Do you set big goals for yourself, then get upset at yourself if you fall short?
If so, you’re increasing your risk of burnout.
I’m a fan of setting big goals at least sometimes. However, you have to be careful about how you respond when the inevitable happens. When you set big goals, you will sometimes fall short, quite possibly more often than you reach them.
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Some time ago, I was listening to a podcast interview of a high school coach with a PhD in exercise physiology. He pointed out that his athletes could be using watches that measure heart rate, oxygen saturation, cadence, ground contact time, and a crazy number of other values. However, while some had these watches, he didn’t have them paying attention to those values while running. His runners learned how to run by feel.
I wrote down a few notes from that interview and came across them last week, which prompted this post.
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Last week, in discussing strength training, I pointed out why I think most runners should probably not do what the elites are doing. I wanted to expand on that thought some this week because, while it’s good to look at them to get an idea of what works, it can be risky for several reasons to simply replicate what they do.
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I’m going to tag the date on this because our knowledge changes and I’ll probably post an update every once in a while. Hopefully, more than once every 20 years.
I’ve been having discussions with a few runners on strength training recently and I’ve realized that my very old post about strength training, while not entirely invalid, is outdated. Of course, I wrote that somewhere around 20 years ago so what should we expect?
So it’s time for an update. Is strength training good for our running and, if so, what should we do?
The answers are yes and it depends.
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Strava is a wonderful tool. It’s a great way to share your training with friends as well as keep up with what your friends are doing. It’s loaded with great ways to challenge yourself and your friends. It also has kudos. Who doesn’t love getting that little virtual pat on the back for a run well done?
Garmin Connect and others also have great ways to challenge yourself and your friends, from pre-built challenges you can join to the ability to create challenges with friends.
However, there are things to be careful about with these tools.
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