A few weeks ago, I was mulling around for content to put into my KC Endurance Newsletter. I don’t like to get all weird and sciency on people, so I try to look for interesting stories that make sense, which better explains the complexities of the training process. I had nothing to write about…
On a Saturday morning, I went for a long run with a few of the guys that run on the Kansas City Smoke Racing Team. On the run, you’ll get your typical runner chatter about how many miles somebody is putting in, upcoming races, workouts, etc. I’m definitely glad I ran with these guys because Aaron Davidson just happened to give me a great topic, and it came from a guy with some awesome credentials (he has won a huge portion of the races in Kansas City).
My topic was on letting training come to you, and not trying to beat workouts. He summed it up perfectly, so I had to have his story… Here it is:
Aaron Davidson
Personal Bests:
Mile – 4:23 5K – 14:45
10,000 – 31:20
Half Marathon – 1:08:19
Marathon = 2:31:10
When I graduated college in the 2008, I wasn’t sure what direction I wanted to go with my running. I wasn’t excited about marathon training and I felt like I still had my best times ahead of me in the 10k distances and below. I had a former Adams State All-American / Assistant college coach training me mainly for the 5k. I completely believed that what I was doing was the recipe for success. Whatever workouts he gave me, I did them exactly as they were prescribed except sometimes faster than what he wanted. It included everything… long runs, lifting, intervals, core workouts, plyometrics, speed training, etc. Since we lived about 200 miles apart I wasn’t meeting with him, and I felt like I had to not only stick to the schedule but also beat the prescribed paces to let him know everything was going according to plan. I recorded all my workouts and we talked several times each week to discuss the training.
Unfortunately, I didn’t see my times improve during that season. I had never worked so hard, been so sore, and committed that much time only to have it NOT produce the results I wanted. Not blaming the coach, but eventually, after a minor case of plantar fasciitis and basically the end of the training cycle, I stopped working with him and started doing more running with my high school kids. I ran the easy days with the kids and I did workouts only when I felt ready. I did my hard workouts by myself and ran times based more on how I felt instead of trying to beat a prescribed pace. At times, I felt like workouts were too easy and I wasn’t pushing hard enough because I wasn’t spilling my guts on the side of the track.
What it came down to was that I stopped racing myself in workouts and I stopped trying to impress “the eye in the sky” so I could report back to somebody that I “beat” the workout. I finished workouts feeling like I had more in the tank. Once I realized that workouts are intended to produce a training effect and that it didn’t matter if I beat my previous paces or whatever I had written down, hard workout days weren’t so terrible anymore. I looked forward to interval workouts and I didn’t stress if I wasn’t hitting faster times than previous workouts. Conscientiously, I knew I was running slower but my body didn’t remember if I beat my times; it only responds to the actual workouts. However, the human body is pretty good at letting you know if you went too fast, which makes it harder to adapt if you are actually just digging yourself a hole and making it take longer to recover. Previously I thought to improve or adapt it meant I had to run faster in workouts but that wasn’t the case.
After about 3 months of training on my own, I started to see improvement. I had my best year of racing and I set personal bests in every event from 800m up to 10k. If people ask me what the secret to getting faster is, it’s very simple. Listen to your body! It’s the best way to stay healthy, enjoy training, and improve your times. PS. I’ve just started logging all my daily runs on twitter @aarunning. I use it basically as a log for myself and anybody who cares to follow but it has the good, the bad, and all the ugly days.