steady yet manageable pace. Different athletes looking to achieve different training outcomes will vary what this recovery looks like, with marathon folk barely dropping the pace at all, while middle-distance runners might enjoy a slow jog recovery. Regardless, these recovery periods should feel like active recovery, allowing you to catch your breath without fully easing off the gas.
If you keep the intensity relatively high the whole time, the workout will develop multiple energy systems simultaneously. The longer intervals tap aerobic capacity, while the progressive intensity builds toward the anaerobic power needed for the final 15-second bursts. The tempo-pace recovery teaches the body to recycle and clear lactate while maintaining speed, which is precisely the skill needed when competitors surge mid-race.
This design addresses Mona’s original goal: developing the ability to handle the unpredictable pace changes thrown by African competitors who “had a habit of surging mid-race”. The workout's structure mirrors the tactical demands of championship marathon racing, where maintaining composure through repeated surges often determines the winner.
Steve Moneghetti poses in front of Lake Wendouree, the place where he first ran the Mona Fartlek
As mentioned, the beauty of fartleks lie, in part, in their adaptability, and the Mona Fartlek has not been spared the myriad of alterations so often imposed by athletes and coaches looking to squeeze every bit of specificity (imagined or real) out of tweaking an established workout. Be it a 15-minute tempo run before the first rep or doubling back for a second consecutive Mona Fartlek, runners all over the world have made changes to the way the session is run.
But the man himself doesn’t mind, so long as people are doing it in a way that permits consistency.
“I was running 200km a week. I was so tired. One Mona Fartlek was enough for me because I did all this base training to make myself tired, and then I had these spikes of really intense sessions on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. It’s not one super session that makes you a great distance runner; it’s consistency over many weeks, months, and years.”
Even yours truly is guilty of making quite a common change to the session, dropping the 4 x 15s in favour of two extra 30-second reps.
“A lot of people don’t like the 15s; I actually love the 15s because I would try to actually get my speed back…because they’re short enough that I could do that and get away with it,” Steve explained in a recent conversation with me.
But, regardless of whether you keep the original or put your own twist on things, all are obliged to take part in one of our sport’s weirder running jokes (no pun intended): expressing your frustrations at once again failing to achieve that elusive sub-20-minute Mona.
Only then have you truly completed a Mona Fartlek.