Training, injuries, coaching, and more
This week I launched Running Writings Apps, a new platform for me to host some of my more technology-heavy running-related projects. During my PhD work I did a lot of data analysis and data visualization, and picked up some strong programming skills along the way. I’m excited to incorporate more of that alongside my long-form writing here.
This week I launched my first project: the Running Writings workout pace percentage calculator! Check it out!
Recently I’ve been diving back into the world of exercise physiology research, especially as it relates to running performance. I got behind on following ex phys in grad school (too busy following biomechanics!), so it’s been a few years since I’ve caught up on the latest research.
This weekend I was reading about capillarization: the growth of new, tiny blood vessels–capillaries–that run between and around individual muscle fibers. Capillaries are super important for aerobic performance, since they’re the place where oxygen diffuses out of red blood cells and into muscle fibers.
While researching my blog post on Renato Canova’s marathon training book, I came across a lecture that Canova gave at a coaching conference put on by Spanish marathoner and coach Antonio Serrano in 2017. The talk, called The Keys to Marathon Training[1] was held in conjunction with the 2017 Valencia Marathon.
This lecture directly answers one of the questions I had when writing up my analysis of Canova’s book–what’s changed since 1999? From his answers in a 2011 interview, I knew that Canova believed some important things had changed, but that video didn’t go into too much detail. Canova’s talk at this conference goes into much more depth, so I wanted to do a more formal write-up on it.
How do the best marathon runners in the world train? While you might catch a workout or two on Instagram or hear rumors about epic training weeks on message boards, there’s precious little information on the systematic approaches that elite coaches use with top marathon runners–and even less information on the science that backs up these approaches for designing marathon training programs.
One exception to this general rule has been the Italian coach Renato Canova, arguably the greatest living running coach and the topic of several of my previous posts on Running Writings. Canova freely discusses his training philosophy and posts example workouts or even full training schedules for the athletes he has worked with, which include Olympic and World Championships medallists.
In 1999, Canova even co-authored a book on the science of marathon training—however, there’s a bit of a catch: this book was printed through the IAAF (now World Athletics), not a traditional publishing company or printing press. As a result, Canova’s book is extraordinarily rare. I had heard of this book probably a decade ago, but in the intervening years I couldn't find any substantive information on its contents. Until now.
Though many runners treat treadmills as a necessary evil, treadmill access is a must-have if you live anywhere that gets extreme cold or extreme heat and want to train seriously year-round. Being from Minnesota (and having coached many runners in the Midwest), I’ve had plenty of experience modifying workouts and training sessions for the treadmill.
On top of that, I’ve just wrapped up a biomechanics study as a part of my PhD dissertation that involved 60 runners completing a treadmill run in a motion capture lab, so I have a lot of experience working with biomechanical data from treadmill running.
When you’re doing treadmill workouts, you can’t always just translate your outdoor workouts 1:1 and expect everything to go well. There are several important physiological, biomechanical, and psychological aspects of treadmill running that differ from outdoor running.
Moreover, I’ve found that a lot of runners have ideas about treadmill training that aren’t in alignment with the scientific research on treadmill running. So, this article is designed to refute some of these incorrect ideas, and provide some guidance on how to incorporate treadmill running, when necessary, into your own training.
Just want to know the most important info before you hit the treadmill? Click the link below to go directly to my seven scientifically-supported best practices for treadmill training.
When runners ask online about ways to improve their running form or increase their footspeed, a common response is “add some strides.” It’s assumed or implicit in such a response that everyone knows what strides are and how to do them optimally.
As with many things in training, it’s worth spending some time to dig into what constitutes “doing strides,” and how we might incorporate them into training in a more thoughtful way.
I recently appeared on Joe Sell's excellent Marathon Running Podcast for a second time to talk about fueling and nutrition for the marathon (see my first appearance here in case you missed it).
The impetus for this podcast was my recent blog post on how to plan fueling for elite marathoners who have "bottle service" at their race, but in the podcast we talk about fueling for all kinds of runners.
We had a great time and went really in-depth on the science behind optimal fueling (both hydration and sports drinks + gels) for marathoning. Check it out here!
Hello readers! I have a few quick Running Writings-related updates to share: first, in early August, Running Writings will be migrating from its current (and very ancient) Google Blogger framework to a shiny new web host, with new servers and a more modern look. If I pull this off correctly (Update: I did!), the site ... Read more
Getting your personal water bottles placed at aid stations in a road race is one of the perks offered to people fast enough for elite or sub-elite status at major marathons. It’s amazingly convenient to be able to place your own nutrition and hydration along the course, but since this perk is such a rarity among the broader running population, there’s very little information out there about how to change your nutrition strategy if this is an option for you.
The advantages of personal nutrition are manifold: you’re free to choose the form and flavor of the nutrition you consume, you don’t have to physically carry the gels and fluids with you, and you can drink out of an actual water bottle, which is much easier than drinking out of a paper cup.
Additionally, marathons sometimes make questionable decisions about the official hydration sponsor; I know of more than one major race that has historically offered a low-carb or calorie-free hydration mix as their official fluid at the general public aid stations! Using your own nutrition frees you from worrying about this problem.
A few of the athletes I’ve worked with over the years have been fast enough to get “bottle service” at major city races, and I’ve learned a few tricks from other coaches and athletes for how to optimize a nutrition plan for this scenario. Let’s say you’ve just qualified for the elite field at a big race, and you find out you get to supply your own nutrition–what do you do? In this post, I’ll walk you through how to design your fueling plan and how to prepare the bottles themselves, using an example from a real athlete and a real marathon.
Several years ago I wrote about getting the warm-up right, and I still believe that many runners neglect the warm-up to their own detriment. But after you work out, what about the cooldown (or, less commonly these days, a “warm-down”)? How long, how far, and how fast should a cooldown be? Getting to a place where we can answer these questions is going to require getting a framework in place where we understand why you should cool down in the first place.
Like much of the accumulated lore of running, the common rationales for doing a cool-down at all contain a healthy mix of physiology, bro science, folk wisdom, and true coaching wisdom. Allegedly, the cooldown is supposed to gradually reduce your heart rate, pump “lactic acid” out of your muscles, and condition your legs to running while tired. Failing to cool down is again allegedly supposed to make you feel more sore the next day, and harm your recovery capabilities. Needless to say, each of these rationales has a hefty amount of myth alongside perhaps a kernel of truth.
Instead of trying to consider and analyze each of these claims in turn, I think it’s better to break the question of “why do a cooldown” into smaller parts: who is doing the cooldown, what workout does it follow, and what training goals are we trying to accomplish, both in this workout and in the longer-term training plan.