diff --git a/training/tesstrain.sh b/training/tesstrain.sh
index 37de22222d..c1af1e86c1 100755
--- a/training/tesstrain.sh
+++ b/training/tesstrain.sh
@@ -49,11 +49,8 @@ source `dirname $0`/tesstrain_utils.sh
 ARGV=("$@")
 parse_flags
 
-tlog "\n=== Starting training for language '${LANG_CODE}'"
-
-tlog "Cleaning workspace directory ${TRAINING_DIR}..."
 mkdir -p ${TRAINING_DIR}
-rm -fr ${TRAINING_DIR}/*
+tlog "\n=== Starting training for language '${LANG_CODE}'"
 
 source `dirname $0`/language-specific.sh
 set_lang_specific_parameters ${LANG_CODE}
diff --git a/training/tesstrain_utils.sh b/training/tesstrain_utils.sh
index 2983764978..30006bc1f7 100755
--- a/training/tesstrain_utils.sh
+++ b/training/tesstrain_utils.sh
@@ -25,7 +25,7 @@ OUTPUT_DIR="/tmp/tesstrain/tessdata"
 OVERWRITE=0
 RUN_SHAPE_CLUSTERING=0
 EXTRACT_FONT_PROPERTIES=1
-WORKSPACE_DIR="/tmp/tesstrain"
+WORKSPACE_DIR=`mktemp -d`
 EXPOSURES=0
 
 # Logging helper functions.