Running Slow on Easy Days Leads to Fast Race Times
At age 44 Jan Tripp has knocked more than a minute off her 5K personal best, breaking the 20-minute barrier in the process. Last fall Fred Carson ran a marathon PR of 3:35 at age 56 and qualified for Boston for the first time in his life. George Tarrico at age 61 ran a 10K PR this spring at Pike's Peek. Uri Goldbourt has been running his fastest times in 25 years. R.J. Spalding ran 17:42 for 5K this summer, his fastest time since his college days in the 1980s. What do these runners know that perhaps you need to know to run better?
I am going to share their secret with you. All of them are training with a heart monitor and following the effort-based training program that I have developed for them. Admittedly, much of my wisdom flows from Coach Roy Benson, the guru of heart monitor training. Coach Gary Resnick has had similar success employing the principles of effort-based training for his runners witness Michele Harmon's 3:17 Shamrock marathon, an eight-minute PR!
Training with a heart monitor does two things for Jan, Fred, George, Uri and R.J. First, the monitor helps them to slow down on their easy days. By running their easy days at no more than 70 percent of Maximum Heart Rate (MHR), my runners are fresh and rested so that their hard days (two or three workouts per week) are truly hard, thereby maximizing the benefits. I also insist that my runners keep their long runs under 75 percent of MHR.
The second major benefit of heart monitor training is that the joy of running has come back for these runners. They no longer measure every run by how fast they went. In fact, many of them no longer pay attention to their stop watches. And they are racing faster than ever. Two years ago, I stated that you can race faster by training slower (most of the time). My coaching experience over the past couple of years has reaffirmed this conclusion.
Unfortunately, the hammer mentality is still alive in MCRRC. Some runners continue to race their Sunday long runs and then wonder why they can't get off the couch Sunday afternoon. Come Monday, they can barely move, much less run. These hammer runners are often not able to get in a quality workout on Wednesday. Instead, they struggle through their track workout, feeling dissatisfied with the effort and vowing to work even harder during the rest of the week. Needless to say, the hammer runners usually win the training runs but never seem to run as well as expected on race day. I can understand this mentality because before I got to know Coach Benson and Owen Anderson, I was a hammer runner myself.. PRs did not come my way until I learned to back off on my easy days.
My runners are successful because I have been able to convince them to trust their heart monitor and to forget about pace, splits, etc. (except when peaking during the racing season). Of course, it took some time for them to develop trust in me as a coach and in their heart monitor as their assistant coach. Those who have stuck with effort-based training generally see results in three to four months, and once that happens they become converts for life.
Are you unhappy about your running? Perhaps it's time to think about purchasing a Polar heart monitor. While I cannot guarantee that you will run PRs, I can assure you that you will be training smart.
Coach West is a licensed coach, affiliated with MCRRC, and available to coach motivated adult runners. A portion of his coaching fees for MCRRC members is returned to MCRRC. For further information about personal coaching opportunities, contact Coach West at kirtwest@comcast.net.
