Personal Best Day
In our last blog post we made clear that we really appreciate challenges. And the colleagues from Pushing Limits have announced the Personal Best Day on 26 July. A day on which everyone will try to run a new personal best time.
No matter on which distance, everyone decides on their own. Somehow all together, but still everyone individually and in a way that suits you best. Whether short or long, early in the morning or rather in the afternoon and no matter what level: everyone has the same goal, a new personal best.
5k or 10k Training Plan
No, we are not saying that we will transform you from a running novice to a 10km specialist in eight weeks. It’s just not possible. Our plans are based on you having a certain running fitness and we work specifically on the capabilities you need to run fast.
So whether you are preparing for Personal Best Day or any other day when you want to be in top shape or just want to run faster, here is the plan!
(at the bottom of the post there is a code, with which you can get the plans for free 😉 )
Maximising Speed: VO2max and running economy
On the one hand, the training plan focuses on increasing your running speed. The running speed is determined by your VO2max and your running economy, i.e. how efficiently can you use the oxygen available to you for kinetic energy and how does your movement really contribute to propulsion.
That’s why the plan contains a number of sessions that are specifically designed to increase your VO2max and thus your maximum aerobic energy supply. The running economy will be trained in these sessions as well.
Your running economy can not only be improved metabolically, but also mechanically, for example by increasing muscle strength and the recruitment of muscle fibres. This can be achieved either through targeted strength training and short mini-intervals at very high speed or uphill, so that the power required is higher than in normal running.
In addition, long endurance runs have been found to be an important part of the training of fast runners, who stand out because of their excellent efficiency and / or have a very high maximum oxygen uptake. Therefore we have integrated these elements into the training plan.
But that is not the only reason why we do long runs at low intensity.
Fatigue resistance and endurance
The second part of the aim is to improve the ability to maintain a high, submaximal running speed for longer. This could also be described as resistance to fatigue under stress and is commonly known as endurance.
Endurance is of course a very broad term and can be related to a wide range of exercise durations. Therefore, I find the goal of maintaining a submaximal speed (we don’t sprint, but as fast as possible for the distance) for a longer time (i.e. over the entire competition distance) much more appropriate. As well as being as resistant as possible to fatigue.
This does not mean that you should not feel exhausted in the end, not at all. Fatigue in this context means that due to acute changes in your body caused by the effort, your performance drops. Carbohydrate deficiency is a good example: due to the high load you burn a lot of carbohydrates and your stores run out, you have insufficient energy to keep up this power / speed, so you slow down. You fatigue.
Resistance to fatigue is super complex because of countless interacting factors. And it can never be achieved. But you can always get better! This requires solid endurance training. As Steven Seiler said in one of his presentations: “Low intensity durability is the platform for high intensity repeatability and that’s what wins races.”
So we are focusing on intensive exercises through HIIT (high intensity interval training) with short or long intervals, depending on the distance and time, and HIT (high intensity training) in combination with low intensity endurance training (LIT).
Tips for implementation
Adjust volume
Depending on how your run volume have been over the last few weeks, we would recommend that you adjust the volumes in the training plan, shorten or lengthen sessions or add some if you like.
Over the weeks you can gradually increase your running volume, but be careful not to overdo it!
Training in other disciplines
Even though our running training plan has been developed as a stand-alone, holistic program, you can alternatively integrate it into your (triathlon) training plan.
Take care not to add too much (highly) intensive training in other disciplines. Instead, concentrate on basic endurance or active recovery.
Regeneration
If you change the order of the training sessions or the structure of the days, make sure that you have enough time to recover in between.
During the rest periods the body adapts to the training and becomes stronger, so don’t neglect them!
Training Plans
Enough theory, here are the training plans:
With the code “PBD2020” you get them (until Personal Best day 2020) for free!
Have fun with it!
Let us know how you are doing with the plan, how the training is going and of course how the Personal Best Day will be! Tag us with @noack.sportsupport and share your experiences.
For questions or individual training plans we are here for you anytime!
