Training

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

Saturday, I ran a race. I wasn’t really race ready. I feel like my general fitness is pretty good right now but I haven’t done enough race specific workouts for my race fitness to be ready.

So why did I do this race? Because I needed some practice before my important races.

Racing is different than even the hardest workouts. While workouts are good opportunities to practice the skills we will bring to racing, no workout takes you to the place a race will. As a result, there are simply some things that can’t be practiced any time other than on a race day.

From how to handle lining up pre-race to how you respond when someone near you does something unexpected to knowing when you can kick with all you have without fear of running out of gas before the finish line and so many things in between, the only real way to develop the skills needed for race day is to get real world practice.

So sign up for a few races. If you have a goal race planned for this fall, sign up for a few summer races. Even if you’re not in peak shape for those summer races, you will gain experience that will allow you to perform even better when the goal race comes around in the fall.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

“It’s hard showing up day after day. It’s worth it but it’s hard.” – Jon Marcus

I was recently listening to the Magness and Marcus podcast and I heard that quote from Jon Marcus. I was already thinking of writing about this topic and that quote just clicked with me because it’s so true and so important to running.

I often find myself saying the biggest key to success in distance running is consistency. How do you be consistent? Well, obviously you have to stay healthy so your training isn’t sidelined by injury. However, in my opinion, the biggest factor is just showing up.

On those days your motivation is lagging but you know you have work to do, you get it done.

On those days when the weather sucks and you just want to stay inside, you get out the door.

On those days when the treadmill is the only good option and you hate treadmills, you get on it anyway.

It’s not easy to show up day after day, week after week, month after month. But being hard is part of what makes it so worthwhile. When you reach your goal that others were telling you was impossible, you know how you got there.

Which brings me to another quote, which seems to be commonly attributed to Jerry Rice. “Today I will do what other won’t, so tomorrow I can accomplish what others can’t.”

Photo credit: Loneliest by Andrew Murray, on Flickr

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

By now, I’m sure most of you know my thoughts on the “10% rule”. It’s far too simplistic. That said, there is such a thing as building up too quickly, right?

Of course there is. It’s just not as simple as this week should always be no more than 10% more distance than last week.

Ideally, we listen to our bodies to know if problems are creeping up but what if we had cues to tell us when we may need to pay closer attention or take concerns more seriously?

Enter the Acute-to-Chronic training ratio (what I will abbreviate as the A:C ratio).

What is the A:C ratio?

It’s simply your past week’s running mileage divided by the average of your past 4 weeks. An example might be helpful.

Let’s say your past 4 weeks have looked like the following:

45 miles

50 miles

55 miles

60 miles

Your A:C ratio is then 60 / 52.5 (52.5 is the average of 45, 50, 55, 60). Rounded off, this is 1.14.

Research has found that, on average, injury risk climbs when you hit a ratio of 1.2 and significantly increases around 1.5.

However, that’s for the “average” person. How many of us are perfectly average? If you look at your history, you’ll probably find that there is some fuzzy area where you cross from being relatively solid with no real injury concerns to where you feel like you’re walking a tightrope.

With this knowledge, you could actually adjust to where you know that, for example, at 1.3 you begin feeling not so great and bad things happen when you get over 1.6. So you can watch for those numbers instead of 1.2 and 1.5.

Also, some suggestions are that you take intensity into account. Not all miles are equal. A 5 mile tempo run is more strenuous than 5 miles very easy. This is a little more complicated to keep track of but might make this kind of ratio even more useful as you can track increases in both volume and intensity.

Why is this better than the 10%rule?

To be honest, this is a similar concept to the 10% rule but, depending on how deep you go, it offers more flexibility.

First, in even its most simple sense, you are given two levels to watch: graduated risk and high risk. It’s not as simple as 9.5% = good, 10.5% = bad.

Second, I like the idea that it doesn’t just take a look at the past two weeks. By looking at the past 4 weeks, it gets a more complete picture of your recent training, not just a very limited snapshot. It would be great to look at 2-3 months, of course, but I get how that would complicate things. 4 weeks seems like a decent compromise.

Third, the idea and, in some circles, encouragement to adjust those numbers to your unique needs is outstanding. Track your history, find the numbers that work for you, then adjust.

Finally, if you go the most complex route and add in intensity, you’re measuring not just volume but total training stress. This is an outstanding, though admittedly much more complex, addition to the equation.

In the end, obviously, we aren’t robots. No numerical formula is going to perfectly predict injury risk. You might get injured when your A:C ratio is below 1 (meaning you’re reducing training load) or you might be able to stay healthy when it’s above 2. At 1.3, you might get injured one time but not another. However, if we can track when our risk is increasing, we can be more aware of that and take more precautions.

Addition to the training log

So what does all of this do for us if we’re not easily able to track it? That’s what I started asking myself and I realized I had the ability to offer a solution.

Starting this morning on the HillRunner.com Training Log, you can track your A:C training ratio. It’s right there on your sidebar, easy to see and updated in real time as you update your training log.

Currently, it’s the most simplistic solution. If your ratio is below 1.2, it will show up as green:

From 1.2 to 1.5, it will be orange:

1.5 and above, red:

In the future, I plan to build out this functionality as follows:

First, I want this to be an optional sidebar widget, as are some of the others such as the weather widget, controllable through your log settings.

Second, I plan to make those thresholds customizable. They will default to 1.2 and 1.5 but you will be able to change them to the numbers that work best for you.

Finally, my most ambitious thought is to include intensity. This will take more work as the log doesn’t currently track intensity but I’d like to see it included in the long term future.

As far as I know, the HillRunner.com Training Log is the first log to include this A:C training ratio. As always, I am aiming to provide an easy to use, convenient, but useful training log. I hope this is an addition that, while not affecting ease of use, will conveniently add a useful tracking measure.

Photo credit: PSY_1987 by Inland Empire Running Club, on Flickr

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

Spring is on the way! While many of us already had some summer like weather this year, we’ve also faced some challenging winter weather. Things will be taking a turn soon if they haven’t already begun taking a turn where you are.

It’s so easy when the weather gets better in the spring to get a little too excited about training in good weather and try to do too much. Be careful not to fall into this trap.

After working your way through all the bad winter weather, the last thing you want to do is get yourself hurt when the weather is turning nice, especially since your racing season is likely also just around the corner.

Photo credit: DSCI0012 by Tory Klementsen, on Flickr

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

This week, we had serious wind on Tuesday, my workout day. It was brutal, I was being blown all over the place and my splits during the first half of the workout, when running into the wind, were horrible.

Earlier this year, I had a workout where I could just feel things weren’t going well. It wasn’t the conditions that time. My body just wasn’t responding. It wouldn’t go no matter how much I wanted it to.

Whether due to the conditions or due to it just not being our day, we all have workouts that just don’t go so well. Bad workouts happen. What should you do about it?

Don’t get down

First, don’t get down on yourself if you’re having a bad workout. If you’re having a bad day, just chalk it up to that. We all have bad days. I expect, in any given training cycle, that we will all have a few workouts that just don’t go our way. It’s built into the expectations. When you have that day, just accept it and move on. Analyze why it happened and, if changes can be made to reduce your risk of a repeat occurrence, make those changes.

Most important, don’t dwell on it. What’s done is done. Learn from it if there was a lesson to be learned and move on.

Adjust if needed

During the workout, ask yourself if you’re still accomplishing the goal of the workout. Sometimes, even if you’re not hitting the splits you were aiming for, you’re still accomplishing the goal. In the case of my workout this week, my splits look pretty ridiculous but I know I accomplished what I wanted. In the case of my earlier workout, I wasn’t running the paces I wanted but I was still getting the training stimulus I was aiming for. So, in both cases, I didn’t worry about the watch and just ran.

If something doesn’t feel right, especially if you feel like an injury might be on the way, stop the workout immediately. If the conditions you’re facing are dangerous, stop the workout and find shelter immediately. If you’re just feeling so off that you can’t hit the kind of intensity you’re looking for in the workout, cut it short and move on.

Build mental toughness

This is mostly for workouts in bad conditions but also applies to workouts when you’re just not quite feeling right. Toughing it out in these workouts will make you a mentally stronger runner. If you face similar conditions on race day, chances are they aren’t going to cancel or postpone the race. You’re going to be running in them. If the conditions are good on race day, think how easy it will seem after running through more challenging conditions.

Likewise, if you’re feeling a little off on race day, they aren’t going to postpone it until you’re feeling better. You better be prepared to do your best regardless of how you’re feeling.

In the end, I would consider both of the challenging workouts I had this year productive. Not only did I still get them in and accomplish the stimulus I was looking for. I also toughened myself up. I’m not down on myself for running slow in the first half of my workout on Tuesday, just as I’m not getting carried away by the pace I had with a tailwind in the second half. I am very happy, though, that I battled through and got the workout I wanted even if the conditions weren’t ideal.