|
Contact John Loeschhorn |
|
Training Tips For Optimum Performance
2. REST - You should plan a six to eight week block in every year where you will not race and you will not be preparing for a race. During this training break you will run slowly and only about half as many miles as normal. 3. 5K-10K runners should gradually increase their running to an hour per day five days per week and an hour and a half one day per week. One day per week the hour should include twelve minutes of running at your best 5K pace or a little faster. This should be an interval type workout consisting of some combination of 400's, 800's and 1200's. When running repeat 400's the rest interval should not be more than one minute of jogging, to avoid running them too fast. Three minutes of jogging should be enough rest between the 800's and 1200's. Once a week you should run ten to fifteen minutes at your best 10K pace. If you run only ten minutes it should be in one surge, but fifteen minutes should be divided in three to fives surges with one to two minutes’ rest between each. 4. Run slower, to be able to race faster. Most runners run too fast everyday and thus risk injury. These same runners seldom run race pace or faster. I like to think of speed work as “skills training,” because an important part of the reason we run fast, is to practice the stride length, stride frequency and stride rhythm of our goal race pace. Our bodies can only tolerate a small quantity of fast running, so make all of your fast running race pace running. The rest of our training should be to develop our fitness, slow running accomplishes this almost as effectively as fast running and it is mush less likely to produce an injury. Injuries need to be avoided at all costs. Your day to day training pace should be one to two minutes per mile slower than your current best 10K pace.
Great racing is not an exercise of will, but rather an exercise
of moving your conscious mind out of the way, so your body
is able to blossom with the promise it has been conditioned
to fulfill.
5.
When you are running fast, practice running relaxed; because
the essence of great running is "smooth flowing, fast flowing,
effortlessly flowing." I like to think of a drop of
water running down a windowpane, when I am running fast; it
glides effortlessly.
6.
Marathoners should gradually increase their running to an hour
per day, four days per week, an hour and a half two days per
week and two hours one day per week. As in the 5K-10K
above, one day per week should include ten minutes of running
at your best 10K pace. One day should include a continuous
run of about thirty minutes at your goal pace for the marathon. |
1.
Run fifty-two weeks of every year. Consistent training is necessary
to maintain optimum fitness.
Left: Fast Fred Cowles demonstrates how he
got his nickname.
Copyright © 2001 by John Loeschhorn - Mail to:mtnrnr@pacbell.net February 16, 2001 |