Track and Field Blogs - RunDMC

Coach’s wisdom

I have had a lot of coaches with lots of different philosophies. Here are a few of the gold nuggets I picked up over the years.

“Fast as you can easy” – My HS coach used to use this phrase all the time. Over the years I have come to understand it better. Run hard, but not all out in your workouts so you can stack more workouts together. 3 workouts a week at 80-85% is better than 1 at 95%. It’s not how fast you go, but how much you go fast.

There are 2 ways to become a faster distance runner: run more and run faster. Nuff said.

The magic number is 90. 90min runs will start to take you into depletion. This is where big endurance gains are made and physiological efficiency is gained in a big way. Do as many runs of 90+ minutes as possible. “You’d be surprised how quickly a 90min run can go by.” – A teammate of mine who was putting in 120mi weeks and consequently ran 14:02 for 5k.

Long term development – you will not become a great distance runner in 16 weeks despite how you may interpret some reputable literature out there. It takes years of consistency. Lydiard suggests 3 or more years of his cycle of Base, Hills, Speed, and Peak training before reaching potential – each one building on the previous gains. Each year of HS, my 2mi track time would become the next years 2mi split in 5k Cross Country.

If you run fast enough, you don’t need a kick.

The 3 week rule – you can do anything for 3 weeks before it catches up to you. That is when breakdown starts and when our coach could tell who ran enough over the summer.

The last 7 standing are the team. Back before Title IX was used to enforce inequality, my college CC team did not have cuts. We just had attrition. We started with about 50 guys and 20 girls. At season’s end, it was 20 guys and 7 girls.

Body rhythms – everybody has days and weeks that they feel good and bad. Try to cycle your training to coincide with these feelings. Push more when you feel good, less when you feel bad. However part of training is to make sure that your body is ready on race day whatever your body cycle is. So stick to a schedule that prepares you, but be somewhat flexible in the intensity. The training cycle can actually force they body rhythm where you need it.

Be there or stay there – One coach would announce at practice that the bus would leave at some oddball time like 7:04am, then announce the time on his watch. As soon as his watch said 7:04am, the bus cranked up and pulled out. Didn’t matter if you were an All American or third string, if you were not there, you got left. Races and life don’t wait for you. The first step to success is showing up.

A great runner does not make a great coach. I have found that the lesser runner usually studies the sport and training techniques in great detail to improve himself and therefore makes the better coach. The great runner runs great without any real thought and has a hard time understanding why others don’t run as fast as them. There are always exceptions, but this has been my experience.