First, a disclaimer (starting the article with some sexy talk for all the lawyers in the house). There is no single way to train for a longer ultramarathon. Each person can succeed through a bunch of different approaches, and this one may not be right for you.

If you鈥檝e read these articles over the years, you know I hate giving specific advice without five non-controversial articles from medical journals to back it up. I鈥檓 like the annoying character on a TV drama that always says why the seemingly incontrovertible evidence the hero has gathered might be wrong. My style is basically Scully from X-Files mixed with a golden retriever.

RELATED READING:

However, one thing I always see is people being so daunted by the general idea of the 50-mile distance (and higher) that they never chase the goals that truly ignite their passion. They often think it requires tons of weekly miles, a Wolverine-like recovery ability, or a Batman-like ability to be way too confident in one鈥檚 abilities. In other words, they think longer ultras are for superhumans.

But ultras are for everyone who is motivated by the allure of seeing just how far they can go. This article goes over some principles that you can apply to your training if you鈥檙e debating going over 50K, and it even provides specifics through a 12-week intermediate training plan starting at 30 miles per week. The goal isn鈥檛 to tell you how to train, since like the number of analogies that is excessive in a trail-running article, I don鈥檛 know the answer to that question. Instead, it鈥檚 designed for athletes without coaches or backgrounds in training philosophy looking for a quick guide to chasing their scariest dreams. Let鈥檚 start with six big principles:

1. Overall training load is less important than specific training stress. (Translation: you don鈥檛 need to run crazy-high mileage, though some big weeks and back-to-back long runs can help.)

Top road-marathon performances often involve more training mileage than top ultra-trail performances. That seems counter-intuitive. Shouldn鈥檛 longer distances reward even more miles in training? The reason that isn鈥檛 always the case is that marathon performances are usually aerobically limited, with velocity around aerobic threshold being most important and biomechanical resilience being secondary. In ultras, ability to withstand biomechanical stresses often matters more than the raw power of the aerobic engine.

Marathoners run huge volume and do massive workouts because it鈥檚 the best way to optimize aerobic development and running economy, whereas ultramarathoners are usually more focused on handling the unique demands of performance over rocks and vert for many hours.

For ultra athletes, it鈥檚 hard to prepare for the acute stresses of long runs and mountain runs while also under high levels of chronic stress from extra-high volume unless they have a big base and durability to match. There are tons of stories that illustrate the point. Cat Bradley averaged 66 miles per week before winning the 2017 Western States 100, Zachary Ornelas averaged 60 miles per week before winning the 2018 U.S. 50 Mile Champs, just last week Kat Drew averaged 52 miles per week before winning the Chuckanut 50K. You鈥檒l rarely see similar stories of pro marathoners consistently below 80 to 100 miles per week (though there are plenty of examples in both directions).

For your training, focus on building up to key efforts that simulate the demands of race day. That can be extra-long runs or training races (see week four in the plan) or back-to-back long runs that spur glycogen depletion and stress the musculoskeletal system (see weeks two, three, and five in the plan). Chronic stress matters (weekly miles), but acute stress matters more (key specific efforts on terrain like race day).

2. Running economy at higher intensities correlates with economy at lower intensities, like those on race day. (Translation: speed matters.)

Studies show that output (around a one-hour effort) generally corresponds with performance at distances that are both shorter and farther than one hour. While there are tons of variables in long ultras and it won鈥檛 be an exact correlation with speed, optimizing running economy at faster paces usually makes slower paces more efficient.

In other words, going out and slogging through the miles each day just improves your slogging ability, and slogging ability can only improve so much over time. A faster 10K or ten-mile race pace will usually correspond to a faster all-day pace with a moderate amount of specific training, and it will reinforce adaptations that can compound over multiple training cycles. That running economy includes low-level aerobic development from easy days and top-end sustainable speed from and intervals. This is all a convoluted way of saying that well-rounded training will improve ultra performance, plus it may allow for more than just focusing on long trail days with lots of climbing.

For your training, it鈥檚 important to work on running economy most of the year to avoid plateauing and eventually regressing from not reinforcing neuromuscular adaptations needed to run fast. In practice, that probably means doing strides (most Tuesdays and Sundays in the plan), shorter workouts (most Wednesdays in the plan) and some longer tempo runs (some Saturdays).

3. However, your 鈥渕inimum velocity鈥� will often be more relevant on race day than your velocity at lactate or aerobic thresholds. (Translation: be a confident hiker and consider cross training.)

This principle is adapted from something I heard from coach and athlete Ian Sharman, who talked in a about making sure your least-common-denominator pace (what you can do when the stuff hits the fan) is optimized. means being able to hike fast uphill and run efficiently downhill late in races. I don鈥檛 care how fast someone is, if they slow to a crawl when hiking or lose the ability to run downhills on pounded legs, then they will probably be doing the slowest walk of shame late in ultras (trust me, I鈥檝e been there).

In training, make sure you are a confident hiker. Practice on trail runs (weekends in the plan), possibly add treadmill hikes of 20 to 30 minutes at 15 percent grade and four-plus miles per hour (Wednesdays after week seven in the plan), and consider adding nature hikes when it sounds fun. Run downhills purposefully in long runs to prepare the legs for the pounding of race day, gobbling up free speed in the process. Cross train/strength train if you have time and energy to spare.

4. Biomechanical stresses of downhills often cause more breakdown than aerobic and musculoskeletal stresses of uphills (Translation: practice efficient downhill running)

Every downhill is an opportunity. Running downhills in ultras, most athletes will be well below aerobic threshold, with low heart rates even at solid paces. Theoretically, that means it should be all-day pace. In practice, though, the biomechanical and neuromuscular demands of downhill running can cause breakdown and residual fatigue that makes what should be an easy effort feel impossible.

Here, it鈥檚 more about practice of a skill than the more painful adaptations from going hard. To practice, use several long runs (some Saturdays in the plan) as a chance to work on purposeful downhills. The body adapts to with just a few bouts of steep downhill running, so the biomechanical adaptations don鈥檛 take much reinforcement. Neuromuscularly, it鈥檚 tough at first, but eventually it becomes second nature. Plus, it鈥檚 where a lot of experienced trail runners describe 鈥渇inding flow鈥� of being in the moment, with a little bit of effortless transcendence mixed in.

5. Glycogen depletion can cause substantial decreases in output. (Translation: practice pacing and fueling.)

As described in a recent by coach and athlete Corrine Malcolm, ultras really are an eating competition. Studies show that low glycogen can decrease power output even before the dreaded bonk, so it鈥檚 important to stay on top of fueling. Part of that comes from pacing, with higher-intensity efforts burning more glycogen relative to fat, making it essential not to go out too fast. And part is adapting the small intestine to absorb nutrients during activity, which can be trained relatively rapidly.

In training, consider practicing race-day fueling on most runs over 90 minutes. There are other approaches that can work for some athletes, but most of us should just focus on excelling in the eating competition.

6. Unique psychological demands of race day require practicing performance-enhancing tips from sports psychology. (Translation: positive self-talk is key.)

If you sign up for an ultra, you are doing it because it鈥檚 hard. Doing it without difficulty being a primary motivation would be like getting to the cashier at the post office and asking where you can find the milk. Sports psychology shows that can super-charge performance, reducing perceived exertion and actually improving fitness over time.

Let鈥檚 think about why that is. Imagine you鈥檙e doing that 5 x 3-minute hill workout in week seven of the plan. That one hurts. It often hurts really, really bad.

Or does it? What if it hurts 鈥済ood鈥� instead? By changing the narrative around exertion to something positive, an athlete may avoid the slight panic that can set in on hard efforts or some of the fatigue of long efforts. They might be a touch faster, and even if they aren鈥檛, they鈥檒l be less stressed. shows that stress can have a primary influence on adaptation. So it鈥檚 possible that just by thinking positive thoughts about yourself and what you are doing, your physiology can adapt better to the same stimulus.

More importantly, it鈥檚 way more fun to go around thinking about how awesome you are. And on race day, that might be what gets you out of the chair at the mile-40 aid station.

There are lots more principles that are relevant, but if you鈥檝e read this far, I assume endurance is already your strong suit. So we鈥檒l stop there for now. The big message is pretty simple.

Be consistent, get fast, stay fast, go long in moderation and believe in yourself. Do that, and there is no trail race you can鈥檛 conquer with a smile.

Sample 12-week plan (starting at a consistent, healthy 30 miles per week)

Note: This plan might not work for you. In fact, it might be too general to work for anybody. But it illustrates some of the principles above for a template athlete with no coach and limited background in training philosophy that wants to step up to longer ultras.

Double note: I just realized that note is not adequately expressing positive self-talk. (Looks in mirror). It鈥檚 a great plan. You got this.

David Roche partners with runners of all abilities through his coaching service, . His book, The Happy Runner, is about moving toward unconditional self-acceptance in a running life, and it鈥檚 available now at .

The post How to Train for Your First Ultra over 50K appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

This article was first published by .

I had a brief flirtation with running in seventh grade. That dalliance culminated at a local 5K, where I ran a relatively impressive race. After the awards ceremony, a spectator came up to me and offered congratulations. He looked a bit like Gandalf, so even though he talked a bit like Elmer Fudd, I listened to what he said next. And it was a training tip! Score!

Only it was total crap, a formula for calculating body weight based on height that he indicated would help me when I went to high school a couple years later. Country Gandalf couldn鈥檛 be wrong in my impressionable eyes, nor could numbers. I was on the school trivia team after all, a born mathlete. So I tried to solve that equation.

Over the next few months, I lost some weight. I also lost a solid chunk of hair from underfueling. I eventually quit running, moved to football, and later realized that what I thought was wisdom was actually bullshit.

The training tip that sent me astray as a kid could be summed up as 鈥測ou need to weigh a certain amount to reach your potential.鈥� This type of horrid advice misses the nuance of individual variation: what works in moderation for some people could cause a physiological shitstorm for others. Everything that goes into training is complicated, from workout design to weekly structure to every physical and mental input imaginable. It can be easy to summarize that complication into a formula that is pseudoscience or superstition wrapped up in a coating of certainty that makes it feel helpful.

This article points out 10 of those types of tips, with each of them usually starting at a place of well-meaning associations, and sometimes ending at a place of actively unhelpful misinformation. Let鈥檚 start with the bad tip that I heard as a kid.

Bad Tip One: Your Body Needs to Look a Certain Way or Weigh a Certain Amount

Being an athlete is all about finding your strong. Every runner that has long-term growth and success fuels their body adequately. For some athletes, that leads to complying with that formula espoused by Mr. Crap-Face. For other athletes, it means a body that looks different and weighs more or less. All are equally valid. And here鈥檚 the biggest point of all: all are optimizing what they are capable of given their unique genetics and backgrounds.

The problem is that a formula might be interpolated from an outlier, a person that won an Olympic medal or Western States. Interpolating from outliers is crap science, and it鈥檚 crap physiology. Athletes that try to fight against their unique genetics and backgrounds will not adapt to training stimuli efficiently, and will almost always get slower with time. That time might not be tomorrow, but trying to fit into someone else鈥檚 clothes or onto their scale is a ticking time bomb for athletic growth.

Three years ago, the New Zealand rowing team . A survey indicated that all but one athlete was at risk of low energy availability. Doctors, nutritionists, and coaches worked with athletes to change the culture and approach to fueling. Rower Brooke Donoghue summarized the wisdom that they applied leading up to the Olympics: 鈥淣ow I understand being lean isn鈥檛 a priority, being strong is,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t doesn鈥檛 matter what I sit at on the scales. It鈥檚 opened us up to understand it鈥檚 not about a number but more about a good feeling, knowing we鈥檙e fuelling well.鈥�

In Tokyo, Donoghue won a silver medal, and the whole team had breakthrough successes. Low energy availability from a focus on body weight . The New Zealand rowing team learned something else. Eating enough can fuel better performance, recovery, and adaptation. Food can act as a natural, legal, fun PED.

Move, eat, love, repeat. You found your strong. .

Bad Tip Two: Easy Runs Need to Be at a Certain Heart Rate All the Time

The body does not work in cordoned-off physiological zones, where exceeding aerobic threshold is a crime scene for athletic growth. When you feel good, your easy runs can be a bit faster. When you feel tired or are not recovering rapidly, your easy runs can put snails to shame. The require that an athlete listens to their body, not to a calculator.

This tip is grounded in the truth that easy runs can be very easy, and often should be very easy. The aerobic system should be built from the ground up. Just make sure that focusing on the aerobic system doesn鈥檛 neglect the musculoskeletal, biomechanical, and neuromuscular systems. You have to go faster to get faster, in moderation.

Bad Tip Three: To Be a Pro, You Have to Do Doubles/100 Miles a Week/Complicated Workouts

This is the general catch-all heading for tips that you might hear from an elite athlete talking about their own training. The problem is that all of these tips are overwhelmed by confounding variables, and sometimes people get the lines of causation mixed up. are an important feature of some pro athlete training, but also coincide with athletes that have the time and physiology to handle them. High-volume weeks can be a proxy variable for stress and adaptation, but the cells don鈥檛 give a single frick about a week, and only care about a mile in association with the chemical context that goes along with it (). Big double-threshold workouts or could help growth, but are also just a part of training for athletes that are tough as nails and have big dreams.

Successful athletes can likely be successful using multiple approaches, but we can鈥檛 prove a negative. So we are left adding up a bunch of N=1 experiments. Don鈥檛 feel obligated to mimic the specific approach that works for someone else. General principles are your friend (doubles/100-mile weeks = consistent and frequent chronic stress, workout design = efficient and strategic acute stress). Specific rules can just be dogma.

Bad Tip Four: It鈥檚 All About Time on Feet

This tip is mostly for the ultra crowd. Time on feet may be helpful if it involves moving efficiently on trails, including hiking, with plenty of time for recovery and adaptation. But there is no evidence and little physiological theory that chronic weekly totals of dozens of hours on feet will help an athlete move more efficiently (or be healthier). While that stuff may work for some people, you can be fast and healthy by spending time in the morning doing your activity, then living your life normally (periodically mixing in some bigger acute stresses along the way), even when training for races that take 12-24+ hours.

Bad Tip Five: The More training Volume and/or Vert, the Better

Connected to the last two points, volume and vert totals are proxy variables for stress. But they are not actual stress as experienced by the cells and body systems that drive performance. A 10-mile run might just be a 10-mile run. Or it might act a bit like a 20-mile run if you鈥檝e been up all night with a kid, are dealing with a mental health lull, or are preparing a work presentation. One of the hardests things to internalize for an athlete is that the body can actually adapt to the lower volume just as well as higher volume as long as stress is calibrated appropriately for their unique context.

The body doesn鈥檛 know miles, it knows stress. And more stress is not always better, particularly when some champions are specifically chosen due to being genetic anomalies when it comes to managing chronic training stress.

Bad Tip Six: You Should Hike a Hill in Training if You鈥檇 Hike It in Racing

Specificity is important sometimes, just don鈥檛 go overboard with it. I see so many athletes sell themselves short by hiking every uphill because they read that tip in an ultra running article, or heard it from a friend. The problem is that it鈥檚 very hard to level up if your brain is constraining you in advance of your body saying it needs constraints.

If you hike all of the time, . But if you are healthy enough to run, try to run a couple steps more on your next run. It can be so freaking exciting to see where this athletic journey goes when we take off the constraints that were holding us back.

Bad Tip Seven: You Can Always Get All of the Nutrition You Need from Food and Sunlight

Maybe you can! But through coaching and research, my wife/co-coach Megan and I see a lot of bloodwork, and there are many athletes that can鈥檛. Pay special attention to ferritin and vitamin D. Sometimes, leafy greens and UV rays don鈥檛 cut it, and that鈥檚 OK. If you鈥檙e unsure, get blood tests from your doctor or a company like Inside Tracker.

Bad Tip Eight: You Can鈥檛 Lose Fitness in a Taper

True, your aerobic system won鈥檛 undergo a fundamental remodeling in a couple weeks. But blood volume, VO2 max, cardiac output, and neuromuscular efficiency all can detrain rather quickly. It鈥檚 important to rest more, but don鈥檛 shut down like you鈥檙e a bear in November. Most of our athletes maintain their normal frequency at 30-50% lower training volume, with a rest day or two more for ultras, plus a bit of intensity too.

Bonus Tip: Minimal Shoes Are Better for Health and/or Performance

I don鈥檛 think people say this piece of advice anymore, but it鈥檚 worth addressing just in case someone went into a coma after reading Born To Run. First, to that coma person, did you like The Apprentice? You won鈥檛 now.

Second, for the love of all that is good in this world, wear shoes that are comfortable for you, not shoes that are comfortable for someone who may or may not have a functioning achilles tendon in a few years. Different things work for everyone.

Bad Tip Nine: Death Before DNF

Running is not a test, it鈥檚 a celebration.

As Dani Rojas said in Ted Lasso, 鈥淸The sports psychologist] helped me remember that even though futbol is life, futbol is also death. And that futbol is futbol too. But mostly that futbol is life!鈥�

Whether you get to the finish line or not, you find out that you are just carrying what you brought with you during the journey. Throughout the process, you are awesome and you are enough just as you are. Races celebrate that awesomeness. They will never prove anything, because you have nothing to prove in the first place. Running is running, not a verdict on self-worth.

As told me, it often takes courage to DNF. Let鈥檚 celebrate those 鈥渇ailures鈥� too, because running is also death.

BUT MOSTLY RUNNING IS LIFE!

Bad Tip 10: Don鈥檛 Fuel Your Long Runs

I鈥檇 argue that is looking at the wrong side of the equation to improve performance. Yes, it may improve energy efficiency in moderation for some male athletes. But instead of that, how about we train to crank up output so damn high that an athlete can get faster and faster without messing with sensitive metabolic pathways. Touching that upper-end output unequivocally requires fueling in longer runs.

But more importantly, energy deficits and low energy availability can set off endocrine and nervous system cascades that cause major health issues. Female athletes are especially at risk, with studies showing no adaptation benefit to fasted training, but major risk to bone health and sex hormone balance.

My takeaway: At its best, indiscriminate fasted running risks making athletes more efficient at being slightly inefficient. At its worst, fasted running can cause health crises.

This article just points out that what works for you might be different than what works for someone else. That individual variation can make running training nerve wracking, uncertain, and difficult. But I also think that not being 100% sure of the right answers all the time is what makes training incredibly freaking cool.

The post Runners, Ignore These Popular Training Tips appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Let鈥檚 start with a thought exercise.听Remember: the brain burns a lot of calories, so make sure you have some chocolate ice cream handy to replenish your glycogen stores afterward.

Imagine a run where you go out and frolic in the forest for an hour, letting your body flow on downhills and push a bit on uphills. You get back, and you are glistening with the post-workout glow composed of sweat, joy and a little bit of stray mucus. That鈥檚 a great run, right?

Now imagine some other scenarios, like we鈥檙e conducting an imaginary scientific study. In the control group, the runner goes watchless, showing off a scandalously naked wrist. In another group, the runner wears a GPS watch, uploads the file afterward and is dismayed to be 42 seconds behind their best climb time on the hill, with a slower overall pace than expected.

Take bridge engineering for example. When calculating maximum load, it鈥檚 a physics equation. It doesn鈥檛 actually matter how the bridge feels that day.

Those athletes had the same run, but one is relaxed and the other discouraged. We鈥檒l get back to why that matters in a second. Before that, imagine yet another group, this one with an athlete that has a watch that gives mile splits. At the first mile, it beeps and vibrates. They look down and see . . . crap, 10 seconds slower than it felt. That runner turns around and goes home.

All three runners came in with the same physiology that day; however the third runner will develop less after the shorter run.

Here鈥檚 the really cool part: a developing area of training theory indicates that the relaxed runner may adapt more positively than the discouraged runner even though they underwent the same stimulus. On top of that, the stress they took into the workout can change how they perform and adapt.

Stress is the canvas on which athletes paint their training. If the canvas is waterlogged (or on fire), it鈥檚 tough to paint the Mona Lisa.

The Brain and Nervous System Can Be as Important as the Heart and Lungs

To summarize some of the work by researcher and coach John Kiely, the neurobiological context of training matters, often in non-linear and difficult-to-predict ways. Stress can cause long-term changes in adaptation processes from the cellular to the systemic levels. That way of thinking goes against how we traditionally envision cause-and-effect.

Take bridge engineering for example. When calculating maximum load, it鈥檚 a physics equation. It doesn鈥檛 actually matter how the bridge feels that day.

What if, instead of that, the bridge鈥檚 load-carrying capacity changed based on how the bridge felt about itself and what it was doing and what all the other bridges were saying about it? That would make it really hard to be a bridge engineer. The self-loathing bridge might break down at the first gust of wind, while the self-believing bridge might laugh in the face of earthquakes, even though all the other input variables are identical.

As much as it鈥檚 comforting to think we can control all of the variables, there is often little explanation beyond the amorphous concept of 鈥渟tress.鈥�

The same conundrum is faced by many runners, with input and output connected by an unpredictable maze of internal variables that are difficult to measure. Collectively, these internal variables can be characterized as stress: anything from higher training load causing fatigue or a busy life causing elevated levels of the hormone cortisol or menstrual cycle variability (or a judgmental GPS watch).

Anecdotally, I see stress-related phenomena all the time in coaching. My favorite examples involve 鈥淕PS dead zones鈥� where watches consistently show faster paces (like some tracks) or slower ones (often forested areas or trails with lots of switchbacks). In my experience, runners in the fast zones improve more rapidly than those in the slow zones, likely because they deal with less negative stress about their running.

If I were a contestant on Shark Tank, I would pitch a GPS watch that tells runners they are going 30 seconds per mile faster than they are.

鈥淏ut they aren鈥檛 actually going faster,鈥� Mark Cuban might say. 鈥淵ou鈥檙e lying.鈥�

鈥淭hey aren鈥檛 actually going faster聽yet,鈥� I鈥檇 respond. 鈥淛ust wait six months.鈥�

Injuries

I also see it with injuries and health. An athlete might be going through a stressful time at work, or a divorce or a pet鈥檚 death, and suddenly an injury appears. In some instances, it鈥檚 a diagnosable physical ailment, likely caused by increased stress that made the body less able to absorb a training stimulus. But here鈥檚 the really interesting thing: sometimes, the athlete will get an MRI that is entirely clean of ailments despite severe pain. On a few occasions, the pain lifted when the clean MRI results came back. On others, the severe pain vanished after the stress passed.

Psychosomatic pain could be playing a factor, when there are physical manifestations of mental struggles. But giving it a label could stigmatize it 鈥� just know we all go through it to a certain extent, even if it鈥檚 just fresher legs after a promotion or sorer legs after a crappy presentation.

I have seen miraculous workouts after runners got engaged, terrible ones when an athlete is distressed about work, long-term fitness growth in a time of spiritual contentedness and everything in between. As much as it鈥檚 comforting to think we can control all of the variables, there is often little explanation beyond the amorphous concept of 鈥渟tress.鈥�

There Are No Universal Answers to the Stress Problem

The stress equation is complicated. Stress influences how you feel going into a workout, how your body performs during the workout and how it adapts after the workout.

Some underlying psychological mechanisms are likely similar to those discussed last week, related to聽. Maybe an uplifting or relaxed internal narrative makes for better daily runs by reducing perceived exertion (which, in itself is a catch-all, susceptible to several different variables), which makes for a better running over time.

In addition, as theorized by Kiely and shown in narrower circumstances across many studies, the neurobiological context of training changes how physiology works. If there is a surplus of negative stress, then it could lead to negative outcomes independent of what an athlete actually does in training.

This all sounds a bit up in the clouds, I get it. However, the takeaway message is simple: Think about stress (but not so much that it stresses you out). Every mile is not created equally for a single athlete over time, let alone when comparing across athletes. With that in mind, here are five quick-hitter things to remember or try:

• Don鈥檛 try to do the training of someone living a different life

A pro runner might lounge around napping all day while you sleep 4 hours a night. The runner down the street might work a chill office job while you do manual labor. Heck, your competitor might just naturally handle the same stresses differently than you do, with their neurological wiring set to Matthew McConaughey while yours is set to Gilbert Gottfried. So cut yourself some slack and don鈥檛 compare. As McConaughey would say, you鈥檒l be alright, alright, alright.

• Monitor stress over time, rather than viewing training in a silo

Tracking mood and emotions can help you determine how ready your body is for increased training, or you might find that you do best in a heightened state where you are dealing with good stressors that keep you engaged.

Usually, stress is subjective, but some people swear by heart-rate variability, a semi-controversial tool that measures changes in duration between heart beats. You could use resting heart rate in the AM as well. Just remember that even with those metrics, how they apply to you could be different than how they apply to others.

• Find relaxation techniques that work for you

Some people love , some like reading, others like Netflix and chilling. For everyone, the more sleep the better. Just make sure you don鈥檛 elevate constant stress as a virtue to be cultivated, like you鈥檒l see in many big law firms or universities.

• If you use GPS, consider removing mileage from the watch face

Your runs should be independent of what your watch is telling you about your runs. GPS can add purpose to training, provide some fun data to peruse and even help you make more memories through a digital snapshot. However, I ask athletes not to be aware of mile splits, and do almost all intervals by time instead of distance. And if you can鈥檛 separate what the watch says from your perception of the run and yourself, ditch it altogether.

• Think in terms of months and years, not days and weeks

The body is complicated, which makes sense because life and the universe are complicated. If the body handled stress in a straightforward, predictable way, it would be entirely out of character for what we know of existence. The unpredictability is especially evident if you zoom in and view training on the small-scale. Great workouts can come out of nowhere, as can injuries and three-hour crying episodes and the worst runs of your entire life. There鈥檚 a lot of noise mixed in with a little signal.

Instead, zoom out. Try to view your running training through a prism of long-term stress. Pay attention to how you actually feel (and not just physically). And remember to laugh as much as possible. There are no studies about how laughter affects performance, but we know聽. Thus, through a little extrapolation about what we know of stress and smiling, laughter might be the most productive workout you can do.

—

About the Author聽

David Roche partners with runners of all abilities through his coaching service, .听His book,聽Happy Runner, is co-written with his wife Megan and available for pre-order now at聽.

From

The post The Body Doesn鈥檛 Know Miles, It Knows Stress appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

You may have heard the training saying: 鈥淓asy runs easy; hard runs hard.鈥� I think there鈥檚 an important addition to a well-rounded training plan, particularly for trail runners: 鈥淢edium runs medium.鈥�

The strict polarization between easy and hard serves a purpose. The grey area between aerobic threshold (an effort you can sustain for a few hours or more) and lactate threshold (around an hour, with variance) is a bit like a vacation to Cancun. It鈥檚 fun to visit, but stay there too long and it starts to wear out its welcome, and before long you鈥檒l be covered in sunburn welts while Ted Cruz walks by in the saddest Hawaiian shirt. Countless running careers have been undercut in that grey area. But that doesn鈥檛 mean the grey area is all bad.

It gets back to the old correlation versus causation conundrum. Athletes that do their easy runs with too much effort likely have an overall approach to training that is less sustainable. They chase the quick gains and more impressive Strava files from moderate running, get some of those quick gains, then assume that those gains will continue. At that point, the transition from rapid initial gains to marginal long-term gains pulls them out to the deep end. They keep doing many moderate runs, see less progress, fail to adapt their training to a more polarized approach, and eventually find themselves treading water via injury or stagnation.

As discussed in this article on the , that model plays out every year in college programs across the country. Faster easy running often coincides with faster racing, leading to an association that can undercut growth after the aerobic, endocrine and nervous systems rebel against the chronic stress. Or in athletes that start their running journey later in life, any run might be moderate at first, creating an understanding that all running should be moderate even as fitness grows. That鈥檚 when you鈥檒l sometimes have success with interventions involving , since excessive moderate running can undermine both low-level aerobic efficiency and upper-level aerobic capacity.

The key word there is 鈥渆xcessive鈥� 鈥� we don鈥檛 need to throw the moderate-running baby out with the polarized-training bathwater. In fact, I am going on the record to say I am against throwing out babies or bathwater altogether. I am brave to take that stand, thank you for saying so.

In coaching, my wife Megan and I rarely program specific 鈥渕oderate鈥� days because these grey-area runs can be counterproductive when they are inefficient, like when completed on sore legs or during periods of high life stress. That is why doing moderate running all the time can be so negative 鈥� if an athlete feels like crap and forces the pace, it becomes a hard run that can tear them down. Instead, we use the looser term 鈥渆asy/moderate.鈥�

Easy/Moderate Definition

Easy/moderate runs involve starting very easy. As the run progresses, athletes have permission to find ease of motion without urgency, while covering ground with smooth flow on flats/downhills and efficient purpose on uphills. The runs are faster if an athlete feels good, slower if they don鈥檛. Heart rate may be below aerobic threshold on downhills and flats, and closer to lactate threshold on climbs. Essentially, easy/moderate runs allow training to be dictated by the body and brain, rather than obligation to numbers on a plan or compulsion to push each day to the limit. Two major physiological principles are important to apply easy/moderate runs.

Principle One: Steady running around aerobic threshold can have major benefits for endurance, or major negative effects when forced

Coach Renato Canova works with many of the best marathoners of all time, and these types of steady effort long runs are key to his system. In his book Marathon Training: A Scientific Approach, Canova refers to steady effort runs as being around what he calls aerobic lipidic power, essentially meaning the effort is both fast and sustainable. His training system for marathoners revolves around increasing that power so that output at lactate threshold and aerobic threshold get very close together. That鈥檚 why the top marathoners don鈥檛 look like they鈥檙e breathing all that hard at 5-minute miles 鈥� they have wildly impressive output around aerobic threshold.

Steady runs may improve lipid oxidation at higher outputs, whereas purely easy runs don鈥檛 always have the same benefit. In addition, these runs could improve the power and recruitment of Type-I slow-twitch muscle fibers, while also spurring the production of mitochondria and capillaries. And since the runs are faster, the muscular output is greater, leading to more strength.

But there are downsides too. Go too hard, and some of those aerobic benefits erode away, while endocrine and nervous system stresses go sky-high. A steady run forced on tired legs leads to injury risk, with little benefit other than mental toughness. And if you鈥檙e after mental toughness through increased discomfort, you could just stick your finger in the trash compactor.

We frame these runs as easy/moderate to emphasize that athletes should err on the side of relaxed. The goal is to run with as much pace as possible with as little effort as possible, since that is when running economy improves the most. And we don鈥檛 want to have to call a plumber to clean the trash compactor.

Principle Two: In trail running, athletes must train for the specific musculoskeletal demands of running efficiently over varied terrain

Steady runs are especially important for marathoners, who often use long runs to lock into faster paces. Meanwhile, easy/moderate runs are geared toward trail runners who are running over varied terrain, with different paces, outputs and even form depending on the trail. The trail athletes face a much wider range of musculoskeletal and biomechanical stresses, emphasizing the ATHLETE part of being a runner. Easy/moderate runs build specific adaptations to uphills and downhills, particularly during long runs that start to approximate race pace for ultra runners. We like athletes to apply five rules to add some structure to these unstructured effort days.

Guideline One: Start easy for the first 10 minutes

Let the body kick into a fully aerobic gear. No pace is too slow, like all easy runs.

Guideline Two: Let your body dictate the effort by finding ease of motion, without urgency

After those 10 minutes, listen to your body. What is it saying? 鈥淚 feel good and fresh鈥� = time to let the effort roll. 鈥淚 am a bit ragged鈥� = take it easier. 鈥淔ive, five dollar, five dollar foot loooong鈥� = go to Subway post-run. The cue of finding ease is what I like athletes to lock into in ultra races, and easy/moderate long runs are great for practice.

Guideline Three: Flow on the downs and smooth on the flats

On downhills, heart rate will be lower, so it鈥檚 a good time to practice running with focused, purposeful flow. As you adapt to the musculoskeletal demands, downhills will become free speed. On flatter terrain, embody smoothness with relaxed arms and no urgency.

Guideline Four: Efficient purpose on the ups, with the option to progress effort on good days

Easy/moderate runs can become extra effective workouts for trail runners due to the uphill stress. If you walk most of the ups in training, try to run a bit more. If you walk some of the ups, try to run all but the steepest grades. If you rarely walk, add a bit more power into your stride. For all athletes, on days you feel good, some of the steeper ups may approach , and that鈥檚 great for fitness. Just make sure you鈥檙e not fading too hard as the run goes on, which may indicate pacing that exceeds your current fitness levels.

Guideline Five: Fuel well

Because easy/moderate runs are higher overall effort, they are also higher risk. to improve endurance and adapt to the training you are doing, while also mitigating some of that risk.

For our athletes, easy/moderate long runs on trails are a staple outside of base period. Sometimes, they will even include 20-30 minute moderately hard tempo runs after a warm-up, which is how we without doing 30 or 40 mile runs in training. Every 4-6 weeks, a mid-week trail run may be a similar approach, often in .

Easy/moderate means that you鈥檙e giving your body the love and respect to let it tell you what it鈥檚 ready for. Use these runs in the context of a well-rounded training plan with high-end speed and low-end aerobic development, and your body will probably be telling you that it鈥檚 ready for race-day breakthroughs.

David Roche partners with runners of all abilities through his coaching service, . With Megan Roche, M.D., he hosts the on running (and other things), and they wrote a book called .

贵谤辞尘听

The post Increase Your Endurance by Embracing 鈥淢oderate鈥� Effort appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Hill intervals are mirrors. They reflect back what you see in yourself.

Each hill interval is slower than flat running. They are not comfortable, at least not in the same way that drinking a cup of hot cocoa under a weighted blanket is comfortable. It is a series of compromises layered on top of one another: speed versus pain, grit versus caution. You give so much and get back so little. I went on this hill workout journey and all I got was this stupid taste of pennies in my mouth.

The cool thing I have seen in training logs is that athletes usually report back something about their soul disguised as notes on a workout.

The cool thing I have seen in training logs is that athletes usually report back something about their soul disguised as notes on a workout. When they have practiced that all-caps BELIEF over months and years, they鈥檒l describe how it was tough but they conquered it. Rocked that crap. Crushed it. Little known fact: Britney wrote the song 鈥淲ork B#tch鈥� about them.

But when that belief is fraying at the edges, the reports are often different. It was hard, and the performance was weak. Meh. Their internal monologue is singing 鈥渃ause you had a bad day鈥� on repeat like it鈥檚 2005 all over again.

That鈥檚 the paradox of giving your all and in return just getting aching legs and the taste of bile. Going hard but going relatively slowly is a test of spirit as much as it鈥檚 a test of fitness.

And that鈥檚 just one of many reasons I love hill workouts

They鈥檙e a chance to hone that self-belief muscle, . They also have tons of physical benefits, as outlined in this more from last year. A 2017 in the journal Sports Medicine described how uphill running can involve increased internal mechanical work, often meaning greater muscular activity than the same effort on flat ground. That review article and some of the studies it cites describe how athletes may increase output on hill efforts.

And even if they don鈥檛, a in the Journal of Biomechanics found that uphill running decreased impact forces while increasing parallel propulsive peaks by 75 percent. In other words, there is likely less injury risk for the same workload, which is especially important for aging or injury-prone athletes. Finally, a in the European Journal of Applied Physiology described how running economy is correlated on uphill ground and level ground, even though the biomechanics are different. So uphill gains likely feed back into faster running on all grades as long as there鈥檚 enough work on both ups and flats. (鈥淓nough鈥� is going a lot of legwork in that sentence, so just make sure you .)

Mix in just enough flat running for neuromuscular and biomechanical adaptations to fast paces (which varies on the athlete and their goals), and it鈥檚 a chain reaction of awesomeness. It鈥檚 like when one person starts dancing at a wedding, then another starts dancing, and another, just in your cells.

That fitness stimulus is likely related to the increase in muscular activity and the change of recruitment patterns. As the muscles are under increased load, they fatigue rapidly. But that鈥檚 a good thing, because the fatigue leads to muscular endurance adaptations in a well-rounded training plan. As muscular endurance goes up, the aerobic and cardiovascular systems play catch-up to provide oxygen to muscles that are putting out more work. Those aerobic adaptations increase muscular output more, which can lead to more aerobic development.

Mix in just enough flat running for neuromuscular and biomechanical adaptations to fast paces (which varies on the athlete and their goals), and it鈥檚 a chain reaction of awesomeness. It鈥檚 like when one person starts dancing at a wedding, then another starts dancing, and another, just in your cells.

Over time, I have placed a much greater emphasis on hill workouts for all athletes, from beginners to pros.

Some of that is the psychological element. I am not sure if hill beasts become life beasts, or life beasts become hill beasts, all I know is that people that conquer hills are all-around beasts and I don鈥檛 want to mess around with it by trying to tease out correlation and causation.

But mainly I think the long-term growth I see in athletes that do many hill workouts is physical. The muscular and aerobic demands are high, but usually without the annoying soreness or niggles that can come from a pure focus on flat and fast workouts. The general approach my wife Megan and I use is to start a training cycle by getting strong on the hills (with a heavy dose of ) to develop the musculoskeletal and aerobic systems.

The general approach my wife Megan and I use is to start a training cycle by getting strong on the hills (with a heavy dose of ) to develop the musculoskeletal and aerobic systems.

Next, we introduce flatter speed to adapt the neuromuscular and biomechanical systems to faster paces鈥攔oad racers may spend most of a training cycle with this focus. For trail racers, many will spend a lot of time subsequently reinforcing the hill stimulus to keep getting stronger. And will usually have more of a focus on hill intervals independent of their goals, since they may not respond as well to excessively fast workouts.

Going through training logs, there are 8 different hill workouts that athletes we coach do often. You鈥檒l notice that most of the hill intervals are not too long. That is because the muscular demand can lead to some athletes greatly decreasing output with longer repeats, similar to how you do a certain number of push-ups, then lose all ability to do more push-ups.

You can do one or two workouts a week, and make sure you do 15 to 30 minutes of easy warm-up and cool-down running too. Alright, let鈥檚 do this!

The Shark Teeth

8 x 1 minute steeper hills moderately hard with 2 minutes easy/moderate recovery

This is a good workout when you鈥檙e early in a training cycle, or have some residual fatigue built up later in training. The steeper hills call on every muscle fiber, while the works lactate clearance. In 24 minutes, you can get a major stimulus with less fatigue the next day.

The T. Rex

6 x 2 minute hills moderately hard with run down recovery after each, followed by steady running on tired legs

Two-minute hills allow you to push without having to worry about hitting the wall too much. Many athletes say that the after the hills can counter-intuitively feel easier, which may be related to cool processes like the central governor. Or it could be more simple, your brain deciding that anything is better than hill intervals. This workout is great for any part of the training cycle, since the steady running provides an endurance stimulus on tired legs. It鈥檚 called The T. Rex because it鈥檚 vicious and has a long tail.

Corrine鈥檚 Hills

5 x 3 minute hills moderately hard with run down recovery after each>

If I could only give one shorter workout for the rest of my coaching life, it would be this one. Almost every athlete we coach has seen it many times over, a perfect balance of difficulty, power demand and aerobic stress. Your ticket to an existential crisis in 30 minutes or less! Get through it, and you come out resilient and faster.

The Fast And The Spurious

1/2/3/2/1 minute hills moderately hard to hard with run down recovery, followed by 4 x 1 minute faster on flatter ground

A classic combining the normal muscular demands of a hill workout followed by the speed demand of flatter running. It鈥檚 great to do as a bridge to flatter workouts, or you can add combo elements like 1 minute intervals at the end of any hill workout.

The Quad Blaster

5/4/3/2/1 minute hills moderately hard with run down easy/moderate recovery, followed by 4 x 30 second steep hills hard

Nice Legs Finish Blasted

4 x 2 minute hills moderately hard with run down recovery, 4 x 1 minute hills hard with run down recovery, 4 x 30 second steep hills all out

These two workouts are purely designed to ask everything of your muscles, making them perfect mid-cycle stimuli to kick up fitness. At the end of the 30-second intervals, you鈥檒l likely feel like you are running in radioactive sludge. That鈥檚 a good thing. Right?

Lizzo鈥檚 Tempo

15-30 minute hill moderate to mod/hard, 5 minutes easy, 6 x 1 min hill hard with run down recovery

Longer hill are a staple of our athletes鈥� training plans, particular in the context of long runs. Twenty minutes is a sweet spot where you can push lactate threshold without deciding to quit running (or ). Tag on some hard hills to get the higher output that is difficult on tempos, plus a lactate clearance stress. Do hill tempos mid-training cycle and later, after you have developed your running economy enough to be efficient. Adaptations are optimized if you listen to 鈥淭empo鈥� by Lizzo.

The Hill Beast

10/8/6/4/2 minute hills moderately hard with run down recovery after each

The Hill Beast is reserved for the most hardy souls, like multiple-time Golden Trail Finalist , who is the original hill beast the workout is named for. It鈥檚 saved for 10 to 20 days before steep trail and skyracing. The goal? Survive. Do that, and you鈥檒l find the big hill workout secret.

After you finish, you aren鈥檛 just a bit of a different athlete. You鈥檙e a bit of a different person.

David Roche partners with runners of all abilities through his coaching service, . With Megan Roche, M.D., he hosts the on running (and other things), and they wrote a book called .

From

The post 8 Favorite Hill Workouts appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.