For a tempo run, you start, as usual, with a warm up jog of, say ten minutes. The next step is to increase your pace to where it is still comfortable, but represents more effort than easy jogging. Hold that for, say, five minutes.
Now you'll increase your pace again to 5K pace or a little faster. This stage should be uncomfortable, but not an all-out effort, because you need to sustain it for five minutes or so. This is the speed training part of the tempo run.
For the fourth part of the tempo run, you'll back off to
the same level as the second part -- comfortable, but not too easy.
(This is the test of your endurance: you need to resist the temptation
to believe that you have finished your speed training
and can can now ease back to a recovery jog.) Hold this pace for five
minutes, and complete your tempo run with a five minute easy jog or
walk to cool down.
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