Whether our goal is to run without pain, progress the distance we’re able to run in one go, how many miles we run each week, or to blow past our previous personal bests, consistency is the most important factor to make it happen.
Risk management
Not the sexiest sub-heading you’ll ever read in a blog, but ultimately it’s what training comes down to. We all have a risk of illness or injury which training will contribute to, to a lesser or greater extent.
There’s a sweet spot for the amount of training we do. Not enough and we progress more slowly than we’d like. Train above that sweet spot however, and you’re more likely to get injured or worn down, making you ill, either that be physically or mentally.
You have to try to find that balance, which will never be perfect since our lives and the human body are far too complex to be boiled down to a simple formula or set of rules. Sometimes you’ll do a bit too much, and other times you’ll lack the time, energy or motivation to train the ideal amount. That’s absolutely fine.
Consistently good, is better than perfect but inconsistent
I’d nearly always rather un-do training than overcook it and suffer the consequences, especially when those consequences cause the exact thing that overtraining seeks to avoid in the first place.
If you’re unwell with a cold, stomach issues or something else. If you’ve got aches or pains that aren’t improving, then you need to take a step back and get better first. That doesn’t mean doing no training, but it may mean missing the odd run, easing off the paces or shortening a couple of runs with the view of more consistent training in the long term.
Linear progression vs peak weeks
I’m not a big fan or believer in peak training weeks for most amaetur runners. The proven formula or progressing running load (through more volume or intensity) is great for elite or professional athletes. They build for 2-3 weeks before easing back in the following week, and it does absolutely work. They stimulate adaptation through the hardest of those weeks in particular, and recover afterwards.
We’re not like that though. Our lives aren’t dictated by training. For us, life dictates how much training we can do. If we try to mimic these swings in training volume and intensity, we’re likely to have one of two outcomes.
- We burn out. Our lives don’t stop or get less busy because we’re training more. The same weekly demands on top of heavier training mean illness and injury are more likely.
- We don’t actually achieve the peaks. There’s a good chance you won’t actually hit the top, whether it be something that crops up and you’re too short on time to train, or the intensity of training is too high to hit without additional recovery time. You’ll likely not be able to raise your game.
I nearly always opt for linear progressions for myself and my clients. We build training load in one of two ways
1) Increase intensity or volume over blocks of time. To increase intensity, we might take their normal 9 mile effort session which has 4 miles of harder work, and we reduce the warm up and cool down by 0.5 miles each to now make the run have 5 harder miles. For volume, we’d start by adding a mile to easy runs or making long runs outside of the marathon block that bit longer.
2) Increase volume and intensity on alternating weeks. I.e. week one the overall mileage increases by 1-2 miles, and week two we keep that mileage but use faster paces, harder session formats or run fewer easy pace miles in one of a few possible ways.
By tweaking one variable at a time, we keep risks low whilst still progressing.
Racing frequency
Keep this in mind when planning training. Racing means either lower volume with higher intensity if you have a small taper. If you miss the taper and just keep training, you maintain volume and increase intensity, to a very large degree. That’s a recipe for poor quality racing compared to what you’re capable of doing, as well as increasing your risk of injury pretty substantially.
Focus on the quality of your performance in races rather than the quantity of races you do in a year. There is a balance here again, in that racing can be a big motivation boost, and is a big reason that so many of us train in the first place.
Having faster goals doesn’t necessarily mean training more
A friend of mine has made huge progress over the last few years, and exceeded her expectations in her Spring marathon by several minutes. When we spoke about her next marathon, she said the plan was to increase mileage further. Since she’d been having some aches and pains beyond what would be expected, I suggested that she stick to her current training volume since it had worked so well in producing an exceptional marathon time, and instead focus only on increasing the paces she used in training to reflect her current fitness.
It’s yet to be seen how that pans out, but it makes sense to adjust one thing at a time, rather than multiple factors, particularly when training and racing is already progressing so well as it is.
You don’t always need to change everything and revamp what you do. It’s really tempting, especially when things are going well and we have the buzz of success around us, but again, consistency and context are the biggest deciding factors when it comes to making the right decisions in training.
Consistency doesn’t mean never missing anything in training. Yes, we want to get as much of our planned activity done as possible, and at the right intensity. Occasionally though, missing some training or easing back is the right option. Manage the risk as best as you can.
Written by Kyle Brooks, Running Coach based in Norwich, Norfolk
I included the finish line photo from the 2021 UK Boston marathon because training for this was cautious but consistent as I continue to feel my way into the marathon distance. My 3rd racing of the distance and progressing from 2:51 down to 2:39 in 18 months. Not through heroics, but by patiently adjusting and progressing consistently.