Eating the Elephant: Breaking Down Long Distance Training (#1)

        Mental fatigue is a real thing. Our brains and emotions can get tired, often before our bodies give up. We will doubt our capabilities, question our preparation, curse the weather, and of course motivation will waiver. Eventually, we will think about quitting, and this all happens before we even run our goal race! Here are a few thoughts on how you can become a champ at mentally preparing yourself for a race that tests us like no other.

       The old Vietnam War General, Creighton Abrams is said to have told his men, "If you want to eat an elephant, take one bite at a time." This is the first of 3-4 blog posts on breaking the marathon training cycle down into smaller digestible chunks, as well as the marathon race. (The half-marathon is a relatively similar preparation and distance, so I'm sure halfers will find this equally applicable.) I have begun to see again and again that what we experience during the 16 week build-up for a marathon is incredibly similar to what we will experience race day. This paradigm will give added meaning to the seemingly endless miles you will do over the 4 months before the marathon.  This paradigm shift will help you not only feel more physically prepared, but perhaps more importantly, you will be mentally stronger and ready to run!

Miles 1-3, Weeks 1-3: Emotional Preparation

       If the first 3 weeks of training are like the first 3 miles of 26.2 miles, you can spend these weeks pacing yourself and being careful not to over-extend yourself. Early in the marathon and early in the training cycle it is important to get off to a good start by loading up on emotional fuel and by not going faster than your fitness indicates.

      In the early miles of the marathon, even though everything is humming it is still wise to start fueling. Early in the race, you know you don’t need the calories from a gel or sports drink yet. Your muscles are still bursting with glycogen and your belly is still cooperating. But you know it won’t always be this way. You know you will need calories in a little over an hour, so you start to drink your drink and slurp your gunk.    

         Similarly, even though you may not need inspiration during these early weeks of your marathon training; you will need it further down the road.  With this in mind, to build a reserve of motivation, I have started several fueling habits. Here are just two.

       I begin to narrow down a few running mantras that I want to have tattooed into my subconscious by the time race day comes around. A couple of my favorites are: Ain’t no thing. This is what you’re looking for. This is where courage is born. There is still more in the tank. Lift your knee; push with your hip. Run with integrity.

        By establishing these phrases now and using them early and often, I will be able to draw on them in the dog days of the training cycle when I am mentally fatigued. I try to keep them short, and word them in the positive rather than the negative. For example, instead of saying “Don’t be a coward.” I say, “This is where courage is born.” I phrase them in such a way that sounds kind, but challenging. In many ways, this is also how I would talk to a friend, and how you should talk to yourself. I also find this practice more helpful when I physically write them down in my training journal, on index cars, or post it notes.

       Second, I like to begin reading an inspirational athlete’s biography, or true story of heroism and survival. A few of my favorite titles are: Unbroken, The Long Walk, Crashing Through, Living with a Navy Seal, Natural Born Heroes, and Duel in the Sun. After having done this routine over a dozen times, my heart is conditioned and gets excited when a new book starts because it means marathon training is about to start! This also gives me something to think about during runs, and gives me someone else’s story to draw on for inspiration and strength. 

How to do a Negative Split - Recover and Don’t Go Out to Fast!

         A runner will frequently ask me about a singularly hard workout that they failed at. They’ll think the workout I gave was too difficult, when in fact they had run the two easy workouts the day before the hard workout like they were racing – leaving them depleted and not able to do the challenging workout. When we struggle in a workout it is usually because we have been trying to run too much or to fast. We become especially susceptible to this temptation in the first weeks of training because we feel fresh, so we want to run fast and we want to run a lot.

        However, this inevitably leads to a physical breakdown, creating momentum towards mental staleness and lethargy in the next stage of the training cycle. If an athlete I’ve been working with notes low motivation for several weeks in a row, I get concerned that an injury or illness is on the horizon. Apathy towards running in weeks 4-6 can often be traced back to overtraining from the first weeks of the training cycle.

       Early on then, I will ask someone to run less or go slower.  During this time, one of my favorite workouts to give is a negative split easy run. This requires the athlete to go slow and easy, but still practice finishing faster than they started. This is the same pacing strategy I’ll ask them to approach the marathon with as well. While they may not be running the actual race slow and easy, their goal is to finish the marathon in a position to make a final push. To do this, they will have to run slightly slower than their physical capability the first few miles.

         However, if you find yourself having taken out the marathon too fast you should briefly slow down and recover, and it is the same in your training. Like the race, my goal for the 16 weeks of training is to be in a position to make a final push, to be able to run my best, fastest, and longest runs in the final month before the marathon. In other words, I’m trying to negative split my marathon-training plan. The easiest way to do this is to take time for recovery.

      This is when a coach or outside observer can be most helpful. It is very difficult for a Type-A personality (which most distance athletes are) to know when they are experiencing the right kind of discomfort verses the wrong kind that comes from pushing ourselves towards burnout, overuse, and injury. If we don’t take recovery weeks, not only do we get weaker, we also run dry emotionally.

       There is a misconception among runners that we get stronger during hard workouts. We are actually getting broken down during a challenging run, but we grow stronger in the recovery period after the run. If there is no recovery in a training plan, then we just keep getting weaker. This is the exact opposite of “Negative Splitting” a training cycle. We end up running our final weeks tired, burnt out, and maybe injured instead of faster and longer. We feel this in the marathon itself when we’ve gone out too aggressive, end up walking more than intended, or just hate the experience. This is where we’ll turn our attention next time. Growing stronger and faster as you head into the Muddy Middle of the marathon and the marathon training cycle. This is Miles 4-20, and Weeks 4-12.