A year ago, Grace P. had never run before. I am sure she tried to catch a bus or get refuge from the rain at some point, but never what we picture when we think of a runner.
She is friends with my wife and on a fateful October day of last year, we were invited to a small gathering at her house. I wasn’t too keen on spending a Saturday afternoon with people I don’t know but there are certain sacrifices a husband must make. Grace’s husband was wearing Brooks shoes, so to make small chitchat I asked if he was a runner. “I only run when Grace wants to hit me”, he joked back.
Still looking strong and happy at mile 18 of the Marine Corps Marathon.
Then my wife stated that I was a running coach and Grace jumped in saying something along the lines of: “I’ve always wanted to run, but I can’t get very far without getting tired. I see my neighbor running all the time, but I can’t run like her”. So, I told her I was the head coach for the City of Tamarac Run Club. “If you are at X park at X time on X day, I will get you running”. And she showed up. And kept on showing up. Last October 29th, she became a marathoner.
Three or 4 weeks into the training, on a cold and rainy night, everyone bowed out of the run through our chat. Except Grace. So, I showed up. She was scheduled to run three miles and at two, in the midst of a downpour, I told her it was OK to cut it short. With a huge smile, she told me she was completing her workout. And she did.
That was the specific moment when I realized that she caught the running bug and that she had the talent and drive necessary to achieve great things in this sport. Her training improved so fast that in less than two months of running, she skipped the 5K and went straight to a 10K race, in which she ran 1:00:13. A month later she ran her first 10 miler and another month later her first half marathon in 2:18. Within another month she set two more PRs in the distance, finishing the season with 2:05. That is a minute per mile faster than six weeks earlier. Now she wanted a marathon.
The story escalated quickly from there. As her coach, I wanted to make sure she recovered properly. That she took the necessary time off, that she began a strengthening program, that she learned about nutrition, hydration, recovery, etc. She even took to learn about the story of women in running by reading Marathon Woman, by Kathrine Switzer, who she learned to admire.
While in DC, Grace had the chance to meet and mingle with the one and only Kathrine Switzer
Then, as the hottest month of July in recorded history dawned in South Florida, Grace and her training partner Luis D. started their marathon preparation. It was brutal. More than once they had to take to the streets at 5 AM under 85-degree temperature and 100% humidity. Yet, they persevered. They kept going until one day… Voila!!! It all kicked in and new distances beyond 13.1 became not only possible but she thrived on them. I can recall her finishing her first 15-miler hooting and jumping with a big smile. Yes, I know. Totally crazy!
Sure, there were setbacks. And those were important, too. There was one time she hit the wall and had to finish walking. In the midst of her disappointment, I taught her to learn from it. To take it as an opportunity. She had progressed so fast she hadn’t experienced much failure. Another time she tried a new gel and it backfired badly. She had to use one of her lifelines and phone a friend to pick her up. She was upset but I told her it was important to learn that this brand doesn’t work for her, now, instead of at mile 22 on race day. And she persevered.
Marathon day arrived on October 29. Grace was ready and excited. But the weather wasn’t as cool as expected. Her training partner was dealing with a leg issue and dropped off the pace from the very beginning. There was a ton of traffic at the start and her first 5k was off by over a minute-per-mile slower than planned. So, she adjusted to her circumstances, picked up the pace to what she trained for and maintained it until Km35 (Mile 22), where she slowed down a little bit. The last mile was very tough, yet she persevered and did not walk at all, finishing in a solid 4:39:07. This, I remind you again, was someone who told me a year ago she wanted to run without tiring, like her neighbor.
Coach Adolfo, Grace and Norvin (Grace’s husband), on our way to the startng line of the MCM races
If this wasn’t enough of a story, her husband caught the running bug, too. He started walking, then run/walking, and then pursued loftier goals as he felt better and stronger. He lost over 20 Lbs. and started fitting into clothes he hadn’t worn in years. And if that wasn’t enough, he ran the Marine Corps 10K without stopping in a time of 1:16. Now he is eyeing his first half.
From the coaching side, not only it has been a treat to coach a runner as talented and dedicated as Grace P., but she has also become an integral part of our Saturday running group. Moreover, she and her husband have become close friends with my wife and I, which has been a great addition to our lives. Running is the gift that keeps on giving.
Not everyone possesses the hidden talent and drive that Grace demonstrated. Not everyone aspires to become a marathoner. However, everyone has the potential to make the most of their physical capabilities. Just like Grace, it begins with showing up at the park on the appointed date and time, embarking on a personal journey whose destination remains unknown. Who knows where it may lead you?
A few days ago, I received a phone call from one of my athletes. She’s training for her second marathon, which is fast approaching. My concerns exploded right away, as the first words out of her mouth were: “I have a problem!”. Possibilities such as injury, illness, unexplained pains, job loss, etc., started rushing through my mind. In this blog post, we\’ll explore the art of balancing running and life, especially when facing unexpected life dilemmas.
“What’s happening?”, I asked as I tried to contain my uneasiness so I could keep her calm.
“My husband bought tickets to a comedy show on Friday night, and I won’t be able to do my Saturday long run?”. She explained.
Multiple aspects of your life must be juggled around so your running doesn’t become the ruler of your schedule (Photo Michael Judkins, Pexels)
As the color returned to my face, I told her with the best sarcastic tone I could muster: “What an inconsiderate man! Wanting to go out on a Friday night, with his wife, to have fun? That is awful. If you could only move that long run to Sunday.”
Then I explained that as important as her marathon is, and as much as she is invested in her running, keeping a balanced life between family, work, and running is essential. This was not the night before her marathon, and it doesn’t happen every Friday night. If she doesn’t allow the necessary flexibility to move some workouts around, then her husband, her kids, and eventually her, will resent her running. That would be disastrous for all the parties involved.
“Thank you for the perspective”, she said. And hung up two seconds later”.
I guarantee this incident is not an isolated one. I bet every single reader of this blog post has a personal version of this story. I certainly do. More than one. At one time or another, we had to confront this reality. “I want to train. But my—insert relationship here—wants to—insert activity here— What should I do?”
Most likely you are not qualifying for the Olympics, lining up side-by-side with Eliud Kipchoge at the Berlin Marathon start, or even considered the favorite to win your local 5K. So, moving things around in your training schedule, or God forbid, skipping a workout, are feasible arrangements to fit in running around your life.
What to do if you score World Series tickets for the night before your marathon?
In my experience, both personally and as a coach, the newer you are in the sport, the tougher it becomes to keep running in perspective. As you get started on your journey, the improvement curve is so steep that you want to keep the progress for as long as possible. You may not understand the benefits of a day off, or that not one particular session is going to make or break your race or your running career. This is the time when you must check in with your coach or your more experienced running buddies to help you put it into perspective.
Just like the runner at the start of this post, you may be taken aback by tickets to an event at an inconvenient time. It happens. Hopefully, you shared your goal race with your significant other and he/she will time well the invitations. But it could also happen that you get your hands on tickets to something like the World Series when your team is playing but is happening the night before your New York City Marathon. Then it is time to choose between a once-in-a-lifetime event and what you’ve trained for but may certainly do again, later.
My son got married on a Friday night in November. That’s high training season for local racing where I live. Asking my son to get married another day because I run long on Saturdays was not right. Missing his wedding was out of the question. So, what do you do? You attend your son’s wedding, you have fun and you forget about running on behalf of a momentous occasion in the life of an important person in your life. That’s what you do.
Sure, sacrifices must be made. But it is never about having to choose between your running and your spouse, your significant other, your kids, your family, friends, or work. It is about understanding that in life, there are more important things than a rack full of medals.
Have you ever had a dilemma between running and life? Please share your experience in the comment box, below.
The most recent print edition of Runner’s World Magazine (2023/3) was Eliud Kipchoge centered. It had 8 stories that told us from his humble origins to his monastic lifestyle to a dissection of every detail of his record-setting running shoes to Evans Chebet as his most likely successor. It is the most detailed account I’ve seen of Kipchoge related info in one place.
Runner’s World magazine cover for the issue with the 8 Eliud Kipchoge related stories
The story that caught my attention is titled “Train Like Kipchoge (Sorta)”, by Sarah Gearhart, in which she shares five key aspects of Eliud’s training. My first thought was: how can we transfer them to us, simple mortals, to improve our running results. The article talks about how the greatest of all time (GOAT) does it, which doesn’t mean we must apply it in the exact same way. The key is to harness the key lesson of each one and make it part of our current circumstances.
These are the five principles, as per Runner’s World, with a personal commentary on how to apply it to our recreational runner training repertoire:
1 – Sleep like your run depends on it: Kipchoge sleeps 9 hours a night and takes naps. Most of us don’t have the time for that, but neither we are professionals, nor do we run 120 miles per week. The point is to be purposeful about your sleeping habits. Sleep as much as your body needs and don’t brag about your lack of sleep as a badge of honor. Our body recovers and rebuilds while we sleep, which is more valuable than all other recovery tools in your arsenal put together.
2 – Revive Sore Muscles with an Ice Bath: He takes 10-minute ice baths twice a week “to aid his post run recovery.” As recreational runners we may not have the facilities, the time or will tolerate this uncomfortable activity. But the point is that it works for him and despite the pain and inconvenience, he does it anyway because he works diligently on his recovery. Remember that you don’t become a better runner just as you finish your hard workout. You become a better runner once your body has recovered and adapted to the stress it just went through. So, be as diligent as Kipchoge in your recovery.
3 – Upgrade Your Diet with Protein: Kipchoge’s high-carb diet is essential for his training and performance, yet in 2017 he upgraded his protein intake “to aid his recovery as well as help to build and maintain his lean muscle.” The point here is that diet is key to training, performance and recovery. It is not a matter of how many calories we take in but the quality of those calories. If we fuel with a dozen donuts and a pint of ice cream, our weekly milage or our daily nap won’t really provide the benefit they should.
Stationary biking is one of the multiple options to enhance your aerobic capacity without overtaxing your system (Photo: William Adams, Pexels)
4 – Meditate to Build Mental Strength: Kipchoge is a “mindful runner” says his coach Patrick Sang. “While training and racing, he focuses on his breath and his movements, and aims to minimize outside distractions.” While not all of us can or want to live Kipchoge’s spartan life nor we have the will to perfecting the art of mindfulness, we can separate 10 minutes for daily meditation, we can read a book on mental toughness or practice the visualization of our goals without becoming Zen masters.
5 – Build Bonus Endurance on a Bike: Interesting to note that to add to his training volume “without increasing his risk of a running injury, Kipchoge rides a stationary bike for an hour twice a week after his runs.” For mere running aficionados like us, this is what we call cross training. Participating in a non-running activity once or twice a week to enhance our strength or aerobic training while resting our muscles and soft tissues from the pounding of running. Biking, rowing, weight training, yoga, elliptical, etc. Make sure you do something other than running to complement your training.
If these techniques work for the GOAT, scaling them down to our level would be beneficial. Don’t just think about it, do something about it and don’t take too much time getting started. Marathon season is around the corner.
Runner’s World Magazine, the reference media outlet for the running community for over 50 years, ran an article on April 27, titled “How to Pace a 5K So You Can Hit Your PR”. It was written by Stephen Sheehan. The expert quoted throughout the narrative was Coach Adolfo Salgueiro, head coach at Foultips.Run.
“I have been a Runner’s World reader since the early 1980s,” Stated Coach Salgueiro. “Being able to contribute to one of their articles is a dream come true. The fact they wanted my expertise on the subject is a statement to the value of the decades of experience and preparation I’ve put into this passion of mine.”
This is the second time Coach Adolfo has been in Runner’s World. A summary on his running career ran back in March 2021.
To read the full Runner’s World article you may click here.
Be aware that Runner’s World has a limit on the number of free articles non-members can read a month. If you have exceeded such a number, you may have to come back next month to read it. Or contact me and I will send you a PDF version.
In the last post I dissected the phases of the racing off-season. Through these you can properly prepare for next season and be ready in time to achieve your goals. If you haven’t read the post yet, you can do so by clicking here.
The nature of the post didn’t allow me to go in depth, so this week I want to dig deeper into the first phase: Rest and Recovery. I firmly believe this phase is the key for whatever goals you may set forth the next racing season. It is what will allow you to reset and restart working towards them. It is what will make them achievable.
A great time to hit the gym and start working on your strength training. Not having enough time is no longer an excuse (Photo: Andrea Piacquardio, Pexels)
I have identified six areas in which to focus during your Rest and Recovery phase. These will allow you to decompress, rest, recover, prevent burnout and make you tougher against injuries. It is not a complete list, just a handful of suggestions on which you may want to focus for a month or two (or three) so you can reset all the systems.
1 – Focus on life balance: We all love running. We chose this sport. There’s no PT teacher timing us on the mile. We run because we want to. Even if you are doing it on doctor’s orders, you have other exercise options. For most of us, running is an essential part of our lives. Our therapy, our steam relief valve, our social time outside home/work. Yet, unless we are professionals or we are planning to qualify for the Olympics Trials, it is not what brings home the bacon. Our families, jobs, other hobbies and home responsibilities require our attention and presence. An elite Kenyan runner may not be able to take two weeks off if a child gets sick, because winning his marathon is not just payday but “pay-year”. I am sure 99.9% of my readership are not in the same boat. So, keep life balanced.
2 – Work on your running form: There is not one way of doing it right. Your form is unique to you and you alone. Changing form is not needed unless it’s getting you injured but it doesn’t mean there’s no room for improvement. There is always an adjustment or two that may get you more efficient, less injury-prone, improve your breathing, avoid aches and pains or make your joints stronger. Figure out the tweaks you need and take advantage of this time to work on them. Four weeks prior to your goal marathon is not the time to work on your overstriding.
I can’t stress enough how important it is to catch up on your sleep as a recovery tool (Photo: Ketuf Subiyanto, Pexels)
3 – Catch up on your sleep: If you are one of my recurrent readers, you read this advice plenty of times. But if you can grasp the concept that humans have been on this earth for 200-300 thousand years and have not yet evolved to stop sleeping, then you will understand that sleep is a non-negotiable activity to keep yourself healthy. If that wasn’t enough, there is no number of massages, compression socks, percussion guns or cold plunges that match sleep as recovery tool. And I don’t mean one individually. I mean all combined. This is science. It is not open to debate.
4 – Partake in other physical activities: Since you may (and should) be running less than during training season, you could take a yoga class, go for a swim, a bike ride, a hike, or whatever else will complement your physical activity requirements. Running is a highly repetitive, high-impact activity. A 10K alone will have each leg hitting the surface about 5000 times at 2.5-4 times your weight load. Getting your movement benefits from other sources will not only help you heal and get stronger but will facilitate your brain to vary from the same moving patterns, which also provides neurological benefits.
5 – Run at a low heart rate: Running slow so you can run fast is one of the toughest concepts for a runner to comprehend. Hopefully, now that you don’t need to run fast for some months, you may take time to apply this concept and verify its benefits. When you run at a slow heart rate, and thus pace, your body will learn to burn more fat as fuel, will increase your aerobic capacity, increase your mitochondrial density and your fuel consumption economy. None of this is possible when running fast, because your body requires so much energy, and it needs it right now, that all these benefits are negated. Sure, you can run faster, but there’s a cost to that. Your body will be invoicing you for it later, during race training.
6 – Of course, strength training: Yes, I know. It is boring, challenging and takes time. I don’t like it either, it is one of the weakest points of my training. But I do it anyway. You don’t need to spend 3 hours in the gym 5 times a week. Start easily and increase from there. Thirty minutes sessions, 3 times a week during the off-season will make you stronger, more resistant to injury, increase your power and your speed. As you increase your running mileage, once you are strong, you can decrease it to two times a week. I can’t stress enough the importance and the benefits of a strengths training program. The the time to implement it is now.
Any thoughts? Please let me know in the comment box, below.
In a recent phone conversation with a runner I train, she expressed concern about two consecutive bad runs she had just experienced. She had an important race coming up in a few days, though not a goal race. She began to freak out a little bit, thinking she may not be ready, or she may fail, or she just wasn’t a good runner.
I told her that these things happen to everyone. That they are an inherent part of running. When you have good days, the bad days are around the corner. Just as when you feel on top of the world but then you feel underprepared and crappy when it counts. It is part of the process, one from which you should learn, so you can keep them at bay.
One of your running dreams will eventually come to die in porta potty (Photo Pexels)
Keep running and it will happen. “What will happen?”, you ask: Everything! Both the good and the bad.
One or more of these dreadful things happening, even simultaneously, doesn’t mean you are finished as a runner, or that your race is doomed. Just as one or more great achievements don’t mean you’ve made it. It only means you are travelling through one of the typical high-and-low cycles of life, which also reflects itself in your running.
40+ years in running have taught me that if it hasn’t happened yet, it is only because you haven’t run enough. Keep running and it will happen. Guaranteed.
The Bad:
You will fall. Hopefully, you won’t break a bone, but you will fall.
You will underperform in a race, just when you thought you’re PR was in the bag.
You will crap/pee in your pants.
You will twist an ankle. How bad, that’s another conversation, but it will happen.
You will have a close call with a car. Hopefully, it won’t go beyond that.
You will have a close encounter with an angry dog. Be prepared.
You will have to stop a run far from your finishing point and require help getting back.
You will eat something that unsettles your stomach and spend a pre-long-run night throwing up or sitting on the throne.
You will have a bad night of sleep, or two, or three; just before your goal race.
You will experience uncooperating weather during your key training run or goal race.
You will miss an important run because life just got in the way.
If any of these hasn’t happened yet, just keep running.
Remember: Experience is what we get when we don’t obtain what we originally set out for. Make sure you take advantage of the inevitable and learn a lesson, so you minimize the chances of it happening again.
Good things you haven’t experienced will happen if you keep running. Here is a small sample of them.
One day your battery will die and you will need help getting back to the start. (Photo Pexels)
The Good:
You will experience an unexpected PR on a race when you thought it wasn’t even a possibility.
You will overcome obstacles to realize you are stronger than you thought.
You will reap the rewards of having embraced the lesson from a previous failure.-
You will find the assistance from a running angel at the perfect time, or even better, you will be that angel for a runner in need.
You will run farther and longer than you once thought possible.
You will inspire someone who didn’t know he/she was a runner to fall in love with the sport.
You will become friends with people you couldn’t believe you had much in common.
You will find some of the best friendships of your life by hanging out with likeminded people.
You will surprise yourself and your doctor with the results of your annual physical.
If any of these hasn’t happened yet, just keep running.
Anything you may want to ad to these lists? Let me know in the box below.
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