The Need (To Race Weekly) And The Damage Done

"I want to improve my 5K time."  "My race times aren't improving."  "Why do I keep getting beaten at races?"  This statement was said by no runner.  Ever.

I am surprised at the number of times I hear something along these lines, as well as the occasional "weight issue" and "how can I improve my triathlon performance" queries.  Those are questions which are really "tell me the secret to successful running" questions.  When I tell them the uncomfortable truth; the fact they race too much and train too little, it's my way of informing them there's only one secret to being a successful runner: "Choose your parents wisely."  There are no miracles in running, and only one secret.  The successful runner chooses their target races wisely.  They train wisely leading up to the race date, and they return to training when their body is ready.

Depending on the training focus - race distances, specific times of the year - and the individual athlete's economies (physical and fiscal) a well-trained runner can sustain peak racing performance for four to six weeks.  A longer, more-controlled training year with a single peak period will reveal a longer peak, a two peak focus or longer distance target races are closer to four weeks.  I know persons who participate in half-marathon and marathon events on a weekly basis; most do little more than the event as their weekly volume, and often at paces which more closely resemble quick walks.  Regardless of the pace, damage happens.  I often wondered why I could trot 5,000 meters on a Saturday morning at eight-minute pace and grade papers or study with no ill effect, but a 5K road race run six minutes faster would find me asleep in the recliner for two hours.  Damage happens in training runs, but more acutely so when we race.

Double a race distance, and the muscular and molecular damage which comes from racing is not just doubled; it's doubled, plus "interest."  A marathon isn't only eight and a half times the distance of a five-thousand meter race, it's ten times the damage.  So the recovery rules-of thumb - complete rest for each hour of racing, easy run training for each mile of racing - aligns well for the 24-minute 5K runner and the four-hour marathoner; followed wisely, all other things being equal, both can start another 18-to-24-weeks of training as long as the base training has been done.

But many recreational runners fail to ensure they've developed a good, solid base.  They don't consider long, steady runs which develop muscle, brain and heart to be necessary.  Speedwork, including short repeats and tempo runs of 20 minutes, aren't that important to them.  Everything is run at the same pace, with little variation from day to day.  To continue to do the same thing from week-to-week, without variation and expect anything else but the same performances, searching in vain for the secret, is the runner's way of living a lie.

"I want to live a lie."  This statement was said by no serious runner.  Ever.

Red Bull: The (Nearly) Two-Percent Solution

Spend enough time with a demographic which closely resembles the target viewing audience for adventure sporting events, and you cannot help but notice the large drink cans close by.  Even after nine weeks of boot camp, with plenty of exercise and the finest food the military has to offer, (all right, there's a good reason the dining facilities are called "mess halls) the young men and women I encountered on a weekly basis in my classroom drank can after can of sugary "energy drinks." 

When my wife makes the decision to party she doesn't hit the white zinfandel or the belgian Trappist ale.  She resorts to a very popular energy drink, often mixed with vodka.  The drink mixture makes as much sense as my Sunday brunch switch between a large cup of Seattle's finest export, the name of which rhymes with "four bucks," and a chilled flute of mimosa.  Take enough of the stuff in and you have a buzz in two different forms...a very alert drunk.  But that's a different editorial statement altogether.

The folks who make the beverage in the little blue and silver cans seem to be everywhere in the past couple of months.  Whether it's a guy who wants to go the speed of sound without an aircraft or a bunch of runners who want to outrun roller derby girls, the beverage and it's logo is darned near ubiquitous.  And the advertising is more, er, mature now.  I haven't seen as many of the silly black-and-white line-drawing animated cartoons.  They're back to focusing on a message of: 'drink this if you want to go farther than anyone else.'

That little blue and silver can...what's it got?  Well, about the same amount of sugar or sweetener as a typical soda...about 65 percent of the caffeine of the same sized coffee...some B-vitamins, a chemical found in detox drinks, and the amino acid taurine.  If you're used to drinking coffee before a race or a workout, there's a really good chance you probably won't be hurt drinking the beverage that reportedly "gives you wings."  In fact, it's not just the caffeine that may help your run performance, but the taurine.

First, taurine is commonly found in skeletal muscle, cardiac muscle and brain tissue; the chemical has been suspected to have a strong role in a number of physiological actions but until recently there was little research done.  Four researchers in the United Kingdom recently investigated the amino acid's effect on endurance performance, testing run performance for a three-kilometer time trial.  They found the subjects who took the taurine two hours prior to a maximum simulated 3K effort on a treadmill improved their performance by an average of 1.7 (and up to 4.2) percent, without appreciable change in heart rate, oxygen intake or perceived effort.  The researchers weren't able to explain the specific reason for the improved performance, however.

But, the little aluminum can is not necessarily the "two percent solution."  Energy drinks containing the two known ergogenics (caffeine and taurine) in other studies were shown to aid in endurance and resistance to fatigue, but the additional ingredients may slow or limit the body's ability to benefit from them.

REFERENCE:  Balshaw, TG, Bampouras, TM, Barry, TJ, Sparks, A (2012). The effect of acute taurine ingestion on 3-km running performance in trained middle distance runners.  Amino acids.  Springer-Verlag, Aug 2

Me Against The Watch

Before I start talking about the main topic, I have to confess this time of year, with a lead-in to another Olympic Games, is a sports junkie's dream.  It has been good for my recovery.  I’ve initiated my own little ‘occupy the couch’ movement with the US Olympic swimming and track/field trials, topped by the Tour de France as the background. 

While many of the participants of the larger ‘occupation’ movements were nebulous in what they desired, I have two goals:  The first goal is to let the lingering tendonitis in my ankles and knees completely heal.  It’s simple:  The only way to recover from an overuse injury is not to overuse what gets injured.  The second goal is to motivate myself into a frenzy of smart training once the Olympics are over.  It’s still going to be infernal, but I have a gym membership and a flexible schedule, so early morning and late evening training is not a problem.

Track and field events, and the Tour de France cycle race, have more in common than the average television spectator might guess, for a number of reasons:  When there are preliminary and semi-final heats at a track meet, the goal of most every athlete is to finish either in a position where they automatically qualify for the next round or in as fast a time as possible to be selected.  Does the athlete necessarily want to finish in first place?  All they need to do is exert just enough energy to qualify, save their energies for the final heat when a win means something. 

During the years when Lance Armstrong won seven Tours de France, he didn’t win every single stage.  He’d win a mountain stage here, and a road stage there; he would finish consistently close enough to the front of the pack every time he was on the road. 

There were races during the Olympic Trials, like the final of the women’s 5,000-meter run and the 3,000-meter steeplechase, where the leading runners not only had to win (or finish in the top three) to qualify, but also had to push the pace of the race in order to make the Olympic qualifying standard.  Some of the athletes collaborated with training partners and co-competitors to ensure a fast pace.  Others felt the need to go “off the front” and do it alone. 

Road stages of the Tour de France (and other cycling races) are a collaborative effort between teams and individual riders, both to push the pace or to hold the pace back…depending on their own best interests.  But there also is what is known in cycling as the race of truth.  Many stage races, including the Tour de France, begin with a short prologue individual time trial and also have one or two longer individual time trials during the course of the event.  The ‘race of truth’ sorts the good from the great athlete.  A rider can win a grand tour without being a great individual rider but there’s no way to win without being a good individual rider.  The time trial exposes every weakness in training, more so than the typical mass-start race.  There’s nobody to hide behind; no teammate to help pick up the pace should they falter. 

For runners, it’s more difficult is it to run a race going off the front alone without a supportive pacer than as part of a pack of individuals with near-identical fitness.

I trained under a coach who (i know) adjusted my training efforts based on recent racing results.  I never did time trials on my own because I ran at a level where I was out of reach of the really good runners and ahead of the slower ones…after the first mile of a race I was usually in “no-man’s land.”  But, when training a runner who is focused on, say, the half-marathon or the marathon, I like to schedule a 5,000-meter time trial on the roads to judge their fitness and make adjustments to their training paces.  It doesn’t necessarily have to be an organized 5K race (although I prefer a certified course), and it might not be until somewhere around six-to-twelve weeks out, but I prefer a course which resembles the terrain or conditions for their target event.

The goal of the time trial is either to run it at a slightly faster pace than the previous time trial, or to run it at the same time, but with a lower perceived effort.  If the athlete’s previous 5K time trial was at a pace where a few seconds of improvement will move them to a higher Daniels’ VDOT score, and subsequently faster training paces, I prefer the “same time at less effort” result.  Just like “heat racing,” the goal is not to light the fuse for a fantastic short race effort six, eight, or ten weeks out from the longer target event, but to develop the runner’s confidence; hiding an “extra gear” inside their head which they can save for race day.  It's the sum total of good runs, rather than a single great workout surrounded by a bunch of crappy ones, which are going to help define a running performance.

Undertrained, Yet Not Overwhelmed

Home from the Ottawa (Canada) Race Weekend, where I ran my "target" half-marathon event.

No, it was not a personal best.  But in light of my slow healing of the achilles' tendons and an (seemingly) untimely illness during training I went into the event in a way I've often recommended to my own athletes.

Undertrained.

The state of undertraining showed during three jaunts around the Rideau Canal and Queen Elizabeth Boulevard;  I could run along at a six-something minute-per-mile clip for a quarter mile, but it took about 45 minutes to get comfortable enough to get there.  There were no joyous "check in the box" or "hay in the barn" runs to speak of during the next two days, including a shutdown after fifteen minutes.  I knew there was little chance of running close to the last half I ran as part of my triathlon training, but I was going to try.

Naturally, when you are running with over ten-thousand of your closest friends the best place to be is at - or near - the front.  This did not happen.  In fact, the only way I, or the crowd standing around me on the curb at Confederation Square, were going to get into our assigned corral at the gun was crowd surfing.  The female runners were more likely to benefit from this idea; we guys were doomed.

The crowd did not thin out for five kilometers.  Seriously.  I didn't have much trouble going the pace I planned for, but when it came time to ask myself 'will I be able to step up the pace between now and nine miles?' the answer was a calm 'not today.'

You want to know the nice thing about racing or running a race where the splits are in kilometers?  

The splits are in kilometers.

Sure, you can sit there and do all the mental 'eight (kilometers) is five (miles)' gymnastics you want, but it's great to have splits arrive at 62 percent of the time you would normally expect.  It's like doing a Rock n' Roll event and getting 42 bands rather than 26...you have more stimulation.  And that increase in checkpoints is especially important when you hit the 'dark tea-time of the soul' section of the run.  I've learned that every race director has a bit of sadist in them; the most barren, crowd-bereft section of every run course ALWAYS comes at the same time we begin to doubt.  The whole gamut of doubt.  From "I doubt I can hold this pace until the finish," to "I doubt I can even finish" doubt.

I'm not going to directly attribute the performance I got - which was better than the performance I feared - strictly to increased external feedback.  I still looked at my watch when my (mile) split buzzed, and found my splits more or less 30 seconds slower than my "out-of-my-mind" goal pace, but 15-to-30 seconds faster than my average training pace.  However, I wasn't fixating on the difference between my GPS and the mile split marker (which I know is approximate) my heart rate data, my pace, my yada, yada, yada the entire time...all the things which can take a runner out of the race they may have mistakenly set themselves up for.  And place them in the race they can feel.

My Favorite (Marathon) Mistake

If the "typical" age-group runner were to look at the workouts I post on my training group's blog they would either say the workouts are "too easy" or "too intense." It's always the extremes of the continuum, rarely if ever anything in between. Come out to the track and watch the group go through repeats, and you're more likely to doubt the benefits. 'Nobody,' you would say, 'can improve on that simple a plan.'

The plan rewards patience and consistency: short-distance speed work to focus on the anaerobic system, longer distance repeats to improve the lactate threshhold, long distance runs to develop aerobic and mental fitness, topped off with a few easier efforts here and there. There are no secret workouts, no gimmicks or gadgetry I foist on people; I do tend to get down on the athlete within the first month or so about their shoes, usually after I hear "hey, Coach, I have an ache in my..."

I'm not a control freak who wants to turn every athlete who shows up on Sunday morning, Tuesday evening, or Thursday evening into a "hobby-jogger" "tri-geek" "harrier" like me. Almost all adult athletes have a firm grasp of their strengths, weaknesses, limitations, goals and priorities, so I serve as much as a sanity check or sounding board as I do a provider of workouts. If the athlete has gaps in their plan of action then I feel like it's my role to help out. I'll either refer to materials and resources which have worked in the past, or to seemingly good ideas which failed miserably when I attempted execution.

The relationship is not "one size fits all." Some of my athletes only work with me once a month during an easy jog around the beach. We talk about the mental side of running (and it is true - running is 50 percent physical and 90 percent mental); I provide encouragement and a little humor. Rarely if ever do I need to "spank," because they've done the spanking well enough on their own.

One of my more-active athletes recently missed his desired marathon performance by nine minutes. In spite of his disappointment I had to tip my running cap in his general direction, since he ran about the same time I've done for my best marathon performance.

So, as we stood in the parking lot and talked about the race experience - he ran one of the marathon majors, which adversely affected his race execution - we also talked about some of the other potential barriers to a good marathon performance.

Slow training=slow racing: When we are both working on short(er) track repeats I am more likely to have my heart rate monitor strap handed to me. The most recent 5K he ran, all other factors being equal, would have predicted a couple of minutes faster than his goal time.

Let's remember that term: "all other factors being equal."

He got plenty of long runs - including the "ten the hard way" run with me one Sunday which was the "filling" to his 20-mile "sandwich" run. Trouble was we did more runs at the long run pace and not enough efforts at race pace, which in his case would have been about a minute-per-mile faster.

Family functions+race=focus on everything else: Marathon training - in fact, training for any endurance event - is a selfish activity. As the day approaches the race needs to be looked at like "a day at the office." Without suit and tie. You want to shoehorn a shopping trip, a sightseeing excursion, or a really cool "thanks for supporting my training, honey" dinner when you're in town during the last couple of days before the race? Not a good idea. Sitting on the couch at Barnes and Noble with a cup of Starbucks sounds much better, especially when you spent a hundred bucks in race entry fees and a thousand miles in training. Have we forgotten the term "taper" already? Move the special occasions "to the right" on the calendar, to the recovery days after the race. Sure, you will walk around like a wooden-legged zombie, but it makes a great conversation starter with the waitrons.

P.O.A.&M. or O.U.S.O.B.: Everyone knows all the pithy lines about preparation...failing to prepare is preparing to fail...prior planning prevents poor performance...and so on. Know exactly where your starting corral is relative to the starting line, the first and last five kilometers of the course, and as many of the aid stations as possible. Study the terrain, the turns, the tarmac and the temperatures. Leave nothing to chance.

While in the corral take a look around at your fellow runners. If a lot of them are wearing headphones it might be a good idea to move forward of them, if at all possible. See a lot of matching singlets and tops? The best way to keep from fartleking and swerving away from the "six-abreast-singing-kumbaya-red-rover-my-foot" rambling groups is to get in front of them IMMEDIATELY. Carry your own (throwaway) fluid bottle so you don't get hung up in the first two aid stations on the course. Trust me. You'll thank me later. If you don't the medical staff most likely will.

If you've made it through the marathon training fit, healthy and prepared to run your best race, don't make the mistake of looking at it as another race. There are no guarantees of the next starting line, so make the ones you get to count.

The ABC (Race)'s of The Training Cycle

What is the most important part of the workout, as far as the coach is concerned? My athletes would say, incorrectly, the second set of the workout.

While I call it "the money set," the second set of our workout - where the longest repeats, tempo or acceleration work is focused - is of secondary importance to me. What's the most important is the first and the final twenty minutes of our Tuesday and Thursday evening track workouts. That's the time when I get to pry, subtly, into what the athlete has done in the previous two-to-five days, or what's in their immediate future.

Both Deena and Jim, my marathoners, enjoy jumping into the occasional road race as part of their training. In fact, they both did fairly well at a recent cross-country 5K event. I chuckled as Deena talked about her race; at a late point on the course she was running with a group and one or two suggested putting a surge in to catch a couple of runners just ahead. Deena said she smiled and let the pair (of guys) go on ahead:

"I was out there to enjoy myself, Coach. I had plenty left in me to push the pace but I wasn't in the mood."

...which to me seemed the perfect time to teach the ABC's of racing.

Run and race for long enough and it is certain the personal best performances will not only be smaller in time increments but also harder won. There are runners who choose to race on a near-weekly basis through the season. Most of them do it in the hope of improvement by the end of the season. Many will race every race the same way. Some may be fortunate enough to improve, but most will eventually be a runner most-frustrated.

When they finally describe what they do I have to bit my tongue and not refer them to the quote attributed to Albert Einstein. He might not have been a distance runner, but if he could figure out the theory of relativity then he certainly could figure out the definition of insanity.

Some races are relatively more important than others:

"C" races, to me, are those early-season "rust-busters" a runner uses to help determine fitness. (Jack Daniels, in his Running Formula, uses personal best race performances or time-trial sessions to determine training paces for long runs, easy running, threshold pace workouts, and interval pace work.) Nothing wrong, in my humble opinion, with running a 5K or 10K as part of or in place of a weekend run in the early season. "C" races are the events at which the runner should be able to shrug off a less-than-stellar effort, or smile and say "I'm on the right track" when it's all said and done.

As the runner gets into the middle of their training cycle; closer to the weeks of the season or the event which is their target, it's time to start plugging in the "B" race/races. The "B" races are used to simulate the effort desired for the target race, can be on a portion of the target event course, or resemble the terrain on which the runner intends to eventually race.

Naturally, the "A" race is that target race or races which the runner has circled in pen on the calendar months in advance. Everything in the training cycle, ideally, should lead up to the runner being their sharpest - four or five weeks if racing shorter distances, two or three for longer ones.

The recreational runner's racing schedule doesn't necessarily take an Einstein to plan. All they need to do is know their ABC's.

Horses For Courses - The Right Music For The Run

Not a week after we returned from Singapore, my second iPod Touch went on to it's eternal reward. Apple, in their infinite wisdom(?) decreed the cause of "death" to be immersion or exposure to fluid. I unsuccessfully tried to explain I live in a part of the country where humidity is a way of life. The only way to NOT expose electronics to fluid is to hermetically seal it within a plastic casing, like the DryCase I reviewed months back. The positive of the DryCase sealing technology was countered by its size. I could easily carry the iPod Touch in a knitted pouch hung around my neck, access the on/off/volume controls, and so on. I didn't run with the iPod in Singapore because I forgot to take the DryCase along. Somehow the exposure happened. Nothing else can be done without spending a lot of money to repair the iPod.


So, I'm back to running without music.


It's a blessing and a curse. Running with music naturally provide mental stimulation, and allows runners to dissociate - tune out - the messages which often try to slow down or stop them on a run. For me, running without music - especially in the morning - provided the chance to tune in to bird songs, watch clouds move, and pay close(r) attention to my immediate surroundings. There are times it's nice to not have any distractions blaring into your head.


The first "non-musical" treadmill run, however, found me grooving voluntarily to a John Mayer tune in the back of my mind. I recalled entire albums of music from memory before on road runs, because Walkmans were heavier and had lousy battery life.

Running author Hal Higdon mentioned in social media posts the favorite pieces of music he would listen to during treadmill workouts. Higdon liked classical music, including Beethoven and Tchaikovsky. "Horses for courses," triathlon coach Brett Sutton would say, while it works for Hal, I think I'll avoid the 1812 Overture and the climactic cannonade...at least on the treadmill. We all have our own personal tastes. And, as I used to tell my students, "there is no such thing as bad music."


So, what's the best kind of music to listen to when running?


An English sports psychologist studied the effects of musical performance, and considered tempo to be everything. In his opinion, most commercial dance tunes and rock music seemed to fit best, having a tempo which ranged from 120-to-140 beats per minute. Music professors, fitness buffs and medical professionals seem to agree a tempo which aligns with specific workout motions is the best for the activity.


When I think about the music I've "channeled" during some of my best races, it falls into the 120-to-125 beat-per-minute range. My best long runs, however, are in the 160-to-180 (or 80-to-90) beat range. Of course, good grooves are everything. Punk and hard rock - styles which often make a concerted effort to break the "comfortable" groove - are probably the least desirable genres for running.


Ah, but horses for courses.


There are a variety of sites on-line where you can find new music at a desired tempo; other sites allow you to find old favorites or in different genres. There are also great workout podcasts available for download, with music mixed to a particular tempo. One site I'll send some love out to is http://www.djsteveboy.com/. Steve Boyett has several mix podcasts which are among the iTunes Store's top downloads. His Podrunner casts feature many independent and out-of-the-box musicians, mixed at tempos ranging from 120 to 180. The most recent series has tempo progressions which mimic pyramid and tempo workouts...all of them are around 60 minutes and include warm-up and cool-down segments.

Making the treadmill workout a little less dull can take some time and effort on the part of the individual runner. There are tempo-defining programs which can help catalog the runner's music collection, or the workout at a particular pace can be downloaded from the internet.

And the "horse," when matched to the right "course," can make an hour's treadmiling less...boring.

The Size Of The Dog In The Fight

"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog." - Samuel Langhorne Clemens, a.k.a. Mark Twain (1835-1910)

My personal best at the 5,000 meter distance on the roads came at the tail end of a great season of training & racing with a couple of really good guys, guys who would definitely be on my short list of favorite training partners in the past. As I think about them, one guy definitely stands out from the others; he brought out the best (on rare occasions the worst) in me at the track & on the roads.

Mike was one of those guys who did not look like a "typical runner". Really. Think about the folks you see when you show up at a local road race; most are milling about in their singlets & shorts doing their stretches, jogging their striders. Everybody's tense, as if their self-image depends on running a personal best. Well, everybody except for Mike. To see him before the start of a race, (or hanging out at the track before a workout, for that matter) you would scratch your head in wonder: Did this guy miss the turn to the softball field & somehow end up here? So, right off the bat you would discount this guy's ability to be at the front of the field, or at least in front of you.

That is, until the gun went off. Mike was the kind of runner who could blow your doors off at the first mile; he could lay back & wait patiently until the three-mile point, then kick past you as you're "dying". Either way, you would gasp in wonder at the finish: "how can a BIG guy run so quickly?"There are factors involved in running which cannot be easily measured, such as motivation, discipline & mental toughness - some or all of these qualities can make the difference between a person being a good runner & a very good runner. But, there are measurable factors which can help determine potential running performance, or determine the level for potential improvement.

The first measure I've talked about in the recent past, VO2max. VO2max is defined as the maximum capacity of an individual's body to transport and use oxygen during exercise; the more physically fit you are, supposedly, the higher your VO2max. A person's VO2max can be affected by age, gender, fitness, training, altitude change, & action of the muscles involved in breathing. It's a measure lots of runners strive to improve - I've had runners come to me to help them improve their VO2max - the first thing I tell them is that VO2max is a relatively poor predictor of running performance.

The most recent example I have encountered is a young lady training for her first iron-distance triathlon. She wanted to improve her VO2max (which I translated as "I need to get my running speed up") but I soon found she was lacking in running economy. She had a very loud footstrike, which I reasoned was due to overstriding & a low cadence. So, even the most physiologically gifted runner can be hampered by poor running economics, & the intangibles of mental toughness & motivation can either help the runner resist fatigue...or to give in to it on the day.

I was recently reminded by Coach Patrick McCrann from Marathon Nation of the relevance of body composition - weight, literally - to running performance. He reminded me of research which alluded to an increase of two seconds per mile, all other factors being equal, for every excess pound of body weight. It's fairly simple to realize - especially in the case of persons who have too much weight on their frame - how excess weight makes it difficult to run (or even walk, in some cases). But it's a little harder to explain to a five-foot, eight-inch runner who weighs 165-to-170 pounds (depending on the time of year) those extra 10-to-15 pounds could mean the difference between a 1:35 and a 1:29 half marathon time.

Guys like my buddy Mike - who is now what John L. Parker, Jr. described as "Once A Runner" because of knee injuries - & a lot of my contemporaries are confounded in their efforts to drop those few extra pounds by the very nature of their lifestyle. Believe me, I'm preaching to myself on this one, too; my love of beer & pizza has to be continually moderated with a (renewed) love for lean meats & veggies.

There are certain cross-training activities for which I need to be careful. I know there's a solid ten pounds of muscle in my upper body which come from swimming for triathlons. I can still fit into the same size pants I did when I started running, but several of my favorite shirts have had to be sacrificed. Naturally, there's a fine thin line under which your weight probably should not go. Keeping track of your running performances & your weight at the same time is a good idea; there will be a certain weight at which you begin to feel more fatigued & less swift...that's the weight floor.

In closing, a good way to be (to borrow from a few of my favorite songs) "bigger than your body gives you credit for" on race day is to become less of a person than you used to be. Dropping a few pounds may be the edge to give you those extra seconds you need to make that personal best.

Necessity Is The Mother Of Adaptation

Some of the athletes I work with remotely have their own special set of constraints, having much to do with maternity or Mother Nature, both of which are a force stronger than E.F. Hutton. The good news for me when I begin to lay out a training plan for them is they usually have a treadmill for running purposes close by. The only place treadmills are used as a clothes valet, as far as I can tell, is Florida.

The difficult part, however, is how to figure the proper training intensity. I can spend thirty minutes in an e-mail discussing what some call Coach Mike-speak, a variant ot terms used by my former coach, Dale Fox, his coach (1964 Olympic 5,000 meter Gold Medalist) Bob Schul, & his coach, Mihalyi Igloi...which works great when the individual athlete is on the track with me over the course of five or six weeks, because they'll catch the understanding eventually. But when dealing with remote coaching situations I can get a good effort approximation from some other really good coaches; Jack Daniels or Greg McMillan. Daniels' run intensity calculations are easily figured out through a table in the front end of his seminal work, Daniels' Running Formula (which I consider one of the three absolute must have running books), or you can find calculators and reference charts on many different web sites on the Internet (http://www.coacheseducation.com/endur/jack-daniels-nov-00.htm has what I would call Daniels In A Nutshell). I've encountered a fantastic spreadsheet you can use (http://www.electricblues.com/html/runpro.html) to determine the training effect of a particular workout, given the heart rate & run duration, but I recommend it for calculation's sake. McMillan also has a web-based chart, located at http://www.mcmillanrunning.com/ which aligns closely to Daniels'. I'm more familiar with Daniels, so I'll use his terminology to talk about run intensities here.

To determine your VDOT score, which Daniels explains is an estimate of a runner's VO2max at velocity, you'll need the results of your races (1,500 meters, mile, 3,000 meters, 2-mile, 5,000 meters, 10,000 meters, 15,000 meters, half-marathon or marathon) from the past year or so; if you have a variety, so much the better. Find your time for the particular race on a Daniels VDOT Values Table, then look at the number under the VDOT column. A list of best performances over more than one race distance will provide a more-accurate calculation; if you race more long events, focus on the findings based on those results and not so much on the shorter races. I'm one to err on the side of a lower VDOT score, personally, as your body can adapt to a training intensity that is a little too low better than it can an intensity which is too high. Once you have a VDOT score, a second table shows the training intensities based on that particular score for distances from 200 meters up to the easy/long run for the week, depending on the intensity level. For example, the athlete I talked about when I wrote about heart rate monitors has a VDOT score of 44 based on her recent 5K racing. She's training for a marathon in November - given the right conditions, a VDOT of 44 equals a 3:32 marathon performance prediction, but that's another story. Based on that performance I recommended she run her easy runs & her weekly long run at a sliver over nine minutes per mile. Her runs to prepare her for the pace she'll need to run in the marathon would be a little over eight minutes per mile, & the pace I recommended for tempo runs on the track is a little slower than a 7:30 mile. Once the runner knows their specific paces, they can use one or more of a few good 60-minute workouts for the treadmill-bound runner. I recommend one long run, one tempo & one repeat workout per week, with easy runs filling the remainder of the time available. If the athlete finds the workouts a little difficult based on perceived exertion or heart rate, we adjust the pace/s downward or extend the recovery period a little:

Progressive Tempo - 30 minutes at Easy/Long pace, increase speed by .1 mph every four minutes until Marathon Pace is reached. (Runners training for half-marathon or shorter races can continue on to Threshold pace.)

Marathon Tempo - 2 miles at Easy/Long pace, increase speed by .1 mph every two minutes until Marathon Pace is reached. (Runners training for half-marathon or shorter races can continue on to Threshold pace.)

Long Repeats (improve lactate threshold) - 2 miles at Easy/Long pace, increase to Threshold pace for up to five minutes, followed by Easy/Long pace (recovery) for up to two minutes.

Medium Repeats (improve velocity at VO2max) - 2 miles at Easy/Long pace, increase to Interval pace for up to three minutes, broken up by Easy/Long pace (recovery) for up to two minutes.

Short Repeats (improve economy and speed) - 2 miles at Easy/Long pace, increase to Rep pace for 30 seconds to one minute, broken up by Easy/Long pace (recovery) for up to two minutes.

How do you know when you're ready to move the intensities higher? Daniels says race performances are the test of when you're ready to move up...under no circumstances does he recommend trying to beat the training intensities for specific efforts.

While many persons will say a treadmill (simulation) workout is not as good as getting out on the road or the track, I consider it an "eighty-percent solution" for those days when the weather conditions are less than optimal or the runner has a limited amount of time available to train.

Feel The Rhythm, Feel The Rhyme

Coach Patrick McCrann's Endurance Nation (and lately, his new Marathon Nation) sites have provided me some great common-sense hacks to pass along to folks I advise, coach or mentor. If you feel like you're spending way too much time training, not achieving any positive outcomes, and more likely ticking off everyone around you (family, friends, co-workers, employer) because you spend too much time working harder rather than smarter...well, I'd definitely recommend giving any of the two sites, or his personal site - http://www.patrickjohnmccrann - a long look-see.

This month, Patrick is providing 30 marathon (I'm going to borrow and read "distance running" where he says "marathon") tips over the next 30 days...of which you might run into on any of the three blogs (here, or North Florida RRCA, or F.A.S.T. Pensacola) on which I post. I might punch them in verbatim...I might provide some editorial comments, which will be duly noted:

I picked this tip as the first tip because I think it's that important. After years of doing run clinics and gait analysis sessions, I have learned that if a runner can get her cadence into the right spot, almost every other running technique variable takes care of itself. In other words, if you ignore the next 29 tips but nail this one...you'll be in a pretty good place. Repeat studies and performance reviews of elite athletes have shown that 180-190 steps per minute is the golden standard of cadence. In other words, taking approximately 180 steps per minute (or 90 for each leg) is an excellent way to:

move your stride length into the optimal range;
vastly improve your running economy;
reduce your chance of running injury;
and...all of the above without unduly placing too much focus on running "form."

For many people, this 180 steps per minute is much faster than what they are used to doing. While it will take time and focus to ensure that you can properly make the transition to a higher run cadence, since you can actually control (and measure) how many steps you take, this is a very easy way to implement a positive change in how you run. At the end of the day, running with a good cadence can help keep you going stronger, faster, and even help protect you from many common injuries. Let's get started...

Step 1: Assess Your Cadence
Step 2: Practice + Feel 180 Cadence
Step 3: Implement + Score Your Running

Step 1: Assess Your Cadence in :15 Increments
While it's tempting to just start tweaking...you shouldn't. Before we can make any changes, we have to know where you are starting from. The next time you go for a run, make a mental note to count your steps during the warm up, warm down, and main set portions of your run.

Try counting the strides of one leg for 15 seconds and see how close you can get to 22. Alternately, you can also count arm swings if that's easier. If you're a stickler for details, you'll want to multiply the number of steps by "4" to get the number of steps per minute for that leg, then again by "2" to get the total number of steps taken.

Regardless of your effort level / speed, your cadence should be very similar. By the end of the run, you will have a ball park number for your current "default" number of foot strikes.

Step 2: Practice + Feel 180 Cadence
Now that you know what your default cadence is, it's time to begin working on the 180. Following the same target of 22 steps per 15 seconds, begin your next run at this higher cadence. Check in every minute -- or as needed -- to assess. From experience I suggest you keep this run relatively short in duration (no more than 30 minutes) as the mental focus will really consume the workout.

In addition to counting steps, there are many other cues that you can focus on to help maintain this optimal cadence. As Jack Daniels, elite running coach and renown author advises, optimal stride rate should feel like you are running "over the ground, not into it." Here are a few other things to keep in mind:

Stay relaxed.
Land on the balls of your feet.
Keep your knees slightly bent.
Work on being light-footed / reducing friction.
Concentrate on turning your feet over as fast as you can.
Don't put too much emphasis on pushing off the ground. Instead, work on gliding across it.

Step 3: Implementing The Cadence Habit
With a quality run under your belt at the target cadence of 180 we can now go back to your regular running schedule -- i.e., whatever you are training for. As you continue running, make note of your cadence when you feel great and when you feel, well, not-so-great. Check in on the numbers during your intervals and your longer runs. If you notice a decline in steps -- or related running form/performance -- then get back to those quicker steps! Before you know it you'll be hitting 22 steps every 15 seconds like a well-oiled running machine...leaving the old you (and some of the competition) in the dust.

Notes...
Making the cadence change, like any other new element to your running, takes time and practice. At first you will need to repeat the workout in Step 2 rather frequently, but over time you will begin to gravitate to this more natural rhythm. You will also notice a slightly higher heart rate than usual for the same (or slightly slower) pace. This is not uncommon and is evidence that you are, in fact, making a change to how you run. Awesome! Give yourself until the end of the Project and you'll find that as your cadence evolves, your higher heart rate will simply fade away.

COACH MIKE'S COMMENTARY:

While I'm not a fan of running with music, especially on race day or during track workouts when acceleration drills might be on the agenda...there are times when having the right tempo music can help you to groove in that 85-90 left/right foot strikes per minute. I'm one of those guys who loves to know exactly what tempo the tunes in my iTunes are...not only for the benefit of those days when I might be on the treadmill, but also on the elliptical trainer or in the pool (I have a waterproof MP3 player). I have playlists of tunes in five-to-ten beat windows (to borrow from Foghorn Leghorn...), just for such an occasion.

If you prefer to not wear an iPod or MP3 player you can do a search on the internet for song tempos, or purchase a little metronome to clip on your hat or waistband.

There are some folks who can be their own jukebox as needed. I used to memorize entire albums of music and could pick tracks out of thin air. Strangest thing was the tune I picked out for my first road race, across the Gandy Bridge between Tampa and St. Petersburg, was in that 85 left/right foot strike per minute sweet spot...A Thousand Years, from Sting's Brand New Day release (a staple of my late college years). When I went back through my Sting collection in iTunes, I found a few other tracks which fell in that window:

Brand New Day-

-A Thousand Years (88)

-Perfect Love...Gone Wrong (90)

Bring On The Night-

-Low Life (90)

Dream of the Blue Turtles-

-Love Is The Seventh Wave (85)

-Shadows In The Rain (92)

Fields Of Gold: Best Of Sting-

-When We Dance (90)

-Why Should I Cry For You? (84)

Mercury Falling-

-All Four Seasons (88)

Nothing Like The Sun-

-Fragile (84)

Sacred Love-

-Dead Man's Rope (88)

-Forget About The Future (88)

The Soul Cages-

-Mad About You (90)

Ten Summoners Tales-

-Love Is Stronger Than Justice (85)

-She's Too Good For Me (90)

-It's Probably Me (90)

If I had to pick three tunes to channel in order to work on my pacing/rhythm/tempo/footstrike from the tunes above:

3. Fragile - a great tune for those long runs when you want to go to your happy place.

2. Why Should I Cry For You? - perfect for tempo work; the groove just goes.

1. A Thousand Years - race day tune, pure and simple, at least in my opinion.

Take the time to look at the tunes which are your running favorites and see how many of them fall into that 85-90 footstrike/minute pace...I bet there are more than you care to admit.

Recovery Is Underrated

"Recovery. That's the name of the game... Whoever recovers the fastest wins." - Lance Armstrong
Locals haven't seen a lot of me lately; some assume it's because I'm injured or quit running/racing altogether. Nothing is further from the truth. I'm spending more time doing something I could have done better in the past. In order to perform well at my goal events this autumn I'm spending more time on the treadmill, on the elliptical trainer, on the bike, in the pool and - believe it or not - easier efforts on the road. It isn't as fun as road racing. You don't get any awards for doing base training. Maybe that's why it's so overlooked. However, this isn't about me as much as it is about you.

If you participated in every area race since the beginning of the year (Here in Pensacola the first race is not long after New Years' Day, goes until early May, then stops over the summer. Racing then resumes in earnest around the middle of September & reaches it's crescendo right before Thanksgiving.) it might be too late to talk about whether it is time to recover; that time might have been long past. While hard work - long runs, speed work, tempo runs, terrain/event-specific workouts - are important, what is more important (I'm reminded by reading the thoughts of coaches & physiologists) is what Alan Couzens calls "the intelligent distribution of work."The first time we encounter a particular stress during training (say, a workout of 800 meters four times, with 100 meters walk recovery, at "up-tempo fresh" pace) our body becomes alarmed at the assault. Once the body adapts to that stress it compensates to deal with it, making you more fit...for a time. However, extended exposure to the same stress (say, due to a lack of variety) eventually leads to exhausting adaptation; you could end up worse off than when you first started doing that particular workout. That's what makes a variety of training stressors important. The same (4 x 800 in this case) workout that provided a 100% performance benefit at New Years', if done without any change, would provide, if you’re lucky, only a 3% benefit by Memorial Day.A season of hard training - or racing - that is too long leads to a performance plateau, or to fatigue. If you don't ration your efforts wisely over time, you can expect a relative plateau after three months & a decline in performance in five. Backing off the efforts by 1/3 of the normal volume one week each month, & one month each year won't hinder performance a bit.Each athlete needs to know the best length of training period, volume of training, & intensity of training for their goal. This means taking time to quantify not only how far/fast you went, but how intense it felt, & how you felt during the next workout period. You can do this by Borg (perceived effort) scale, average heart rate during the workout, resting heart rate each morning, hours of sleep, relative fatigue...I think you get the picture.Recovery, as the smart people say, is underrated.

Law Of Diminishing Returns

Okay, a survey link on the front page of Yahoo! asks what I consider a rhetorical question: What's the key to having the happiest job? Part of me thinks back to the physician/ultrarunner Timothy Noakes' 14 Laws of Training, hidden in plain sight within his weighty tome Lore of Running. (if you want to be a serious runner or effectively guide runners, this text is probably the philosopher's stone of running texts) One of the laws says something to the degree of try to achieve desired athletic performance on the minimal volume of training possible.
Most runners I encounter, however, want to achieve great gains in performance on less than optimal training, or on no training whatsoever. That's like doing no work & expecting a paycheck mailed to your home...even better, direct deposit to your bank account, as a reward. Crazy, no? John Parker, in several of his books, reiterates a painfully obvious fact on performance gain; there is no secret outside of the often heart-rending process of wearing down the outsoles of your running shoes, one molecule of rubber at a time. Really, if there were a pill, potion, powder or plan that could guarantee performance gains 100 percent of the time, it would have been outlawed by now. Even (so-called) performance-enhancing drugs can't replace desire & discipline. Or plain dumb luck.

So, sometimes you have to experiment & find out how much training is too much, & how much training is the most effective...for you. Not everyone has the time or work schedule, or the physical desire to get up at oh-dark-thirty & run six, eight, ten miles, day in & day out. Perhaps they have found their fastest performances were the result of long, easy runs in the afternoon, with one or two speed workouts laced in during the week. Sometimes this also means taking a rest day or an easy day here & there...planned or unplanned, it makes no difference.

I don't think this is necessarily limited to male athletes. I've trained with a couple of female runners who would literally run themselves into the ground & not give an inch during a workout. One was definitely the type that if I were to mention there was a bone sticking out of her leg she would have likely asked me 'and whose bone might that be?' Regrettably, she is Once A Runner, a recreational runner now, as is her husband. Proof sometimes that madness begets madness? No. Birds of a feather? Perhaps.

Three Is A Magic Number

Fresh in my home e-mail in-box...good stuff from PowerBar and Carmichael Training Systems, which I'll shamelessly borrow for your benefit. (My editorial comments will be in italics.)
Exercising with partners provides additional motivation and adds an important social component to keep you engaged in your exercise program. There are days when it's easier to do something other than exercise, or you'd rather sit on the couch than go for a run. It's not that you don’t want to exercise; you just need a little nudge from a buddy. Even highly motivated professionals benefit from training partners because they make you accountable for your workouts: Someone waiting for you at the park or the gym will make you shut down the computer or drag you out of bed.
In our household I have little trouble getting out the door to the pool or the bike, at least when my wife is home. When she is on the road, however, the positive motivation to get up and get out begins to wane. This autumn I found the motivation loss kicked in about three weeks into her last business trip. Mind you, I still managed to get my afternoon run workouts in, with varying degrees of (perceived) success, but the cross-training sessions which enabled me to loosen up tight muscles went by the wayside.
Optimal performance often depends on involving the perfect number of people. In business, a team that's too big struggles to make decisions, and a team that's too small doesn’t have the brain power to cover all the angles. Likewise, for training groups, involving too many people makes it too complicated to coordinate schedules and preferences. But training alone makes it too easy to put exercise on the back burner.
Even Saturday morning track workouts during the late summer got scrapped because there were no fellow participants. I'd show at the track, see no teammates, and say 'stuff it.' Well, I'd use the YMCA cardio machines (elliptical trainer or treadmill) and/or the pool for lap swimming in order to fill in the check-box for the day...kind of the 80-percent solution to physical training.
I’ve found that three is the perfect number for forming a reliable training group. A triad ensures that if one person can’t make it, there’s still one person depending on you to show up. It’s not imperative that all three of you meet up to do the same workout, just that you commit to starting and finishing together.
Sunday morning runs are a good example here. In fact, I changed the Sunday morning route from a loop course to an out-and-back, based on time, in order to allow everyone to (nearly) finish together. All each person has to do is keep track of their time and turn at the right moment. When/if the pace on the return trip is the same as the outbound, just about everyone encounters each other at the last mile at the worst, the last five minutes at the best. This way no one is left alone on the course, and if someone has a very bad day we can help bring them in.
The importance of a third person is evident even in a (pro-exercise) environment....I noticed that several of my employees were struggling to stick with their fitness programs, so I encouraged them to establish training triads....signing up for endurance events, like the Leadville 100 mountain bike race, and then completing a fraction of the necessary training. He went and completed the events anyway, but he suffered more than he needed to in the process. When he (had one) training (partner), ...only had a little more success sticking with his training. Whenever (one) had to miss a session, (the other) missed it too. But adding (a third athlete) to the team created a training triad, and the chances that at least two people were available for a training session increased by 100%....Training triads work. Even for athletes of differing fitness levels and disciplines because they keep everyone engaged and committed to training.

Strengths And Weaknesses

It's a nice day today; sunshine, blue waters, a little breeze here and there. Vicious rumor has it the weather won't be so nice over the weekend. That's all right. I'll settle for something close to nice, considering the alternative. I could be working. Worse yet, I could be unemployed and looking for a j-o-b. That's right: As the song in the end of the Monty Python movie, Life of Brian goes, '...always look at the bright side of life.'

I haven't touched my bike (save for putting on and taking off my race wheels) at all this week; no spinning class and no ride since Sunday morning. I'm not that concerned about the bike, because right now it's probably the most confident discipline I have. I'll need to have a decent swim and a strong run in order to have a better finish than last year. It would be nice to finish a little higher in the age group, but if I finish with a better time than last year and don't score any hardware, that's all right, too. My goal is to put all three disciplines together without looking stoopid.

One of the uber-gods of triathlon/coaching/mental and spiritual aspects of athletics, Mark Allen, wrote a really neat piece for this week's on-line version of Triathlete magazine, talking about how to fix your weakest link in the sport. The biggest thing I take away is to, as he said, work on your weaknesses to make them strengths. If you can take your race, regardless of the distance, and work it backwards to the beginning, you will probably find where things begin to go awry. At that particular point is where you can find the weaknesses in your own training.

I've talked about some of this before. Often we train our strengths and try to overcompensate so our weaknesses don't (we hope!) show on race day. If you (like me) tend to peter out in the latter stages of a 10-K run, it might mean looking at more 20-to-30-minute tempo runs. Other folks may go out too quickly in the first half mile of a 5-K, and that's all she wrote during the remaining 2.6 miles of the race. Some 500-to-1000-meter repeats at a consistent, sustainable pace, with brief rest intervals might do the trick. Lack that acceleration to get away from a pack in the middle of the race, or you're not able to kick at the end? How about some acceleration drills of 150-to-350 meters?

One area that can't be trained on the road or the track, or the gym, or the pool, is that gray area between our ears. Some coaches are great at tapping into the mind of the individual athlete, making them believe they are capable of great things. Others like to use tools like (as Mark Wetmore was quoted...) "ridicule and sarcasm..." to influence the athlete to think, 'well, I'll prove that blankety-blank wrong by succeeding where they think I can't.'

It takes honesty on both the athlete and the coach to look at a performance and ask the question, 'okay, where did things go wrong?' Not that every performance needs to be picked apart with a fine-toothed comb; some days nearly everything goes right and you say 'cool, I think we're on the right track.' However, more often than not we can find something to work on if we look hard enough.

Just make certain to enjoy yourself; there's plenty of folks who can't get out to do what many of us are blessed with by opportunity or physical ability. As for me, my thoughts will be with my sister this weekend, especially as I try to turn the scenery along the southern Alabama coast into a blur on my triathlon bike.

How Are You, Where You Been?

Sometimes I wonder about the folks who come out, train for a while, then suddenly "fall off the face of the earth." I understand what I call (for lack of a better term) parentism, as well as juggling jobs, home lives, spouses, other commitments, and taking up new and added challenges (Golf!? We're talking golf!?). I've said 'we're not getting paid to do this, so don't make it a job.' One of my newer runners mentioned to me the other night about scout meetings and ball practices that would keep him away. I told him, 'no problem. Make it out when you can; run on your own when you can't. Even one good track workout a week is better than none, as long as you get some easy runs in the meantime.'

What gets under my skin:

First, the assumption I should chase people down. I guess I would be more active in this endeavor if my livelihood were based on their attendance/dues. But I'm not making a living from it. My first few months were about keeping up with everyone, trying to keep them coming out. Now, I try not to take it too personally when they decide to not show for a time. Doesn't mean I don't love them, but I've got business to take care of.

Second, the assumption I should phone/e-mail/visit in case I don't see the athlete once a week. While I maintain a religious undertone when talking about running, I'm not a pastor. Athletes missing practices are not committing a mortal sin. I usually send out an e-mail every week-to-ten days about races, workouts, social functions, so I can be reached by punching the reply key on the e-mail. My voice mail works pretty well, as well as my four e-mail accounts. And with three track workouts, one long and two short road runs during the week, and the Friday night dinner/social, the only way to keep from communicating with me is - like my junior college American History professor said about how to fail his course - with great difficulty. The only way to do it is by avoiding me on purpose.

Third, the assumption I should laud or applaud an athlete's return. I'm pleased to see anyone who's been away a while, but unless the rationale for absence is parentism, work/school or injury/recovery, it's 'glad you're out here, now it's time to get with the program.'

I love each and every person who shows up to train with me; while they may not be the toughest or fastest runners in the area, they all show great potential. And it's neat to see them improve. As they say in Maori: Kia Kaha. Stay Strong.