Spring is a great time to use longer, warmer days to kick your running up a notch. However, after a long winter, it’s also a notoriously dangerous time to pull an under-used muscle. To make sure you transition smoothly, whether you’re preparing for your first 5K or up to marathon distance, we garnered advice from long-time Massachusetts-based coach Mick Grant, who has helped athletes to national championships over his 20-year coaching career. He is one of many experts now sharing training wisdom through CoachUp, the nation’s largest private coaching service. Read his recommendations in his own words below.
Have fun (Rule 1) and stay healthy (Rule 2). A sustainable, long-term running program must first follow these two rules. To realize the great benefits of running, you need to enjoy being outside pretty regularly. If you hate your running program, or if you keep getting injured, you are doing something wrong. Remember, the key to long-term improvement is successfully avoiding your breaking point.
Get off the treadmill. If you want to run, get outside. Head to parks, woods, and trails. Learn how to run on trails and really enjoy the outdoors. At first you might run/hike, and that’s fine. Discover new places. You can find everything from gentle cross-country courses in a park or around a lake to extremely difficult adventure runs or ultras, like the Leadville 100.
Run with friends as often as possible. Meet with your friends for runs, which will only help with that all-important fun factor. To further amp up the social element of running, find a fitness group. It’s a great way to build your aerobic foundation, as the time will pass very quickly on these shared runs.
Understand what you can handle, and do that. There is no improvement without recovery. Dr. Peter Snell, a three-time Olympic gold medalist, said that training is a balance between damage and repair. Follow that advice. If you are ready for five miles but not 20, do five miles, and build up to six, seven, eight, etc. And always keep Rule 1 and Rule 2 in mind.
Build your base. If you plan to run races, keep initial training simple. Respect the event and build an aerobic foundation by not going out too hard; follow a slow, gradual build-up of distance and endurance. Legendary coach and runner Arthur Lydiard said, “The bigger the base, the higher the peak.”
Coach Mick Grant has coached at youth, high school, and post-collegiate levels, in disciplines ranging from track & field events to marathons. Photo courtesy of Mick Grant
Monitor your heart rate. A simple and effective way to monitor your progress is to check your heart rate (HR). Your training HR depends on lots of factors, including age, fitness, health, and pace. While it’s best to consult your doctor to determine a safe HR, I suggest staying under 175 beats per minute to stay aerobic. If you are a newer runner or a new marathoner, I suggest keeping HR under 150. Over time, you will learn how training HR and perceived effort go together.
To monitor recovery, check and track your resting HR when you get up in the morning to learn what your individual resting HR is. As you get fitter, you may notice it going down a little. If it’s going up, you need more rest. An elevated resting HR is a red flag.
Learn your pace. Whether your goal is to complete a 5K or a marathon, learn and master your goal pace for the race. Practice even-split and negative-split running. That is, keep the second half of every run the same pace or faster than the first half.
Run a weekly 6×200. A good thing to incorporate into your training is a weekly set of six 200-meter lengths (jog 200 meters, rest, repeat) on the road, trail, or track. I like these repeats for improving efficiency, running form, cadence, and pacing. Pace will depend on what you are training for, but you could do them at your current 5K pace and check your HR. Also check your cadence (how many steps you take per minute). The rule of thumb for a good cadence is 180. Remember, your 6×200 should not be a hard run. Include a mile or two to warm up and cool down.
Try tempo runs. Weekly tempo runs are terrific, and you can vary distances to make things more interesting. Keep these sessions aerobic (HR less than 175), and track HR at the end of each run. If you’re training for a 5K, try for 2,500 meters at your current 5K pace. If you’re gunning for a 10K, work up to running a 5K at your current 10K pace. Be sure to run even or negative splits. This practice will help you learn how to pace better, how pace and HR go together, and how to devise a better race plan.
Keep pace for the race. On race day, execute on what you’ve practiced: running at the pace you have mastered during training. Let others who have similar goals help you. Don’t go out crazy and blow up. Stick with those even or negative splits and you’ll be surprised at what you can accomplish.
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