Running

Not necessarily – I used to do 10km in c.39m, but smashed my knee up a few years back and went to ultra instead. Did a 12km XC in 48m a few weeks back – that’s on no speed training in years. It’s still not Hobo fast, but faster than I thought possible without training ‘fast’.

Other people have told me they increased short distance speed only doing long-distance running, this is the first time I've seen it.

If you train hard enough you'll be half decent at most things, think the point is that intervals, tempo running and hill reps are a more efficient way of doing it than going long!