How to Recover and Train Between Races

Finn Melanson [00:00:10]: Hello fellow runners. I'm your host Finn Milanson and this is the Run to the Top podcast, the podcast dedicated to making you a better runner. With each and every episode, we are created and produced by the expert team of coaches@runnersconnect.net where you you can find the best running information on the internet, as well as training plans to fit every runner and every budget. With the main portion of the spring racing season completed, many of you are likely pondering what you should do next. If you just finished a marathon or other longer races, maybe recovery is at the forefront of your mind, or maybe you're past the recovery stage in contemplating how to structure your training in the upcoming months or for your next big goal race. So today our current and past coaching team are going to answer some listener questions about what to do after your race. Not only might you have the same questions, but we'll dig deep into the topic so you can really learn and understand how to set yourself up for long term progress. Today you'll learn why you need to have a period of recovery after a marathon and how to do it properly. How to deal with muscle soreness after races and why it might be happening to you more than normal, how to put a bad race behind you, the best way to approach training for back to back marathons, and what to do between races to optimize your long term progression. I know I picked up some great tidbits just from listening in on the coaches and I know you will too. If you have questions you'd like our coaches to answer on the podcast, you can head to RunnersConnect. Net daily and submit them to us. You can send an audio recording or type in your questions. We'll do our best to get your question featured on the next Roundup show. Enjoy today's episode. If you're looking for the best way to increase your focus for your upcoming races, you'll love the new Perform from the Amino Company. You can check out the research@aminoco.com. RTT if you've tried running with Headphones before but didn't like how they felt, then you really need to give oledance Headphones a try. You'll be amazed at the difference their open ear design makes. Head to oledance.com RTT to learn more.

Michael Hammond [00:02:32]: Michael here to answer your training and racing questions. Today's question comes from Richard.

Jeff Gaudette [00:02:38]: I did a Maritin at the weekend. What do you think is the best way to get over Maritime quickly and back into Zoom medium to long mileage?

Michael Hammond [00:02:48]: That's a great question, Richard, and really fantastic question because it's so relevant right now and we're getting just coming off all these really big races. This is a great time to be talking about this topic, which is how do you properly recover after a marathon and how do you get back to training? Because that's what so many people want to do. You want to go on to the next race. You want to go on to the next training cycle. But as you'll learn over the next few minutes, rest is incredibly important. So the break itself after running a marathon is extremely important. I want to start off with a little bit of science behind it just because I think that'll kind of lay the groundwork for what we talk about after that. So a few different aspects here. You got the skeletal system, you've got cellular damage and the immune system. Okay, so skeletal damage, quoting an actual study, it basically concluded that what they were they were studying the calf muscles. Okay, so they were looking at conducting the study on calf muscles of marathon runners, and it showed that both the intensive training for and the actual marathon itself induced inflammation and muscle fiber necrosis that significantly impaired muscle power and durability for up to 14 days after the marathon. So that's two weeks after the marathon that these runners calf muscles were still showing inflammation. That's obviously a very serious issue. Talking about cellular damage, one study concluded that the cellular damage persisted more than seven days post marathon. And another study showed the presence of myoglobin in the bloodstream post marathon for three to four days. Okay, so that's a lot of time that there's a lot of cellular damage in your body and clearly shows you can't just get right back to running then. Looking at the immune system, a suppressed immune system is one of the main causes of overtraining. I think we all look at everything from a very muscular standpoint and kind of looking at the body and injuries and all that, but your immune system is huge. And a recent study showed that the immune system is compromised up to three days post marathon, and it also is a major factor in overtraining syndrome. So keeping your immune system healthy is incredibly important, and you got to let it rest after a marathon. So obviously that's talking about resting the body, but what about resting the mind? The grind of marathon training is very difficult. There's a lot of running that goes into it. A lot of hours, a lot of time spent running, stretching, doing strength training, doing cross training, making sure you get to bed on time, eating right. A lot of things go into it from a mental standpoint. And I think that, honestly, resting your mind, in my opinion, is equally as important as resting your body. You need that rest. Your mind needs a break from the grind of training. So I think that even if your body feels fantastic, if seven days after the marathon this happens, people will say, hey, it's been a week, and I feel great. I'm ready to get back into it. I actually will still tell them, not even looking at the studies we looked at before and the aspects of your body still needing recovery, I'll just say, look, I think we just need more time. From a mental standpoint, I think you just need to take a real break and just kind of relax. So that's very important as well. It's a good time to let injuries heal. Okay, so so often you go into a marathon and even though you tapered down that that last month or two of the real heavy marathon training, you know, a little injury popped up, achilles plantar, fasciitis, it band, whatever it is that happens all the time, that little injuries will pop up during marathon training. And the problem is you can't appropriately rest the injury because you're training for the marathon. You've injured this marathon, you spent the money, you booked the plane ticket, the hotel, you've got family coming, you're committed, you have to run. So that's where it's really tough to give your body the appropriate rest, give that injury that injured area the appropriate rest it needs. Because as important as strength work is and all that, ultimately an injury really does need rest. So this is a great opportunity to do that. It's also a good time talking about strength work. It's a great time to implement some very specific strength work. So, good scenario. Let's say you, you develop an it band injury or a hip injury late in marathon training, real late, pretty close to the race, maybe like three weeks out from the race. That's pretty close. If you've been training for several months for that marathon, that's pretty close to start implementing a whole new strength training regimen specifically for that. So normally most people will just kind of suck it up, take Ibuprofen, and I definitely don't advocate that, I don't condone that, but that's what most people will do is they'll just kind of gut it out for the race. After that race is a great time to start getting in some good strength work, working on your hip, hip flexibility, hip strength, glutes, all that. So it's a great time to implement some of that. But I will say you want to make sure you wait at least one week after the marathon because you want to have a week of real rest. You don't want to be immediately getting into all this strength work or anything like that. So after a week, then you can kind of implement those strength routines to help heal, get those injuries better and get yourself stronger. So we like to implement a three week marathon recovery plan.

Jeff Gaudette [00:08:03]: Okay?

Michael Hammond [00:08:03]: So if you're talking about just running, not really looking at cross training or anything like that, basically what we'll do is we'll prescribe one week essentially completely off. I mean, hardly any running at all. In fact, really, most of the time, no running whatsoever. If there's any running, we're talking like a 15 minutes trot, absolutely as slow as you can go. But more often what we'll say is, look, let's just do complete rest. Let's get in the hot tub a little bit if you have one, or if you have a hot tub at your gym or anything like that. So you can kind of get some more blood flowing to your muscles, take a hot shower, maybe do some contrast contrasting, which is where you basically do alternate between hot and cold. About a few minutes each, maybe 5 minutes each, whatever you can do to get some more blood to your legs and get that recovery boosted. Then after that week, we're going to do one week of very light running. So super light. Basically we're talking like two to 4 miles maybe by the end of the week. So when you're getting to the point where you're just about two weeks out, maybe you're getting up to like a six to eight mile run at the most. And just really light, very easy, no pace prescribed, no strides, no nothing like that. Just really easy running. And then that third week, this is where we're kind of gearing things up to get back into training. Assuming that the individual does want to get back into an actual cycle. After that we'll say, okay, let's just do like a very low mileage week. Still all easy runs. Maybe we'll throw some strides in there, maybe not. Kind of depends on how the individual is recovering. But either way, we're just talking about some very light running, like a low mileage week for you normally. So let's say you're in normal marathon training and you decide to take a down week. This would basically be like one of those down weeks, probably a little less. If you're a real high mileage person, your down week might be 40 miles. Obviously we're not going to do 40 miles this close to the marathon. So either way it's just a very low mileage week, nice easy runs, maybe some strides to kind of get your body ready for what's going to come in the weeks after. Now I'm a big proponent of what's called active rest. Active rest means that, yeah, you're resting from running, but when we're talking about it in a running standpoint, you're resting from running, but you can get some other stuff in. So this is where you're talking about your cross training. I think it's a great opportunity to do some things that maybe you wouldn't during marathon training. Go on a long hike, go mountain biking, go on a long road bike session. Other things that you just wouldn't really do during training, whether it's due to time or the fact that you don't want to tire yourself out for running, whatever it is, this is a great time to implement some of that stuff. And it's also really useful. Go play some tennis, go play some pickup basketball. Whatever it is that you want to do, this is a great time to do it. And that active rest can actually help you because the last thing you want to do after a marathon, we're kind of talking about holding back from running, but you also don't want to go the opposite way. You don't want to do nothing. You wouldn't want to go be a total couch potato for a month after a marathon because when you get back into it, that's when we see injuries probably the most, is after long breaks of no running at all. All of a sudden you jump back into it and your tendons just aren't ready. Your muscles aren't ready for what you're given it. So you definitely want to be doing something. I think that's where that active rest, cross training, other types of exercise are a great thing to do during this time. So in short, don't rush the comeback. You need the break.

Jeff Gaudette [00:11:35]: This is Coach Jeff with you here today. We're going to take a question from Michelle, and it's a voicemail question. So I'm just going to go ahead and let Michelle run right into that voicemail for you. And here we go.

Guest [00:11:46]: Hi. My name is Michelle. After I run marathons and ultramarathons in races, I get extreme discomfort in my calf muscles. And I wondered if this was due to nutrition, hydration, running form. It normally lasts for about 20 minutes and it's more painful than any of the running that I do.

Jeff Gaudette [00:12:13]: So thank you so much for the question, Michelle. As I understand it, the question that you're asking means that you're getting calf soreness and extreme pain, probably cramping after the race, since you mentioned that after you do the marathons and after you do the ultra marathons, and this is something that's pretty common. And basically what's happening is that when we look at running a marathon and a half marathon, when we look at the actual research, there's actually research done on the amount of muscle damage that happens during a marathon and during an ultramarathon. And we can see from the research, and it's not surprising if you've ever run one, that there is considerable muscle damage that happens during the race. So probably what's happening in your case is that there is extreme muscle damage to your calf muscles and therefore they are spasming or cramping up in the days and weeks after the race because they've gone through so much pain. So the first thing that we need to do or I shouldn't say the first thing, but I think the most important thing that you need to do in this case is after you do these types of races marathons ultramarathons, et cetera. You need to focus very, very hard on the recovery aspect and making sure that you do everything you can to get the muscles recovered as quickly as possible. And what I'm going to do right now is I'm just going to kind of run through the checklist of stuff that I do or I recommend after a marathon. So that way you can eliminate as much muscle soreness as possible. So the first thing that you're going to want to do when you finish is you're definitely going to want to try to continue walking if you can. Because once you go from such an extreme effort to just sitting right down, that's going to cause the muscles and the muscles in your body, especially your legs, to kind of seize up a little bit, like tighten up. And what we want to try to do is kind of let the walking will do is kind of let the blood flow go through the muscles a little bit more, give them a chance to kind of cool down or a chance to loosen up, get some fresh blood in there without over exerting themselves like they were for the entire race. Now that's obviously not always possible for everybody since some people finish a race and they barely can walk afterwards and you definitely need time to sit. But I recommend if you do are able to do that, the second thing that you want to do is you're definitely going to want to make sure that you get a really good post nutrition. So as soon as you can after the race, you want to make sure that you're taking in some carbohydrates and some proteins. Ideally you're looking at a four to one ratio of carbohydrates to protein. So for every 4 grams of carbohydrate you would want 1 gram of protein. And it doesn't have to be completely exact, but definitely make sure that you're getting some carbohydrate and then also some protein. And what the protein is going to do is it's going to help with that muscle recovery. And I say as soon after the race as you can. I know there are definitely some people that are, especially after a marathon, your stomach just isn't going to want to digest anything. So if you're somebody that does not struggle with stomach problems, then definitely eat as soon as you can. It could be something like maybe a bagel with peanut butter, a power bar, anything that is going to get some calories in you. The sooner you can get the calories in you, the better. If you are somebody that has a very sensitive stomach or you just finished a race and you're just really not feeling that great, then I do recommend doing some type of shake. A, you're going to need the fluids anyway, but B, a shake is really absorbed a lot better by the body so you're by the stomach, I should say. So you're going to be able to absorb that and actually take that down a little bit. So you could do a product like a nutrition product that has a four to one ratio of carbohydrates to protein and kind of have that waiting for you. Maybe put it in your bag that you send to the finish line at the race. Have maybe one of your family members have that drink for you available. There's all kinds of different drinks now available that do the four to one ratio of carbohydrate to protein. So that's definitely an important option. And then throughout the day so that's kind of like immediately post race as you go throughout the race, sorry, throughout the rest of the day and then in the coming days and weeks, what you want to do is focus on making sure that those muscles recover. So later in the day do a light massage on your muscles. So use something like the stick and slightly massage your muscles and your calves, especially in your case, so that way you can get out any of the muscle soreness and you can start loosening up the muscles, getting blood flow in there. Don't go too hard at anything, don't really dig in. This type of massage is what they call efflarage, which is where they basically are focusing on blood flow. You don't want to be doing anything like trigger point therapy or anything like that. You really just want to focus on making sure that you're getting blood flow through the muscles through the rest of the day. You also want to make sure like maybe three, four or 5 hours after the race that you're getting in a good meal. Again, your stomach, you may not want to eat because you may not be hungry, but it is important that you get in a quality meal. And when I talk quality meal, I'm talking anywhere from 500 to 800 calories. And we don't need the four to one ratio of carbohydrate to protein here, but we do want to have a good mix of carbohydrates proteins and even a little bit of fat. And what that's going to do is the immediate post race meal or post race beverage or whatever it may be, is going to be something that the muscles soak in immediately. The second one that we're talking about here is going to be what allows your body to really kind of kick start the recovery process because without those nutrients the body just can't recover and then throughout the rest of the days leading after, I recommend an ice bath. So maybe if you're at a hotel sitting in the tub with a bag of ice and also doing the next couple of days, doing some either contrast bath which is hot and cold, or just hot water and making sure that you stretch. So I don't think you really should be running much in the days after a race if anything, maybe a mile or two. But I would recommend rather walking than actually running. You can also do like a bike or something where there's non impact and you're just kind of getting the muscles or the blood flowing and then hot bath will help as well. So if you sit in a bath for ten to 15 minutes and just let the kind of hot water go over there and then make sure that you do a good stretch afterwards, that's going to help. If you do some active stretching that's going to help get the muscles alleviated a little bit there. So those are my recommendations. Like I said, I think your problem is in the days and even weeks after a marathon, there is extreme muscle damage that is happening. And so you want to make sure you do everything you can to eliminate that muscle damage and to help the body recover as quickly as possible. And that is going to be something that should take away a lot of that calf soreness that you're having or if anybody's listening to any particular muscle soreness that you're having after that. So I hope that answer helped you recover from these marathons and ultramarathons. I know that's definitely not a great experience, nothing that you want to kind of see, and I want to thank everybody for listening today and I hope you have a great run today.

Coach Claire [00:19:20]: Hello, everyone. This is Coach Claire Bartholic. Today's question is from Ian, and it's about bouncing back after a bad race. Ian wrote into us with this question. I bonked big time in my last marathon, and I'm sad to say the experience has left a bitter taste in my mouth. Any advice for moving past a bad marathon and the anxiety to do another one? Many thanks. Thank you for reaching out, Ian. There's no other way to put it. Bad races are tough, especially a distance like the marathon where you put months and months of hard work in and it all seems to crumble in a few hours. As much as we know intellectually that it's just a race, we're not out there saving the world after all, it still really hurts. Bad races highlight mistakes in training or preparation, but they are also great teachers. You will learn far more from a race that went badly than from an easy race where everything went right. Every race that you run, regardless of the outcome, makes you a more experienced racer, which gives you far more tools for success next time, but only if you view your mistakes as opportunities to learn and grow. The other point to remember is that you didn't just show up on race day never having run a step, or at least I hope not. You had weeks and months of training preparing you for that day. Regardless of the outcome of that one race, your legs have more miles on them than when you started, and that just doesn't go away. Even if the race didn't turn out as you'd hoped, a bad race can actually be a stepping stone to a next great race, because not only are you physically more experienced, but you are mentally tougher, having been through the challenge. This happens to elite racers all the time. Paula Radcliffe, the fastest female marathoner of all time, dropped out of the 2004 Olympic marathon only to win New York City three months later. So let's go through a timeline of some tips that you can use to get through the disappointment immediately after the race. You have every right to be upset and frustrated. Go ahead and let those feelings out, but give yourself a timeline for wallowing. Some coaches say a single day is enough to mourn a loss or to celebrate a win. But you might need a couple of days. But don't let it stretch on for days and days before moving on to the next step. Step two is to debrief and try to analyze what happened. You said that you bonked during your last rates. Well, why do you think that happened? What kind of nutrition were you using? How much did you practice your fueling and training? Was your hydration adequate for the conditions? All of these questions and more will need to be asked and answered as you prepare for your next one. Treat it as a puzzle that you're trying to solve with theories that you can test out when you are ready to train again. The next step is to set a new goal. But it does not have to be another marathon. Some runners immediately sign up for a redemption marathon to avenge their bad race. I know I've done it. We even had an athlete we coached on Runners Connect that signed up for a secret marathon. He didn't even tell his wife he was racing until he came home with his shiny new PR. A redemption marathon can be a great technique to get over the loss, but it might not be right for everyone. You can try a more manageable goal, like a shorter distance, maybe some five k's or ten k's, or even switch sports completely so that you have that feeling of being fresh and new to something. Just pick something that you have an interest in and that you will approach with as much care and passion as you do your running. You can build your confidence in small ways until you miss the pull of the marathon again and can start training again fresh. When you are ready to begin marathon training again, try to focus on the process more so than the outcome. One single day does not define us. It's the day after day of small things that we do with consistency that make up who we are. If you love running and love training for a difficult goal like a marathon, then looking at the entire experience, including the months of training, is essential to having a healthy perspective on why you do this. The next step to preventing another bad race is reframing your goals and expectations. Sure, it's great to have a time goal, we all do. But doing your best with what you are given is the best possible outcome, no matter what time the clock says. It's not just about finishing strong. It's about being smart with your pacing, fueling, nutrition and planning. Being brave when you want to slow down and you're tired, and being flexible and resilient when things don't go as expected. I hope a few of these tips have helped inspire you, Ian, and you can use this experience of a bad race to become an even better runner. Have a great run today.

Finn Melanson [00:24:49]: I know how nerve wracking the weeks before a big race can be. Moreover, we all know how that sluggish feeling as we back off from our training can make us feel like we're losing all of our hardearned fitness. And that's why I love using perform from the Amino Company. In the weeks and days leading up to my race, perform immediately gives me energy and focus to help reinvigorate those normally sluggish pre race runs. Even better, perform helps reduce fatigue and increases muscle protein synthesis so you recover faster from both the run and your strength training. I feel great when taking Perform, but I appreciate even more that it's all backed by actual science. In fact, the research on amino acids and performance enhancements is well documented, with hundreds of studies demonstrating their effectiveness. If you're interested in giving Perform a try, we've got a special offer for you where you can save 30% and get a free gift by using the code RC 30. Just head to Aminoco.com RTT that's am Ioco.com R-T-T and use the code RC 30 at checkout to save 30% and get a free gift. If you love the idea of running while listening to music or your favorite podcast but hate how uncomfortable or blocked up traditional in ear headphones make you feel, then you need to check out Oledance headphones. Oledance Headphones use an over the ear design, which means that they don't get into your ear canal. This makes them super comfortable, even for those with the most sensitive ears. Plus, they won't cause ear fatigue like you often get when wearing traditional ear pods for 2 hours or more. For me, the best part is you don't get that stuffy feeling where it feels like you can hear everything inside your head when you run with traditional in ear headphones. If you've tried running with headphones before but didn't like how they felt, I highly recommend giving Oledance a try. You'll be amazed at the difference. Just head to Oledance.com RTT and use the code R-T-T to save 20% on your purchase. That's Oladance.com RTT to save 20%.

Coach Sinead [00:27:07]: Coach Sinead here with you today. We have a pretty interesting question from Scott on how to run back to back marathons.

Guest [00:27:16]: Hi. My name's Scott, and I'm from New Hampshire. Love your show and I've learned a lot. I am a Masters runner and a marathoner completed 19 marathons and I just started running a marathon every seven to nine weeks on my quest for a 50 50. My question to you is I would like to run a back to back marathon in one weekend covering two states. I currently average between 50 to 60 miles per week with a short training cycle because. Of recovery and tapering. I'm wondering how I can build my muscle strength without injury to be able to handle two marathons in one weekend. I look forward to your response and keep up a great show.

Coach Sinead [00:27:59]: First off, Scott, I just want to say I am really impressed. That is quite a feat to do 50 and 50, and it sounds like you're well on your way to completing it. But doing back to back marathons is certainly nothing to sneeze at. It's quite a hard endeavor, but with the right training modifications, you can certainly prepare yourself to accomplish this. So I am going to talk about a few things that you can do to change up your training in preparation for two marathons in 48 hours. The first thing I will say is that your training leading up to the races isn't really going to change much. In preparation for doing two races, the same sort of physiological principles do apply and you're just really trying to focus on improving your ability to burn fat efficiently as fuel and also improve your aerobic threshold. So a lot of the same workouts will apply. The only thing that you really are going to change in preparation for this is you do want to increase your mileage slightly. And the reasoning behind this is pretty straightforward, really. The more you're able to train, the more likely you are to succeed at doing two marathons in 48 hours. So, simply speaking, the higher your training volume, the easier it will be to run and recover from the first marathon and then successfully complete the second marathon. So the way you want to increase your mileage is pretty gradual. Scott, you said that you do about 50 to 60 miles per week on average. So your highest week of mileage is probably around 60. What you're going to want to do is increase that by 10% for a few weeks. So you'll go from 60 to 66, and then you'll increase that number by 10% to get 73 the next week. And then after that, you will actually come down 10%. So you'll go from a 73 miles week down to a 66 miles week. And what this does is it really just allows your body to catch back up with you. It ensures that you are never exceeding your stress threshold and aren't putting yourself at risk for injury. So you do want to kind of follow this 10% up for two weeks and then down 10% for the third week until you get to your desired peak mileage. For you, Scott, going into this marathon, I would add somewhere between five to 10 miles to your peak mileage. So because you average somewhere between 50 and 60, usually I wouldn't go more than 70 in preparation for this because you certainly don't want to be tired come race day. So I wouldn't exceed about 70 miles. Once you get up to 70, you can kind of stay there for a few weeks, keep it consistent. Make sure that third week continues to be a down week. You do want to come down 10% and just kind of follow that until you get to your taper. Whether you do a two week taper or a three week taper, the taper will be exactly the same as if you were training for one marathon instead of two. Another thing you should consider doing is running some of your workouts, your more intense runs and your long runs back to back really just kind of pancaking those runs. And this is going to obviously simulate the recovery and fatigue that you're going to experience on this big race weekend of yours. So, for example, you could schedule a longer marathon pace tempo run the day before a moderate long run. And again, this is just really going to help simulate running on tired legs. You don't want to do this for every workout or even every week. I would just pick one or two weekends to implement this training technique. And make sure you schedule plenty of rest and easy recovery running after these back to back days because it is going to take you a few days to recover from doing two workouts back to back like that. And Scott, you did specifically ask how to build muscle strength in preparation for these two big races. So one thing I will say is that you do just want to make sure you focus on core. Your general core strength is absolutely paramount when it comes to a marathon, let alone two marathons back to back. So oftentimes when you see a runner in the later stages of a marathon, you will see a lot of side to side motion with their arms. I call it butter churning because it kind of looks like they're churning butter and it's just a lot of lateral movement with their arms. This is because they do have some weakness in their core. So one more thing I will say about the training leading up to these races is that you should focus a little bit more on your general core strength. You can do planks, you can do sit ups. Just do a routine every day or every other day that's going to really just build up that strength and help your body to fall back on that strength when it becomes fatigued, as it inevitably will in the first marathon and then especially so in the second marathon. So do some more core work. I would say you definitely want to make sure that your midsection is nice and strong come race day because it's just going to allow your body to fall back on that strength when again it becomes tired. Now I'm going to talk a little bit about the race weekends. So when you are going to recover after your first race, you want to make sure you do this pretty promptly after you cross that finish line. So there are a few tips I'll give you. One is pretty obvious. It's to hydrate as soon after your race as possible with some sort of electrolyte drink. You can do Gatorade, you can do Noon, whatever you prefer. Just make sure you get some electrolytes and some fluids back in your system because you will have lost so much of that in the marathon itself. So you really want to make sure that you do get something with sugar in it to stimulate that insulin response and just help you get your fluids balanced, help you get back those electrolytes that you've expended in that marathon and just kind of help get that recovery process going a lot quicker. Another thing I will say is to eat a small meal or a snack that contains something like a four to one ratio of carbohydrates to protein and if you can handle eating more than a small meal, definitely do that. You want to get something in your system within about 30 minutes of crossing the finish line. Even sooner if you can just make sure that you are getting some sort of carbohydrate rich snack in right after you cross the line. Because again, that 30 minutes window is paramount when it comes to recovery. It's really when your body is most responsive to those carbohydrates. So make sure you do get a little bit of something in there, even if it has to be a banana and peanut butter or some sort of shake. If you can't stomach a whole lot, just get a good solid, carbohydrate rich snack in there. Another thing I will say is to not skip the cool down. That is a recipe for a lot of lactic acid in your legs and so you want to make sure you do a quick cooldown. It doesn't need to be anything too lengthy. You can do a light jog for ten to 15 minutes and then be on your way. But make sure you do some sort of jog because otherwise your body is going to have a hard time going from a pretty intense state to a resting state. So that's what the cooldown is for. It's just to loosen your muscles back up and make that transition from an intense state to a resting state a little more gradual. After your cooldown, do make sure that you stretch any major muscle groups and anything that you feel might be sore or tight. You can also roll out any nagging injuries or problem areas. Oftentimes after a marathon, the quads and the hamstrings are full of knots. So you do want to make sure that you roll out pretty well. After the first marathon, make sure you do some stretching, some static stretching, dynamic stretching, whatever you prefer, and some rolling out following your cooldown. And you'll want to roll out again later that afternoon or evening. Make sure you do roll out at least twice that day just to ensure that you are getting blood flow to that area and working out any knots that might have settled in your legs. Another way you can get blood flow to the area and help reduce any inflammation from that first marathon is to do an ice bath as soon as you can after the race. This is pretty easy, just get a bag of ice and fill up a bathtub and then just go in from the waist down and that's going to be a great way to get blood flow to the area and help reduce inflammation. Again, you will be thinking yourself a lot the next day for doing this. You can do a couple of ice baths that day, you can do one after your race and then one that evening. That's really again just going to help expedite recovery and make sure that you are getting that inflammation back down before you line up for your second race. Another thing you can do is to take an Epsom salt bath before bed. You could even mix the Epsom salt with an ice bath and just kill two birds with 1 st there. The Epsom salts are really going to help reduce inflammation and help push out any of the garbage in your legs, any of that lactic acid that is settled in your legs after that marathon. Epsom salts are great ways to do that. Another thing I will say though I know Scott, it probably does not need to be said for you. You are a veteran marathoner and you know how to fuel after a marathon, I'm sure. But do make sure that you are fueling very well that day following your first race and leading up to your second race. You are going to have burned a lot of calories in that first marathon and you need to make sure that you really are replenishing all of your glycogen stores, really booing up those stores in preparation for the next marathon. A lot of simple carbs because by that point your stomach will have gone through quite a lot of jostling in that first marathon and it's going to be a bit vulnerable. So you don't want to do anything too fibrous. You don't want to do anything too fibrous leading into another marathon anyway. So keep everything pretty simple. Some nice simple carbs, things that are easy to digest, easy on your stomach and couple that with a little bit of protein and you will be nice and ready to go come your second race day. The last thing I'll say is to try and get plenty of sleep. If you have a hard time getting good rest after a race like that, as most runners oftentimes do, you want to try and get a nap that day in the afternoon if at all possible and then just try and get as much sleep as you can that night. If you can get about 8 hours, that would be perfect. If you can get more, even better. But just try and make sure that you are getting plenty of sleep before that second race because sleep is really when all of these vital recovery processes take place. So make sure that you are getting quite a few REM cycles in there if you can. Scott, thank you so much for submitting that question. We've not gotten one quite like that yet and I really enjoyed answering that for you. Wish you the best of luck with your 50 and 50 endeavor and with this upcoming back to back marathon weekend you've got. Thanks so much again for joining me today and I hope you have a fantastic run today.

Michael Hammond [00:39:43]: Michael, here to answer your training and racing questions. Today's question comes from Jill. Hello. Hey, Jill. I have completed full marathon training for basically three cycles in a row. Fall 2016, spring 2017, and now fall 2017. Do you recommend a spring and a half as opposed to another full? I signed up for a trail race in January and one in February. I can choose anywhere from ten to 50K. I've never done trail racing before, so I'm not sure which distance to choose. My overall focus is to improve my full marathon time, but I'm feeling like I need to switch it up a little. What are your recommendations for the spring? When should I queue in my next full? Thanks. Great question, Jill. This is something I really like talking about because I think it's very important. I think it's a very important question to ask yourself is, hey, at what point I've been doing two marathons a year. Some people will do this for years on end. At what point do you say, hey, maybe I ought to change things up a little bit? The human body responds really well to different stimuli. I think this is well understood and most people get this, but for whatever reason, we don't often apply it in running. We'll do the same training cycle, the same everything twice a year for a marathon, train for three or four months, whatever, and never change things up. And so often people will get caught in this huge rut of marathon training. They'll stagnate in their performances, they'll kind of run the same times. And it's so obvious. I think the answer is so obvious, but unfortunately it's kind of hard to see it coming. And not to mention you feel like there's an opportunity cost there. You're missing out on the marathons. Let's say you love to run Boston and New York every single year or something like that. And this, doing something like this where you change things up would potentially involve missing one of those missing one of those really big marathons that maybe you've done several times or missing a marathon that your friends are doing. Whatever it is. I understand that there's definitely opportunities that you're going to have to kind of say no to, but I think it's going to really help your marathon training and we'll definitely talk about that today. I think the trail races are a great idea. I think that's really something cool to really change things up because let's say you decide as you're talking about running a half, which is great, I'm not going to knock that at all. I think it's great and we'll talk about that. But you're doing marathon training and you just say, okay, I'm going to run a half. That's great, you're definitely changing things up. But at the same time, what are you going to do? You're probably going to compare it to your full you're going to say, okay, well, based on my full time, I should be running about this or whatever, a similar course and you're going to end up comparing it to the marathon. It's going to be kind of like two sides of the same coin once it comes down to it. So trail races, that's a great opportunity to do something really different, something that you're going to have to change up the training so much for. And it's just you're not going to be able to necessarily relate it because it's totally different. Even if you run a trail marathon, it's so vastly different from a real marathon that you can't even compare the two. It's like you're competing in two different sports. So I think that's a great idea. In terms of the distances, I would not do both of them, certainly not both of them as fifty K. To be honest. I would recommend doing for sure one of them as a ten K. I think that'd be a great opportunity because now we're talking about something that is so vastly different from a road marathon that it's going to be just a totally different stimulus on your body. You're getting a ten K, which is crazy different from the marathon, and then you're also doing it on trail. So I think definitely do one of them as a ten K and then the other one you can do a little bit longer. I still wouldn't do anything crazy long at this point because I think you're going to be training for a spring half and I think focusing on some shorter stuff during this time makes more sense. I agree with focusing on a half for the spring. I think the training is different enough that you're going to have a very different focus, you're going to work on some different energy systems and I think it'll definitely ultimately end up helping your marathon. I do want to talk real quick about this is kind of jill, this isn't necessarily for your specific question, but I think it's very relevant to the topic is talking about shorter races. I am a huge proponent of people who are generally doing half and full marathon training, which as I said, half training. It's definitely different from full marathon training. I'm not going to say it's not because it is. Of course it is. You're not doing those crazy long runs, or you're not doing necessarily a lot of the really long, two x six mile type workouts, but at the same time, it can still get you in a little bit of that rut that marathon training can. So something I actually recommend a lot is for people that are doing half and full marathon training to do some very short races. Go do some five k's. Go do some ten k's. Go do several of them. Go find a road eight k. The Richmond people that ran the Richmond Marathon in half just this past weekend saw that there was a really awesome eight k there that's really fast. It's got like, a downhill finish. There's a great opportunity to go get a nice fast eight k time that you never run. No one runs eight KS very often. So go find a mile. Go find a 1 mile race. Road miles are becoming crazy popular nowadays. The reason this works so well is because, as I alluded to earlier, you're going to work some really different energy systems. You're just going to give your body something entirely different, and you're also going to work on your short end speed, your running economy, your running form, and all of that ultimately will translate up to the longer stuff. So there's really nothing to lose because, hey, if you're training for a five k and ten k, the good thing is those are still very heavily aerobic events. It's not like you're becoming a 400 meters star. It's not like all of a sudden you're going out and just do it, ripping track workouts five days a week. No, you're still keeping up with the distance stuff, the aerobic stuff, the tempos and the threshold and somewhat long runs, but you're really adding in some real quick speed work, some real heavy turnover stuff that you wouldn't necessarily be doing as often in marathon training. And that's where I think that stuff really comes in handy. I do want to talk real quick about Ryan Hall, who's the American record holder in the marathon. He's also run I think he's the American record holder, but he has run the fastest marathon time ever by an American. It was not a legal time. It was Boston, and there was like a huge backwind, so it wasn't a legal time, but he ran like 204, I want to say. So it was crazy, crazy fast time. But Ryan Hall is definitely regarded as one of the best, certainly the best American marathoner of all time and one of the best American distance runners at any distance. What Ryan Hall did, and the reason he's relevant to this topic, is that Ryan Hall moved to the marathon at a relatively young age. I don't remember how old he was, but he was pretty young. Most Americans, especially, what they'll do, is they'll go on the track, they'll run in the NCAA, in college, and then for several years after college, they'll stick to the track. You can see Galen Rupp doing this right now. I believe Rup is maybe 31, maybe 32 at this point. And he is obviously now gearing up in the marathon and doing really well. But he's been doing the track. I think he graduated college in nine. So for eight years, seven years he's been just doing the track and now he's moving up to the marathon. Ryan hall, on the other hand, moved up much earlier, moved up when he was pretty young, and a lot of people think that it was kind of an issue for him because he moved up and moved up so seriously, had such huge success right away that he, I think, kind of got in one of these ruts. He was just doing marathon training just year in, year out, month in, month out, week in, week out. That the few times that he did try to come back to some shorter stuff, try to come back to some five KS and ten K's, he was awful like relative to where he was at before. He was an NCAA champion in the five K relative to where he was before, he was kind of terrible. And ultimately he wasn't able to use those to really help his marathon training. It's something he tried to do late in his career, but unfortunately it was just too late. He was too far gone. Obviously, he had myriad other issues as well, but nonetheless, he's a good example in kind of needing to just take a little break, forego some marathons and just say, hey, listen, I'm going to take six months of the year or even a full year, and I'm just going to focus on shorter stuff. It can be fun as well. That's a good thing to think about, is that this stuff can be really fun. You can run five KS every other weekend if you want to. I wouldn't recommend it necessarily to do that all the time, but it's something you can do is you can run a lot of races, you can have a lot of fun. You can maybe go win some local races. I don't know. I'm not sure what that means for you specifically, whoever's listening. But either way, you can go have some fun, go do some different stuff and just kind of get yourself out of the rut and it will help your marathon in the long run.

Guest [00:48:41]: Coach Haley, your community manager here. Hope you guys are having a great day and thanks so much for tuning in. We have a great question from Susan today. Is it ever recommended to complete a training cycle and not race in order to achieve speed and endurance without the stress and recovery needed post race? How much benefit do we actually gain from the race itself? That's a great question, Susan. Many people choose to train and not race, and that's fine. The benefits of running extend so far beyond race performances, weight loss, improved health and fitness, stress relief, you can get all these benefits from a training cycle even if you don't race. The benefits from the race itself extend mainly to beating our PRS or gaining racing experience. You can get all those health and fitness benefits just by completing the training cycle. A race might provide structure and motivation in a training plan, but if you're someone who is motivated by factors other than performance, that may not be necessary. In fact, a training cycle that isn't focused on a specific race can have many benefits. For a runner, you can build a really great base on which to start race specific training afterwards. A general fitness training schedule, one that doesn't finish with a specific race, is something we often recommend if your race is, say, six months or more in the future. Training specifically for one race for a long period of time can cause you to burn out or start to feel flat and stale in your training. By using this general fitness block of training, you can actually improve your fitness and then start the race specific training cycle in a much better place. By building on the fitness you've gained from that general fitness cycle, you'll handle the workouts of the race specific cycle much better. A general fitness block can also help rescue runners who've gotten into that burnt out state or have started to overtrain or feel mentally tired. I've personally used a general fitness block, a training cycle that doesn't end with a race. For this reason, last year I was marathon training for a specific race and I just started to feel so run down and tired. I wasn't enjoying my training anymore. So I decided to leave that marathon and instead put in a block of training where I wasn't really aiming for a particular race. I just wanted to find that love of running again and work on a variety of energy systems. I alternated a whole load of different workouts for different purposes and did a little bit of what I fancied. This really improved my fitness. Without the stress of aiming for a particular race. I found my enjoyment of running again and did a little bit of experimenting with what worked for me. I'm ready to start my next specific race training cycle now, and I feel so much better and mentally refreshed. We all need a little break from preparing for a race. Sometimes. A general fitness block has the benefit of, as I mentioned, including many aspects of training. While training for a specific race, we might not focus on certain aspects. For example, marathonists may not do too many pure speed workouts. However, when not focusing on a specific race, these type of workouts can easily be incorporated as well as other types of workouts. The lack of race specific sessions can take some of the stress out of training, and sometimes you'll actually find yourself reaching new levels of fitness. Another reason that doing a training cycle without a race at the end might be something that's for you right now is if you're experiencing stress in other areas of your life, it allows you to keep up the training. And all the mental and physical benefits that come with it without needing that really high degree of focus that comes when you're aiming for one race in particular. A race date can make you feel time constricted. So you might attempt a workout when your body isn't feeling great because, hey, your race is just around the corner. You can be more relaxed about it and move things around a little. Some people refine their love of running this way or keep running through a particularly stressful life period. To summarize, if racing isn't your main priority right now, there's definitely no need to include the race at the end of a training cycle. We've got many members who work on general fitness programs, and of course, if you get that urge to race, you'll be in a great place on which to start a race specific cycle. No aspects of training will have been neglected, and you'll probably feel mentally refreshed and ready to go. I really hope that helps and lets you know that it's absolutely fine to have a training cycle where you aren't aiming for a race, as long as you can stay motivated about that race there to guide you on. There are so many benefits of doing this, and I'd actually recommend that most people take one of these general fitness training cycles every so often. I really love that question. Thanks so much for asking. Have a great day and be sure to tune in next time.

Finn Melanson [00:53:41]: Thanks for listening to the Run to the Top podcast. I'm your host. Finn milanson. 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, Finn, 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. Net podcast. Until next time, happy trading.