Runners Run too much!!!

You Run too much!!!

So it's the day after the 2014 Two Oceans Marathon and some of you have woken up having this out of body experience - like your legs don't belong to you or they're just broken. Others might feel amazing after achieving great results in their race...

I ran my first marathon back in the ninety's & I can still remember every moment of that race. Since 2005 I've stopped running Marathons & Ultra Marathons because of two reasons - 1.) It was taking up so much of my time and after a Sunday morning 30km training run there was not much time left in my day to do anything else & 2.) I found myself running so much, I was running all my "good lean" muscle away and found myself ageing quite fast due to all this running.

Which brings me to my next point...
Have you noticed that South Africans battle to win any of these big races like Comrades and Two Oceans? The answer's quite simple - South Africans train Way too much. Last year the tv commentator touched on it, & I thought - "Spot on"

I'll give you an eg. I worked for Sports Science Institute of S.A & while I was there participated in a study of "muscle damage" - to my quads. I wasn't allowed to run for 2 weeks, as long as I was involved in this "muscle damage" program. This made me nervous, as I had a marathon coming up and was given strict instruction by the testing team NOT to do any form of running. (No running? are you kidding me? How will I cope?)

The testing consisted of lots and lots of Plyometric leg exercises which literally killed me. But, come race day, I ran a PB (personal best). I not only broke my PB, I shattered it...

Which brings me back to the point that South Africans run way too much. I've been there, I've seen it and I'm still seeing it. People half die when they can't go run or can't make it to a race. They'd rather pump themselves full of meds & then go & run - but Run they MUST. Even if it's hail or thunder, runners have to be out there. Or take the Vitamin B injection because they are tired All the time. You don't need a Vitamin B injection if you REST sufficiently between training & races. Not to mention running with an injury... There's always another race the following year BUT you only have one body, look after it.

These days runners are still running a day or 2 before Race Day... Why? - They say it's to "keep their legs loose" Stretch if you want to keep your limbs loose!!!

You should be Resting completely!!!! It's an endurance event - you are going to need all your energy on race day.

I've had so many clients who came to me (21km runner's) and showed me their training programs. I was horrified to see the distances these people put in per week. I got tired just reading it...

I asked them if I they would allow me to change how much they run - Not quite easy to convince an "Addict" :-) but after sum convincing it all worked out. I took a guy that was running 80km's per week and cut his training down to not even a fraction of that & guess what? His race times started improving, drastically. So did his family life... He could now spend more time with the wife & kids because he was training far less. What once was an addiction for him is now just a way of keeping fit - a lifestyle.

I've always said to all my clients - "I will not train twice a day unless you pay me to." I am not a professional athlete so why would I want to train like one?

I still run... just not as much as i used to :-)