Runner's Edge of the Rockies Blog

• Put pen to paper to make them “real”.  By actually seeing it (vs. just thinking it), you will be that much more likely to keep it as a priority.  Take it a step further by taping it up on your bathroom mirror, the door of your fridge, etc.  Even if your goals are intrinsic (i.e. having fun and feeling good), vs. extrinsic (i.e., placing in your age group), writing them down will keep you on track to make them happen.

• Decide if they are realistic.  Setting the bar high is great, but not if it’s completely out of reach.  Remember that Rome wasn’t built in a day, and it takes YEARS to fully reach your full potential as a runner.  And sure, we all could log 70+ miles a week and dedicate ourselves wholeheartedly to achieving our goals, but is that really doable?  Some people are in a position where they are fortunate enough to go at it 100% and put everything else on the back-burner, but for most of us the stress of a job, family, other activities, and “life” can create barriers.  So make sure you’re taking an honest assessment of what you can actually balance before you commit to taking on too much.  If that means you have to dial it back and stick with halves, and put that quest for Boston or your first tri on hold until you’re a bit more balanced, that’s a better choice than pushing yourself too hard and risking burnout and frustration, additional fatigue, and injury.

• Discuss your goals with your family.  If you’re single, then you’re only accountable to yourself, but if you have a spouse and kids then you need to make sure that your family is on board with your goals.  Trying to break 4 hours in a marathon is a very admirable goal, but not at the expense of pissing off your wife/husband, especially if there’s too many other family activities and responsibilities you would need to forego!  Plus, your training will be so much more productive and rewarding, knowing that your family is on board and supporting you.

• Start at your goal date, and think backwards to today.  This will keep you focused on the primary “prize” and will also ensure that you have the proper building-blocks in place to adequately train and prepare yourself.  For example, if you know you want to run your first half in May, start thinking about which race you would like to do, which weekends might work best within the context of balancing work/family, etc.  If you’re trying to do something unique like run your fastest marathon or qualify for Boston, start thinking about which shorter-distance races (5-10km and halves), you should add (or cut!) to enhance your training, if you should add Speedwork, additional cross-training, physiological testing, etc.

• Think about what additional activities might be required for you to achieve you goals.  The miles you actually log are but one part of the puzzle.  Sleep, nutrition, strength/cross-training, injury management and mental training...  These are all critical components that help you become a stronger, faster, and more consistent athlete.  So make sure you’re tapping into other resources in order to increase your chance for success.  (For a list of our recommended wellness providers who have helped many Runner’s Edge members, click HERE.)

• Don’t just run...  TRAIN.  When you have a goal you are shooting for, every run should have a purpose.  If that purpose is a scheduled speed workout to improve your cardiovascular capabilities, a Saturday long run to build endurance, or those all-important recovery runs to allow your body the necessary time to repair and rebuild from previous hard workouts, just make sure that you’re not “running just to run”.  Sometimes the purpose of the run may not even be “time-focused” at all and may just be to focus on a particular aspect of your running (stride, turnover, breathing, form), or after a tough day, to finish your run with a better attitude than you began it with.  No matter what though, always give your run a purpose and you will get more out of your training.

Here is a great article about running injuries, including tips for prevention and treatment.

The North Face® Athlete Tip - Nikki Kimball

"Every year one of every three serious runners will incur a running-related injury. Two thirds of these injuries result from training errors (J Am Acad Orthop Surg 1995;3:309-318). Dr. Stan James, MD paraphrases a colleague’s "rule of too’s" stating "athletes court disaster when they exercise too often, too hard, and too soon and too much after injury and attempt remediation too little and too late," (JAAOS 1995;3:309). The "rule of too’s" summarizes most controllable factors in avoidance of injury. Of course there are other factors such as trauma, intrinsic biomechanical problems and possibly age. But I’d like to focus on the most common risk factors, as these training errors are also avoidable.

Read entire article at http://www2.thenorthface.com/endurancechallenge/training/injury.html

Preparing for this Saturday's training run in Golden and the next three weeks of building mileage:


Here are a couple of things to keep in mind as we prepare for the next few weeks. FIRST: If you ran at race pace on Saturday, you put approximately 30% more pounding on your legs than during your training pace! (If you took a more conservative approach and ran Saturday at goal pace or training pace, you will not feel as much soreness and should rebound faster.) SECOND: As I mentioned above, because Georgetown is a downhill grade, that means your legs sustained even more pounding than on a flat (or uphill) course, which will lead to more soreness too. On Friday I ran 17 downhill miles (in prep for the St. George Marathon), and I can tell you that I was a bit more sore than after a “normal” 17 mile run. The physics of downhill running mean that if your stride is a certain length (say, length of "x"), then by adding a decline to the road (say, a drop in length of "y"), then your actual stride length is really "x + y" which means that you had more of a "fall" from one foot strike to the next. (I’m not a physics major and it’s not automatically that simple, but you get the picture.) That also means that with that added distance you also added more pounding on your body. Yes, downhill running produces faster times but also can produce more soreness!

So prepare accordingly this week to fight the "DOMS" (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness). Get plenty of rest, follow your training schedules as closely as possible, hydrate and eat well, don't forget your stretching routines (twice a day if need be), and also consider getting a massage. (But no massages on Friday as that will make you MORE sore for Saturday.) This weekend, most of you are going long, so that you can continue to build endurance. But that also means there is a premium on nutrition, hydration, rest, sleep, etc... And make sure that you’re putting a premium on recovering from your runs and cross-training workouts as we will have three “On” weeks before another Recovery week. So make sure to treat this Saturday’s group run seriously, leave your egos at home and keep it SLOW. Because for many of you, this Saturday will be the longest training run of the session. I will be preaching it big-time this week that everyone needs to take the next two long runs nice and easy, and really just focus on training slow and building endurance! (And if you didn’t run Georgetown-Idaho Springs, you’ll still want to use the same preparation and pacing strategies to advance your training!)

Have a great week, and we'll see you all Saturday morning in Golden for our long run, which is another “Rocky Mountain Ice Bath” run as we’ll be Starting/Finishing right along the Clear Creek (river), where you can have a nice post-run soak! :-)