Coach Sarah Answers Your Training Questions

In addition to providing a custom training schedule, coaching support, and constant feedback and training adjustments, our RunnersConnect coaching membership also includes weekly Coach Chats that allow you ask our expert coaches your individual training questions.

Coach Sarah Crouch jumped in for a Coach Chat last Sunday and I wanted to share the recording with you since there were some great questions asked and a lot of helpful, in-depth information shared.

Specifically, Coach Sarah addressed the following questions (if any of these pertain to you, definitely watch the video or download the audio file)

Questions answered in this Coach Chat

  1. What do you recommend for a training plan coming off a tibia stress fracture and no running for 6weeks
  2. What is Anterior Pelvic tilt, why does it matter, and how do I fix it
  3. Can you give some mental strategies for 5k racing
  4. Will losing weight improve my running performance? If so, how much?
  5. I’ve been running for a couple of years now – but I’ll be honest I’ve never did any strength training or even stretching. Can you recommend some good exercises as a starting point that I can add to my training regime?
  6. How to balance strength and/or cross training. Specifically, is it better to replace a run with a cycle or ADD it in?
  7. When you start a new cycle for a particular race, how do you decide what goal time to shoot for? And also, do you adjust that goal time (faster or slower) based on how the training is progressing?
  8. How do you not do out too fast in races? I can hit times in training, but always fail in races.
  9. How do you make sure your goals are realistic?! I’ve just ran a 3:30 marathon and I’m finding it tough to set my next finish time, my next marathon isn’t for 9 months so how do I start to decide on a goal time so far out? Or should I concentrate on a few weeks at a time? Thanks.
  10. What is the best advice for the “older” runner to stay injury free. I don’t have a long base of running although it is deep and wide as far as fitness/cardio is concerned. I feel like I am just chasing one injury after another. Is my ability impacted by the lack of a solid running base (just started 6/2011). And I guess the fact that my job has me sitting a lot doesn’t help either.
  11. I’m sure this question will be unpopular but, as a new runner (started this time last year), at age 40, how much faster can I realistically expect to become over the next year or two?
  12. I’m still a bit confused about the “warm up” for various training runs. One of the page links that Jeff provided talks about a 1-2 mile warm up combined with dynamic exercises. I’ve been doing the dynamic exercise warm up consistently for about a month now and it feels great. But, I am unsure of the mileage of easy jog with it or strides or whatever. Typically I’m doing between .5 to 1 mile of easy jogging prior to the Dynamic Warm up. Is the warm up different for different types of training runs??
  13. I trained for my first two marathons using a run-walk method. I have slowly built up to 11 miles without run-walk, but just feel so much more drained and sore afterwards than when I was using that method. What do you think of using run-walk and also it’s impact on recovery? Do “real” runners thing it’s like cheating? To follow up on that run-walk, would it make sense to do the shorter workouts (hills, tempos, etc) as is, and then the weekly long run with the run-walk method?
  14. What is the toughest thing to transition from marathon distance to ultra marathon distance and the training? I’m thinking of looking at a 50K or a 50M race as my next big challenge and I’m a little apprehensive about the additional training.

Watch the Video Now


Link to Video for email viewers

 

Download the podcast to watch later

Download the Full Coach Chat Audio File

 

Hope you enjoyed some of these in-depth answers and we look forward to seeing you at our next coach chat!

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Who We Are

Your team of expert coaches and fellow runners dedicated to helping you train smarter, stay healthy and run faster.

We love running and want to spread our expertise and passion to inspire, motivate, and help you achieve your running goals.

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2 Responses

  1. HI Sarah

    Really enjoyed the video – well done.

    What struck a chord for me was setting a marathon goal (time) too early.
    I am about to gear up for Boston 2014 (having run Boston 2013), so you comments really got me thinking that at the moment I should just run and let the pace come to me rather than chase it too soon.

    Obviously I have a goal in mind, but it is a big step up from my last result so I’ll just imagine my journey as stepping stones across a stream (one for each week), and do them one at a time.

    If I don’t fall off I’ll know the time to shoot for in March!

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