Things I Learned/Relearned This Season

There are some hard and fast training principles that apply to all humans, but each one of us is an experiment of one within those parameters.  I'm thankful to continue to learn more about the techniques that work best for me in training.  I've loved running nearly my whole life, but until 2015 I trained mostly aimlessly and rarely intelligently.  Since then I've continued to grow my knowledge about training and specifically how my body responds to it.

Here is what I learned or was reminded of this season:

• I perform and feel best off of more mileage and less intensity.  I have never felt so good during a training cycle, though I ran the highest mileage I ever have.  My weekly mileage for the full weeks in 2021 so far has been 81, 84, 83, 92, 87, 84, 86, 100, 102, 92, 100, 90, 101, 92.  Generally I do a workout each Wednesday and some work in my Saturday long runs.  The rest, aside from a set or two of strides, is easy running.  The general rule is 80% easy/20% quality mileage, but I think I do best when most weeks are more like 85-90% easy/10-15% quality.
• I need to limit speed work.  I've known for awhile that too much speed work gets me injured, but I've realized that it wears me down mentally and physically as well.  It makes no sense, but I will be more worn out from 10 x 400 m than from a 10 mile tempo run!  I also feel invigorated by strength-based workout and just meh by speed.  I am definitely a strength-based runner, and no matter how hard I work at speed I never see significant improvements with it, whereas with strength I do.  It is important to train all systems, so I still need to touch on speed, but it should never be the cornerstone of my training, even for a 5k (not as if I'm ever going to focus on the 5k, but in principle).
• I need to be vigilant about strength work.  After my hip craziness of 2019, I changed several things, but what helped the most by far was being very dedicated to and consistent with strength work.  I do some strength work every.single.day.  Twice a week it includes heavy weights, but other days I'm using resistance bands, doing core routines, practicing plyometrics, etc.  The only reason I hit it so hard to start with was to resolve my hip impingement pain and keep running, but I believe it's also contributed to me feeling so excellent this season.  I will never love it like I love to run, but I've fully embraced it as an important part of my routine.
• I should fuel before workouts and long runs.  I start most of my runs at 5:30 a.m., and I need to eat 2-3 hours prior to running, so I am not eating before most runs (only before a long race will I get up at 3:30 a.m. to eat!).  Historically, this meant that I wasn't taking in any calories, but this season I've consistently drank UCAN before all workouts and long runs.  Doing back-to-back long runs on Saturdays and Sundays has made me more intentional about pre-run and during-run fueling, and has made a big positive difference in my recovery.  I can run those runs fasted, and I'm not sure my in-run performance is any different, but I feel much less depleted after and ready to go again sooner when I'm fueling.
• I respond better to a short easy day than a day completely off.  When I take a day completely off, I feel lethargic all morning - which makes no sense since I've slept later!  I then just feel sluggish on my next runs.  If I do 3-4 miles very easy, I seem to get a lot of recovery but still feel normal.
• I run slower in cold weather (under about 20).  I almost always forget how much the cold affects me; in the summer I remember not to judge workout times harshly in heat and especially humidity, but in the winter I think I should be my fastest.  Maybe next winter I will actually remember not to judge my fitness by those freezing workout times.  
• Rust buster races often go better than I expect, and catapult me into fitness.  The Cabin Fever 20k was really a rust buster - I hadn't raced for over a year! - and nothing I'd done in training indicated I could run 6:24 pace on the challenging course, but I did, and afterward my workouts really improved.  I had similar experiences at and following Rock the Parkway 2019 and The Big 12 12k 2018.
• I LOVE back-to-back long runs.  My 50k training has essentially been marathon training with a little less intensity and with Saturday + Sunday long runs.  I plan to carry more of these into actual marathon training.  An ultra runner friend told me they'd suck at first, but I loved them from the start and never had a bad Sunday run, even after 20+ milers with workouts and races on Saturdays.

I started thinking more about all of this after I read Bravey by Alexi Pappas this month.  One thing she mentioned that I've also heard elsewhere is the rule of thirds: when training hard, you should feel good 1/3 of the time, okay 1/3 of the time, and bad 1/3 of the time.  If you feel bad more often you're probably over-doing it, and if you feel good more often you're probably not pushing hard enough.  I felt amazing most of this training cycle.  1 felt tired from March 29-April 1 (after my Saturday 25.7 miles with a half race plus 15.3 mile Sunday), but otherwise I never really felt bad nor had a bad workout or long run.  I can't really think of any runs I wasn't excited to do aside from a couple of doubles during those 4 days.  I dialed my intensity down this season, and although I thought it was good that I felt so good all of the time,  I wonder if I wasn't pushing enough.  But, I also think it's always better to do a little less than to do a little too much!

2019 photo I found while looking
for something else, but I'm
bringing it back in hopes I'll
remember how to take good
finish line photos!