There are two kinds of runners out there, or perhaps two
seasons that runners alternate between: “Just Running” and “Training.” Training to me means that the person is
following a specific plan in a build-up to a specific event – a marathon, a
track meet, or what-have-you. Just
Running is all the other times, where you go out for a run just… ‘cause, just
to run. Some runners live their whole
career in the zone of Just Running, and that’s fine.
Me, however? I’m in
Training.
“For what?” you might ask.
“The next race,” I would answer, and sometimes that means I’m looking a
year down the road. Even if I’m just
jogging a few times a week (as I am right now), as far as I’m concerned it’s
still Training and I’m following a specific plan to achieve a specific level of
fitness that will serve as a base on which to build the NEXT level of fitness.
As a friend of mine recently commented, “That seems a lot
more… scientific than I’ve been doing it.”
You could also say “rigid.” Well,
yeah: that’s ‘cause I’m a linear-sequential sorta dude, and that’s the only way
I know how to look at it. I’ve tried the
Just Running thing before, and though I sometimes like to toss a Just Running
day in from time to time, just to break things up, in the long run I just don’t
get anywhere with it. I lose motivation,
mileage drops off, and pretty soon I’m just sitting around on my rear-end,
slowly turning to flab.
“And you say running is a passion??? Wouldn’t you just
be out there running for the sheer joy
of it?”
A fair question, and I can definitely say that there are
runs and/or workouts that I like to do just ‘cause they’re fun. However, my main passion in running comes
from running fast, from testing myself against the clock or the
course. The sort of races I’ve
considered “fun” aren’t the sort that most people pick (in fact, most people
think I’m pretty much insane when I talk about my favorite races). It’s a process of continual self-improvement,
measured finitely. And I’ve learned that
success doesn’t happen by accident; you need a plan.
Therefore, I Train.
Now, there are about as many training philosophies and
systems out there as there are runners, and many different people have had
success following many different plans.
This stems from the fact that each of us is unique in our
physiology. Yes, we all produce lactic
acid and use oxygen to fuel the metabolic process in our cells and use that
heart-muscle thing to keep the blood flowing, but each of us processes that
lactic acid at a different rate and has a heart that is stronger or smaller or
whatever. As a great example, in college
I started using a heart rate monitor in my training. I found I could push my heart rate up to just
shy of 200 and did my “easy” runs at about 160.
All of that lined up with the “typical” numbers that you get from the
“standard” formulas. At the start of the
next season, I noticed one of the other guys was using a monitor as well and we
started swapping stats. He was
incredulous that I ran at 160 because his MAX was less than that! And he was out-running me in just about every
way!
Broad generalizations are a good place to start, but after
that you really have to focus on what works for you. Different people
respond differently to different types of training.
My current philosophy of training has its beginning in high
school, as that was the first time I was presented with an organized training
regime. (I obviously did some kind of training in middle school,
but I honestly have no recollection of what we did.) It was there I was really introduced to
intervals, fartlek, tempo runs, and the like.
Actually, that pretty much sums up my training in high
school: intervals, fartlek, and tempo runs.
Oh, and we’d get an easy day the day before a meet. Sometimes.
Now, a bit of disclaimer here: some of you who read this
will know the coach I am about to reference.
I’m not trying to cut into said coach’s character or put him down in any
way. The knowledge he passed on to us
was the best he knew, and he did the best job he could. This is simply an analytical observation of
the effectiveness of that training plan from my point of view and how my
body responded to it.
That being said… the training plan was flawed.
The story, as best I can remember it, is that back in the
‘70’s my coach had a batch of super-runners come through. They could handle whatever workloads were
thrown at them, and in fact thrived on it.
I think they won state that year, and when I was in school you still saw
several of their names holding school records.
The problem was that coach
then saw the plan that worked for them
must then be the formula that would work for everyone…
… and when I was running there 20 years later, he was using
the same formula. No new research, no
adjustments. We would often hear
statements that this particular workout was the same that so-and-so did at this
same point in the season the year he won state (or set that record, or
whatever). And we, as relatively
uneducated young runners, ate it up.
What was the plan? In
short, it was “run hard.” And when you
were done with that, run hard some more.
And then some more.
Years later, I went back through my running journals from
that time period and discovered that the only “easy” days we had were either a)
the pre-meet workout, or b) Sundays, if
I didn’t go running. That last was
discouraged, as we were told, “Every day you don’t run takes 7 days of running
to make up for it.” No joke. The Sundays I DID meet up with the guys
turned into tempo runs. In the month of
October, 1994, I have only 5 “easy” days recorded, one of which was a no-run
the day after Districts and the other 4 were pre-meet days.
Two-thirds of the way through every season, I was running on
dead legs, and I had no clue why. My
best performances each season – track and cross country both – generally came
in week 6-8 in a 10-12 week season, with few exceptions.
Interestingly enough, those exceptions had something to do
with more recovery days.
1995 was a big disappointment, running-wise. Half way through the track season (just after
I had set my PR of 4:52 for 1,600m), I was knocked out by a stomach flu that I
never really recovered from that season.
Then, after putting in probably my best summer of running to date, I was
out most of cross country trying to work through injury (ITB Syndrome… avoid
that one if you can, it’s no fun) and had had a… let’s call it a
disillusionment with my coach. Coming
into track that next spring, I was starting to realize that a) there wasn’t
enough recovery time in our weekly training and b) Coach wasn’t the God of All
Running Knowledge that I had thought of him as.
As it happened that season, I switched down in distance to the 800m
(previously, I was always a miler), took nearly 2 weeks off in the middle of the
season (for a class trip to the Grand Canyon; I could have run, but really couldn’t be bothered in the midst of all
that fun!), almost NEVER ran on Sundays… and PR’ed at the District meet,
running 2:06.
Now… could I have run faster that year if I hadn’t taken
that mid-season break? Probably. But one thing I DO know: I almost always felt
fresh and ready to run. Multiple-race
meets (always a bane to me previous years) were no problem: the week before
that 2:06, I had PR’ed with a 2:07 just a couple hours after running my first
1,600 of the year. That would have been
unheard of in previous seasons.
Clearly, there’s something to this whole “rest” thing.
The second thing I FINALLY learned that season was how to
pace myself in a race. I had always gone
out too fast, caught up in the adrenaline of the start of the race, and died at
the end. Even my “best” runs had huge
positive splits. My 4:52 (73 pace
average) is split up 70-71-74-77. That
spring, though, running the 800, I figured out how to “float” the first lap and
then bring it home hard. Negative or
even splits were more common that year than positive. And that random 1,600 that I ran at the end
of the season? 4:56, split up
75-77-75-69, and I passed something like 7 or 8 kids on the last lap. It was great!
(I know I could have run a faster time that day, had I been running the
distance all season long, but I had lost the “feel” for it and was honestly
just guessing my way through it.)
In college, although my running itself fell away a bit, I
was able to do more study on the subject.
In high school, the only resources I had were… my coach. We didn’t even have a specialty running store
in town (and to my knowledge, they still don’t): the closest is 2.5 hours away
in Seattle
The first major eye-opener was just the sheer volume of
miles that my college coach was asking us to run in the off-season. The 3 months on either side of the racing
seasons to me had always been a rest time: low mileage, “fun” runs. The 10 weeks of the official season was about
actually getting in shape, to peak for the District meet and hopefully go on
from there. Little did I know that all
of the quality work during the racing season was only truly effective if you
had built the proper base during the
off-season.
The second influence on me was the idea of using a heart
rate monitor to gage effort. My main
source is a book called Training for
Endurance, by Dr. Phil Maffetone (see my Resources page for a full
bibliography). Also from Maffetone:
- Carbohydrates aren’t necessarily the runner’s super-food that I had always thought they were, and just what sort of diet was more beneficial for both endurance training and life in general.
- With running shoes, less is more, even with someone with flat feet like me – today, I run almost exclusively in Vibram Five Fingers®.
- The idea of a large base of highly aerobic (i.e., “easy”) running to support any other training was reinforced, this time with the science to help clarify the concept.
I’m a “why” guy. It
is a Moral Imperative, as far as I’m concerned.
A few years ago, I was recommended to Daniels’ Running Formula, by Dr. Jack Daniels. For the first time in my life, someone
explained to me all of the “whys” behind the “whats.” Daniels corroborates, explains, and expands
upon everything I had learned up to that point, and even goes as far as saying
several times that even with all of his research into the general way of
things, it still comes down to figuring out your own body. Reading
The final piece to my training is a spiritual element. In 2006, I gave my life over to Jesus, and
since then it has been an on-going process of learning to hear His voice,
guiding me in every-day life. I figure
that this includes running, and have several times held off training or done
something different based on what I feel led to do. Most recently, I’ve been encouraged about
taking this approach by the training of Ryan Hall, who has decided to not
employ a coach and plan his ENTIRE training schedule based on the leading of
the Holy Spirit. The results have been
pretty good… if you consider a 2:04:55 Boston Marathon merely “pretty good.” This, for the foreseeable future, is also the
path I endeavor to take.
So, Brian’s Training Philosophy, in a nutshell:
- Follow the prompting of the Holy Spirit
- Understand the “why” of every workout
- A large base of aerobic, easy miles
- Plenty of recovery days, to get the most out of the quality days
- A healthy diet, based on a high percentage of veggies
- Minimalistic running shoes, for a more natural (and therefore healthy) experience
- Negative splits – save something for the end!
And that doesn't include anything like goal-setting or positive self-talk or several other thing - this is just the physical part. This is, as with everything, a work in progress, and much of
my joy in running comes simply from the learning.
Train on, friends, and I’ll see you at the next Start Line!
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