5 Ways to Maximize Your Training Between Races

Finn Melanson [00:00:09]: Hello, fellow runners. I'm your host, Fin to making you a better runner with each and every episode. We are created and produced by the expert team of coaches at runnersconnect.net, where you can find the best running information on the Internet as well as training plans to fit every runner and every budget. Don't let your hard earned fitness go to waste. In this episode, coach Michael gives you 5 ways to approach your training between races so you can start your next training cycle even stronger than before. If you're suffering from joint pain or simply wanna get a jump start on protecting your joint health as you get older. You're gonna love our newest sponsor, Joint Health Plus from Previnix. I'll tell you more about them later in the episode, but if you wanna learn more, head to runnersconnect.netforward/joint.

Michael Hammond [00:01:16]: Hey, Runners Connect listeners. Welcome back to Run to the Top. Coach Michael here, head coach at Runners Connect Here with today's coach chat. Today, we're gonna talk about 5 reasons you should keep training between your races. What I mean by that is, let's say that you just ran one of the big marathons. You know, we had Chicago at the beginning of October. Marine Corps just ran. New York City's coming right up.

Michael Hammond [00:01:36]: CIM in December. Let's say you just ran or about to run one of those races, But maybe your next big goal race isn't till spring or summer ish 2024. What do you do in that period From after your race until you actually start that training plan for that next race, what do you do in that period? Most people, They take a break, you know, 2, 3, 4 weeks after the the big marathon, then they chill a little bit. Maybe they do a little bit of jogging here and there, but nothing super structured. And then 12 or so weeks out from their goal race, they jump jump into an actual training plan. That's what we're gonna talk about is Why I believe that you should do an actual structure training plan between those training plans. I know that gets a little bit confusing, sort of like an inception thing here, but What should you do between those races? So a quick note before we dive into those reasons is that, of course, you should recover. Of course, you have to rest, recover, Take a break after those races.

Michael Hammond [00:02:30]: No doubt. We typically have people after depends on the race, of course, but typically people take about 2 to 4 weeks. And some of that, the distance like, the time of that really kind of depends on sort of the physical and mental recovery. You know, most people need at least 2 weeks, especially after a marathon, to just Physically recover from the event, maybe even 3 weeks. But from there, sometimes it depends on whether you need a little bit of mental recovery. You know, marathon training can be just grueling mentally as much as it is physically. So sometimes I find that people need Maybe they take those 2 weeks and they they feel physically recovered, but maybe they're not quite mentally recovered. Maybe they're still a little bit drained.

Michael Hammond [00:03:07]: They need a little bit more time, and and we give it to them. No doubt. I want people to feel totally fresh physically and mentally before they start any of the stuff that we're talking about, before they start, either training for another race or doing what we're talking about, sort of that training between the training plans. So with that, let's dive into the first reason that I believe you should Keep training between your races. The first big reason is so you don't lose your fitness. I know this one's a little bit obvious, but I do think it's worth mentioning. And I I do wanna say before I I dive into it is that I want people to know that it takes at least 2 weeks of no running to actually lose fitness. So this isn't me saying, oh my goodness.

Michael Hammond [00:03:44]: If you miss 1 or 2 days of running, you're you're you're done. You know, you're gonna lose all your fitness. You're gonna be start at ground 0. It takes 2 weeks of 0 running to even lose any fitness. So by no means am I worried that people are just gonna, like, go to complete 0, but, you know, you worked hard. If you trained for a marathon, you or half marathon, whatever it is that you trained for this fall, You've worked hard. You've done a lot of training. You've done a lot of miles.

Michael Hammond [00:04:07]: You've done a lot of good workouts. I don't want you to lose all that. I don't want you to go I'm I'm not gonna say go back to 0, but I don't want you to go to the point where you have to do this massive buildup. I want you to, you know, maintain that. Fitness is cumulative. I'm actually seeing this myself right now. If any of you guys follow, like, my YouTube channel and stuff, I'm I'm working back into fitness. I was a competitive, You know, track athlete, sort of more of middle distance back in my early to mid twenties, and I retired in 2016.

Michael Hammond [00:04:35]: I've kind I'm ripping off that retirement. I'm coming back, But I'm really seeing how fitness is cumulative, and I'm also seeing how, man, if you don't use it, you lose it. No doubt. Like, I am starting from absolute ground 0, and I know that's not what we're talking about here. By no means, we're talking about you taking 7 years off of training like I did, But it's just something that I'm seeing is how cumulative fitness is. It's not just train for a race, run that race, and then start over from scratch Before the next one, well, it can be if you take too much time off, but that's not how it goes. It's really cumulative. It it builds up over the months years, and that's that can work to your advantage, or it can be a disadvantage if you're not consistent.

Michael Hammond [00:05:14]: So I like to see that momentum that you built in that training plan continue. Know, Newton's first law, an object in motion tends to stay in motion. I like to see that momentum kept, you know, into the next Training plan. Instead of just going race, rest, nothing for several months, and then all of a sudden try to jump back into a plan, I like to see a little bit of that momentum maintained and some of that fitness at least a good portion of that fitness maintained so that it's much easier to build into the next cycle, which is Leads right into the 2nd reason, which is less of a buildup is needed in that next training cycle. And what do we just say? Normally, you do a race, You take a big break, maybe a month, 2 months, 3 months, and then you jump in and build into the next cycle. The problem is when you do that, when you take so much time off, Or even if you're jogging a little bit here and there, but not really following anything structured, typically, what we find is that we have to spend so much time just building up. You know, when you start that that 12 or so week training plan, we have to spend so much time just building you up in terms of mileage. You know, we have to start with very, very light Workouts, we have to slowly build up the volume.

Michael Hammond [00:06:24]: We have to kind of in a way, we sorta have to baby it along because we don't wanna get you hurt. We don't want to, You know, ramp things up too quickly. So if you actually train between those races, there's just less time needed on that buildup. Know, you can keep the momentum going. You can keep the fitness up, and you can sort of jump right in. I'm not saying that there won't be any buildup. I'm not saying there won't be any ramp up, But you can really keep that that fitness at a good level to where you can build on that instead of going back to essentially 0, you know, or close to it and then having to ramp it up from there, which is difficult. That's not to say that I do wanna say it's not to say that you're hammering training in this time.

Michael Hammond [00:07:03]: It's not We're we're not proponents of just going and and just ripping. You know, what you were doing, if you just ran one of the big marathons, if you were doing, like, big marathon specific work in the fall, you're not gonna still be doing that. You're not gonna be doing, you know, 3 by 3 miles threshold, you know, with with 2 minutes rest, or you're not gonna be doing, You know, hard 400 meter repeats or something like that. It's not that you're gonna be hammering training all the time, but you're maintaining that fitness, and you're also maintaining the muscle memory. You know, those of you who who if you've ever taken a substantial break from running, man, you come back, and and it's not just that you're not fit. It's also that you almost feel like you forgot how to do it. Like, you forgot how to run. You forgot how to run certain paces.

Michael Hammond [00:07:40]: That muscle memory feels like it's just gone, and it can take a little bit of time to come back. So I like to see That momentum maintained, and then we can prevent having to do that huge, massive buildup into that next training cycle. The third reason is that we reduce the injury risk. This builds right on what we just talked about with that buildup. Here's a question for you. When do runners most often get injured? A lot of people think it's when they're running high mileage, it's when they're doing harder workouts, or anything like that. The the time that runners most often get injured is at the start of a training plan, Right when we're trying to ramp things up, especially if we try to ramp them up quickly. When you're in a rhythm, when you're into a training plan, you've been you know, you've built your mileage up, you're running some good Workouts, you're you're in a rhythm.

Michael Hammond [00:08:24]: You're you've got momentum. There's a there's a lot less risk. There's never no risk, of course. There's always some injury risk. But when you're in that rhythm, There's a lot less risk of injury than when you come back from a big break. You know, even if you're doing some running here and there, When you come back from a big break and dive into a training plan, that's when there's a huge injury risk. Some things that kind of exacerbate that are, let's Let's say you're in a bit of a time crunch. You know, maybe you've got 12 weeks to prep for a marathon, and you haven't been running at all during the break.

Michael Hammond [00:08:54]: And, you know, you're in a bit of a time crunch. You kinda You can't really take the time to really properly build up the training gradually because you're in such a time crunch. That's a huge injury risk. If you Lost some of that muscle memory. That can exacerbate it big time. We just talked about that, how sometimes when you come back from a break, it's not really the fitness, it's the muscle memory that you feel like you lost. That can that can lead to a huge injury risk. And another big one, of course, is not doing any strength training while you're on your break.

Michael Hammond [00:09:22]: Maybe when you're training for the big race this fall, you were doing some consistent strength training. Maybe not a ton of it, but some of it consistently, and then you just do none while you're on your big break, know, between your races, between your training plans. That's a huge injury risk because now you're gonna fall right back into those old habits. You're gonna fall right back into, You know, maybe worse running form or some of your weaknesses within your your body are gonna be, you know, exacerbated, gonna be magnified. Without doing any strength training, that's gonna really massively increase that injury risk. So that's a big one. And I, yet again, wanna reiterate, we're not hammering during this time. You know, I I'm not a proponent of just constantly hammering.

Michael Hammond [00:09:59]: I think that you need that physical and mental break, of course, as we mentioned, but I also think that there's value in in maintenance, in maintaining, in maintaining that momentum, maintaining that fitness, and maintaining the strength that you've built throughout the big training plan in the fall. So this isn't really Hard training necessarily. It's just structured training. That's what's gonna make the huge difference.

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Michael Hammond [00:13:41]: 4th reason, it's a big opportunity to work on your weaknesses. Typically, the way we do it is we, you know, we run race after race after race, Or we run a race, then we train you know, we take a break. We train for the next race. We we run the race. We take a break. We train for the next race. We run the race. We take a break.

Michael Hammond [00:13:58]: There's no opportunity in there to just kinda do something different, throw a bit of a wrench in things and and change things up, switch it up a little bit. The typical weaknesses that I'm talking about that you have This opportunity to work on during this time are let's say you have poor endurance. Let's say your 5 k time is is pretty good, but your marathon is really suffering or your half. All the longest longer stuff is suffering. That's a sign of just poor endurance. Very, very simple. This is a great opportunity to work on that without worrying about the race. Let's say you have poor speed.

Michael Hammond [00:14:26]: You know, let's say it's the other way around. You're you're totally flipped that that your marathon is really good. You're you're really progressing in the marathon, but your 5 k, 10 k, your shorter stuff It's just lacking a little bit. That could be a sign of just poor speed. Here's a great opportunity to work on that that you may not get if you just jump right back into another training plan. Injuries. If you're having chronic injuries, this is a huge opportunity to get to the bottom of exactly what's going on there, Solve it long term and then run much healthier, you know, long term. This is a huge opportunity to do that.

Michael Hammond [00:14:56]: Same with, like, running form. If you feel like your running form is is weak, which most of us, None of us have perfect running form except like Kipchoge, but, you know, none of us have perfect running form. Most of us could use some improvements. Whether it's a little bit of improvement or if it's a ton of improvement, is a great opportunity to work on that. Same with, like, nutrition and lifestyle. I'm I'm not saying it's not important to work on this stuff while you're in the midst of a training plan, but it can be hard to, like, Switch things up. It can be hard to make changes when you're in the midst of a training plan because you don't want to. You know, this is that huge opportunity to work on those without that pressure of a race right around the corner.

Michael Hammond [00:15:32]: I'll give you an example. An athlete I'm working with, his name's Josh. He's he's running the Miami marathon at the end of January. And Josh's background, he really hasn't done a lot of endurance training. This is totally new for him. He's been more into, like, weight lifting, CrossFit type stuff. So longer endurance stuff is brand new to him. We are really getting some great momentum building into the fall.

Michael Hammond [00:15:52]: He's building up some good mileage, volume. He's Building up some good workouts. We're we're on a roll. Everything's going great, but he wants to work on his running form. That's something that we To work on together is to improve his running form so that he can become stronger, faster, you know, better running economy, all that good stuff that comes with improving your form. However, I've made the decision that I don't really want to do this big overhaul of his running form right now. You know, today, I'm recording this. It's November 1st.

Michael Hammond [00:16:20]: Miami Marathon's at the end of January. That's less than 3 months away. He's in the thick. He you know, November is a huge month. November, December are kind of his biggest months. End of January, he'll start the taper. So these are huge months for marathon training. He's building up mileage for the first time.

Michael Hammond [00:16:34]: I just don't wanna throw all these variables at him all at once. I don't wanna do this massive overhaul of his running form all at once. So we are doing good strength training. We're doing targeted stuff like that, but I don't wanna, you know, just completely overhaul his running form while he's in the midst of marathon training, which is just brand new to him. So what we're doing instead, we're waiting until after Miami in January. He's gonna obviously take a break, take some rest, And then we're gonna have a little phase before he jumps back into any, like, race specific training. He's gonna have a phase where we're really working on Targeted strength training to work on that running form, improve his running form, and help his running long term. So that's just an example of what we're doing, but that's That shows the opportunity that you have between races.

Michael Hammond [00:17:17]: So after the big fall marathon, before you really start the more specific training, Maybe in the spring or or late winter, this is a tremendous opportunity to work on those weaknesses. And that's something we'll talk about. I'm actually recording an episode, next week with Corey Nagler, we'll we'll record an episode where we'll talk about how to work on those weaknesses, what weaknesses exactly you can you can target, how to improve them, and how to really make the most of that time. 5th reason 5th and final reason is to keep the habit. You know, I imagine I imagine you listening to this. I imagine you don't have to, like, pull teeth to get on your on your run every day, most of you listening. I know it's not always easy, But it's probably habit. You know, maybe some of you are newer.

Michael Hammond [00:17:56]: Maybe some of you are still working on building that habit, but any habit, No matter how strong, any habit can die with time and without consistency. If you do you know, you don't wanna do absolutely nothing between the training plans, obviously. But beyond that, you wanna keep the habit. I'm reading this book called Atomic Habits right now, and some of you may have read it. I really didn't Wanna read it, to be honest with you. Anytime I see a book that's, like, so massively promoted, like, you see it everywhere and everyone's talking about it, I admit that when I see that, I don't really wanna read it because that tells me I hate to say this. That tells me that it's probably fluff, you know, and maybe doesn't have That much real information in it. But I I had somebody that I follow that I trust and and that I respect who who was talking about, like, a concept from it.

Michael Hammond [00:18:44]: And I was like, wow. That that's actually pretty interesting. And, really, as I'm reading it, I'm finding that it has much more depth than I thought. And one concept that's really striking me from it is the concept of an identity. This might I'll I'll be honest. I might get be getting a little beyond the scope of this episode, but I'm so taken by this concept that I I just have to talk about it. When you form a habit you know, let's say you say you're gonna do it. Okay? You're forming a new habit.

Michael Hammond [00:19:08]: Okay. Now it's part of your schedule. It's just something that you're gonna try to do. If it becomes part of your identity, that's something else entirely. An example would be, let's say you wanna start playing the guitar, And your typical practice time is, like, 7 PM. If you are someone who says, I'm I'm trying to play the guitar, You know, I'm I'm scheduling it, whatever. I'm making it part of my schedule, and you get to that 7 PM practice time and you're exhausted. You've had a long day at work.

Michael Hammond [00:19:33]: You're tired. All you wanna do is veg out on the couch. You might run into a lot of friction there. You might run into a lot of resistance in getting your butt in there and practicing. But if instead your your identity is I am a musician, I am a guitarist, instead of I play guitar, I Do music, I play music. It's, I am a guitarist. I am a musician. It's just gonna it's a frame it's a frame of thinking that's gonna Change the way you behave.

Michael Hammond [00:20:04]: It's not just that doesn't mean that you're never gonna struggle to get to practice time. It's it doesn't mean you're never gonna struggle to, you know, when you're tired, to practice, it just means that it's what are the decisions that someone with that identity would make. What are the decisions that somebody who is a musician, not just plays music or plays guitar, what are the decisions that someone who says, I am a musician? It's of their identity. It's part of their core. What decisions are they gonna make versus someone who just, you know, just plays in their spare time or plays when they have the chance? I find this relevant here because at Runners Connect, something we say is we we call all of our members, all of our training plan members, we call them athletes. I'm talking about even in, like, internal communications. We have a Slack channel that we use. So even in internal communications, we refer to all of our members as athletes.

Michael Hammond [00:20:50]: This is totally by design. So that's instead of, like, You know, what what do most businesses call them? Like, users or customers or something like that? We call them athletes because we feel that they are athletes even though a lot of them Disagree with that. It's something that we really meet a lot of resistance with because people don't feel like because they're not professional, because they're not fast, because they're not, you know, finishing at the front of races, because they're not Boston qualifying, they feel like I can't say I'm an athlete. But we really feel like, you know, you are an athlete. You are a runner. An athlete you know, You think about it. An athlete doesn't train for a race and then just fall by the wayside for 3 to 4 months. An athlete says, what can I do to get better Long term, how can I utilize every single day to get better long term? And I think this is relevant whether you're chasing PRs or even if you're just running for fun because, ultimately, you wanna be out there running.

Michael Hammond [00:21:40]: And let's be honest. Running faster is fun. Running injury free is definitely fun. Running with injuries is no fun at all. So even if you're totally doing it for fun, if this is all fun, you don't even care what time you finish in or or what place you finish or whatever, it's still relevant to have that identity. It becomes ingrained in you rather than just something that you do. So I know I got a little that's maybe a little bit beyond the scope of this this podcast, but I feel like you keep that habit and and really engrain that identity in you, then you're gonna be better off for it long term. So last thing here, I know it can seem confusing.

Michael Hammond [00:22:16]: You know, what should I do between those races. Maybe you understand now why it's important to do some type of training between those races, but what should I do? Should I just jog? Should I run a lot? Should I build mileage? I start a strength training program? What strength strength training program should I start? What should I focus on? Our boot camps a tremendous solution to this problem. Each boot camp is focused on a different weakness that we talked about before to help turn that weakness into a strength And improve your running long term. You'll have specific running workouts tailored to, of course, your experience, your current fitness, and, of course, your your schedule, your work schedule, and what days you can run, what days you can't. You have a strength training program that's targeted. And from there, things will individualize based on the boot camp and also based on you. This year, what we're doing, we're doing the strength boot camp, which is where you learn how to Add strength working in the right way and get healthy, prevent injuries, become a stronger runner overall, fantastic boot camp. The speed boot camp, I love this one, where you work on your foot Be it improve your mile in 5 k times, which, of course, will translate to the marathon.

Michael Hammond [00:23:15]: You improve your foot speed, you improve your running form, all of that's gonna improve your running Economy, make you more efficient over long distances. We've seen it time and time again. The weight loss boot camp, daily running, and strength Strength training plan combined with nutrition guidance to help you find your healthy weight. This isn't just losing weight. It's finding your healthy weight. The Mileage Building Boot Camp, increase your mileage safely to become an aerobic monster and improve your race times. So if you're looking for, okay, I wanna run more, I wanna improve my endurance, How do I do it? How do I do it in a safe and effective way? The Mileage Building Boot Camp is perfect. And then last, our beginner runner boot camp.

Michael Hammond [00:23:47]: This is for total beginners with lots of questions who just aren't sure where to start. You know, we'll give you daily workouts, exact paces, strength work, and a total beginner runner's course to build your momentum and jump start your running journey. The boot camps are 6 weeks total, so a perfect amount of time to fit in between the races just like we've been talking about. If you wanna join, head to runnersconnect.net/focus. I hope to see you in one of our boot camps this fall and winter. Thank you so much for listening. We appreciate each and every one of you for tuning in and making the show possible. Sincerely, we really do.

Michael Hammond [00:24:17]: I do wanna give a quick shout out to Corey Nagler, who's just been doing such an awesome job with our Friday episodes. He's been a tremendous addition to the team, and I'm absolutely loving his work. I hope you are as well. Great job, Corey. Alright, guys. I'm out. I'll see you next time.

Finn Melanson [00:24:45]: Thanks for listening to the Run to the Top podcast. I'm your host, Finn Melanson. As always, our mission here is to help you become a better runner with every episode. Please consider connecting with me on Instagram at Wasatch and the rest of our team at Runners Connect. Also consider supporting our show for free with a rating on the Spotify and Apple Podcast players. And lastly, if you love the show and want bonus content, behind the scenes experiences with our guests, and premier access to contests and giveaways, then subscribe to our newsletter by going to runnersconnect.netback/podcast. Until next time, happy