Kick-Start This Season The Racers’ Toolbox Way
With all the various festive seasons come and gone, it’s now time to get back into your regular routine of balancing family, work and TRAINING. Some of you may be wondering where you should start and what you should do. Fret not – here are some reasons why testing will get you heading in the right direction.
Get yourself tested: Picture your body as a car. A car should be regularly serviced to ensure you know what is going on under that hood and to make sure the engine is running as efficiently as possible. The same can be said about your body too! Getting yourself tested to see how your internal systems are running is a great way to start out on the right foot.
Get your training zones: Once tested you will now have your current training zones. It’s highly important that your training is kept as specific as possible and this applies not only to the physical but physiological aspects of it. As an endurance athlete, there is not much benefit to having a high power output when your engine does not have the efficiency to last the entire race duration or the length of the season for that matter.
Get your baseline numbers: The baseline numbers from this initial round of testing will act as your measure of improvement when you re-test to monitor your progress. This is a great way to assess the effectiveness of your training and also helps to keep you motivated when you see the fruits of your labor pay off. Last thing any endurance athlete wants to see is time and effort spent training inefficiently and getting nowhere – much like a mouse on a wheel.
For any budding endurance athlete, we recommend getting at least a Fuel Efficiency and Lactate test done to ensure both systems are in order. Even as a newbie or a seasoned athlete, you will be able to benefit massively by just knowing more about your body and following the specific training zones to optimize your time spent training SMART!
Testing should always be done as a fresh start, so make sure you make it a regular way to kick-start the new season of training and racing right.
5 Ways To Avoid Illness & Injury In Training
One of the challenges many runners face when they sign up to complete a 10km, half or full marathon is managing injury and illness that hamper their preparation. Injury and illness are the 2 things that drain the fun out of running and stop it from being that relaxing, meditative and rewarding pastime we know it as.
Here are a few things that you can employ to help keep away the dreaded I’s and remain in tiptop shape for your race.
1. Structure your training. Training should be progressive, however most runners leave training to the last minute and panic when they realize the race is just around the corner and they are not ready. This leads to cramming and doing too much too soon, resulting in injury, illness or mental burnout. By starting your training early, you can start small and progressively increase your weekly training volume and intensities so that your body has a chance to effectively respond and adapt.
2. Get plenty of sleep. Training doesn’t make you a better athlete, training makes you tired. Recovery from training is what leads to adaption and improves your performance, not the training itself. At the core of recovery, lies sleep. Sleep is a wonderful thing that we often neglect in our busy lifestyles. By getting your 7 – 9 hours of sleep per night, you allow your body to shut down, repair and recover, resulting in a better ability to handle your training and remain fresh.
3. Improve your technique. Technique sets the upper limit for where your training will take you. If you have a poor technique and are an inefficient runner, your chances of becoming injured as you increase your training volume go up dramatically. Spend time working on your running form. Aim to run tall, up over your hips. Keep your head high and use your arms without rocking your shoulders from side to side. Aim for a mid foot landing.
4. Wear the right shoes. Shoes come in many different forms. Having a shoe that suits your foot type is useful in reducing your chances of injury. Sometimes having a foot scan helps you get the perfect fit and enhances your running technique as well.
5. Don’t eat – Fuel! Our nutritional habits play a big part in our ability to stay fit, strong and healthy. Your goal should be to load your diet with real foods. This means choosing fresh fruits and vegetables, fish and lean cuts of meat. Focus on achieving a balanced, natural diet and you are well on your way to good health and improved resiliency.
Don’t let injury and illness get you down. By introducing the recommendations above into your lifestyle and training, you will give yourself a good chance of getting through your event with as few hiccups along the way.
SCMS 2011 FREE Training Plans
Welcome Standard Chartered Marathon Singapore 2011 Runners.
As the official training partner for this years event, Racers’ Toolbox has created a number of training plans that you can you use to enhance your training for this event. Training plans are FREE and available for each event distance and will take you through each of the three training phases – base, strength and specifics.
All plans include daily training volume, intensity and specifics and all come with a notes sheet to help you get the most out of the plan.
5km TRAINING PLANS
2 Days Per Week
scm-5krunplan-2
This download includes the 2 day per week training plan and notes for 5km. It is suited to the beginner 5km runner who has 2 days per week to train.
3 Days Per Week
scm-5krunplan-3
This download includes the 3 day per week training plan and notes for 5km. It is suited to any 5km runner who has 3 days per week to train.
4 Days Per Week
scm-5krunplan-4
This download includes the 4 day per week training plan and notes for 5km. It is suited to any 5km runner who has 4 days per week to train.
5 Days Per Week
scm-5krunplan-5
This download includes the 5 day per week training plan and notes for 5km. It is suited to the more advanced 5km runner who has 5 days per week to train.
10km TRAINING PLANS
3 Days Per Week
scm-10krunplan-3
This download includes the 3 day per week training plan and notes for 10km. It is suited to any 10km runner who has 3 days per week to train.
4 Days Per Week
scm-10krunplan-4
This download includes the 4 day per week training plan and notes for 10km. It is suited to any 10km runner who has 4 days per week to train.
5 Days Per Week
scm-10krunplan-5
This download includes the 5 day per week training plan and notes for 10km. It is suited to any 10km runner who has 5 days per week to train.
6 Days Per Week
scm-10krunplan-6
This download includes the 6 day per week training plan and notes for 10km. It is suited to the more advanced 10km runner who has 6 days per week to train.
HALF MARATHON TRAINING PLANS
3 Days Per Week
scm-21krunplan-3
This download includes the 3 day per week training plan and notes for 21km. It is suited to any 21km runner who has 3 days per week to train.
4 Days Per Week
scm-21krunplan-4
This download includes the 4 day per week training plan and notes for 21km. It is suited to any 21km runner who has 4 days per week to train.
5 Days Per Week
scm-21krunplan-5
This download includes the 5 day per week training plan and notes for 21km. It is suited to any 21km runner who has 5 days per week to train.
6 Days Per Week
scm-21krunplan-6
This download includes the 6 day per week training plan and notes for 21km. It is suited to the more advanced 21km runner who has 6 days per week to train.
MARATHON TRAINING PLANS
4 Days Per Week
scm-42krunplan-4
This download includes the 4 day per week training plan and notes for 42km. It is suited to any 42km runner who has 4 days per week to train.
5 Days Per Week
scm-42krunplan-5
This download includes the 5 day per week training plan and notes for 42km. It is suited to any 42km runner who has 5 days per week to train.
6 Days Per Week
scm-42krunplan-6
This download includes the 6 day per week training plan and notes for 42km. It is suited to the more advanced 42km runner who has 6 days per week to train.
Recovery Strategies That Work
Regardless of whether you are training to lose weight, stay in shape or perform in sporting events the rate at which you recover will greatly effect the time it takes you to reach your goals.
Below are a number of basic recovery strategies that you can employ to help you look after your body and minimize your chances of getting injured or rundown.
1. Stretching and Massage
Stretching and massage on a regular basis will keep your muscles knot-free and in good condition. Keeping your muscles knot free is essential when you are trying to train consistently day after day.
Remember to keep massage light after a hard training session or race as deep massage can slow recovery especially if you are not a person who has regular massages.
2. Ice and Cold Water Therapy
After a run, run a cold hose or water over your legs (especially your shins) or place your legs in a swimming pool. This is an effective way to reduce fluid build up. You can also use ice but make sure that you wrap the ice in a wet towel to avoid ice burn.
3. Elevation
Elevating your legs after training helps to reduce fluid build up. Combined with cold water or ice therapy this is very effective.
4. Contrast Therapy
Contrast therapy is where you hose down or soak your legs in cold water (like ice or cold water therapy. see above) and then jump into a hot shower or spa pool. Once you feel your legs heating up and are red with blood jump out and put them back in the cold water. Repeat this several times.
5. Nutrition
It is ideal that within 60 minutes of finishing training, you should eat to start replacing all the nutrients that you lost throughout your training session. If you are a person who finds it difficult to eat after training, try a shake drink with a mix of both carbohydrate and protein. Many companies make these shakes and you can purchase them at most bicycle shops, health food shops and gyms.
6. Relaxation and Sleep
Aim to schedule harder training sessions on days when you can relax and aim to get more sleep. It has also been proven that short sleeps of up to an hour after training can help increase recover by increasing circulating hormones.
7. Foam Roller
Foam rollers are fantastic tools for self-myofascial release, self-massage and stretching.
Incorporating any of the above recovery strategies to complement your training plan will have positive results on your recovery rate and help you to remain injury free and consistent.
False Fast
Why do I need to train at a conservative pace when I see the best athletes out training and they are training fast? This is a question we often get asked in our lab so I thought I would write a few sentences on why this isn’t always as it seems.
While it may appear that they are training “fast” (and sometimes they are) there are a few things you need to consider before you label their pace.
Genetics – elite performers are usually (but not always) blessed with superior genes
Training history – elite performers usually have years of consistent training under their belts
Fitness – elite performers are normally incredibly well conditioned as a result of point 2 above
While sometimes they are training fast (their speed phase), most of the time, they are in fact training in their correct steady zone and the pace (fast), is a result of their superior genes, training history and fitness.
Picture this
A 60 minute 10km runner is out training in his steady (aerobic) zone and is running at 7 minute per kilometer pace. A 35 minute 10km runner is also out training and runs past him seemingly flying. What you need to understand that flying is a relative term and he was in fact running at the same steady (aerobic) pace as the 60 minute man but because of his superior fitness and conditioning is able to run at 4.45 minutes per kilometer (fast).
Be your own athlete
Before you jump in and try to train like the best athletes consider it is not always as it appears to be. Know your body and execute training that will get you into the best shape you can. This is not done by emulating others, it is only done by knowing where you are and where you need to be. If you manage the following, you will soon find yourself becoming faster at the same effort (heart rate, perceived exertion, pace).
Structure – having the correct phases (endurance, strength endurance, speed) will progressively prepare your body for your event ensuring you train the right things at the right time
Intensity – intensity will make or break you and directly follows the structure of your plan. As a rule training intensity builds throughout the 3 phases of training
Festive Fitness for You
As the festive season draws nearer, many of you will be thinking about the great food, drinks and parties that are about to happen. Others will be thinking about how to avoid ‘too much of a good thing’.
Will all that training that you have just completed this past year now go to waste? Fear not… time off to indulge is not such a bad thing if you know exactly what to do to regain your fitness right after.
To prevent yourself from losing too much too soon, you should make it a point to fit in a 30 minute easy recovery run at least 2 times per week over the festive period. This will keep your muscles active and your aerobic system going. It is only an hour in a whole week, which really isn’t much time to get off the couch and to get into action.
As an added bonus….end the year by getting yourself tested in the Racers’ Toolbox Lab. It’s is a great way to assess your current level of ability and gets you back on track with the right intensities that you need to train at to effectively get the results that you want.
These are some simple ways to help you start on the right note once 2011 come around. What are you going to do?
Happy New Year Everyone!
Fuel Efficiency – The Art of Burning Fat
Improving your fuel efficiency is a key way to improve your performance in endurance events, to lose weight and to increase your energy levels. It is a process that when trained correctly can have significant long-term results on any of the above goals listed.
What is Fuel Efficiency?
Fuel efficiency is a term Racers’ Toolbox use to define how the body utilizes fat as energy. Over the past few years, we have spent thousands of hours researching, testing and improving people’s ability to burn fat as an energy source.
Fat is commonly thought of in a negative light and in most cases being ‘fat’ is not a good thing. In fuel efficiency terms, fat is the body’s best source of fuel and the good news is that we can train our body’s to burn much more fat than it currently does, just by making a few simple adjustments to our diet and the way we exercise.
The Most Effective Energy Source
While carbohydrate is the easiest source of fuel for the body, fat provides double the energy per gram than carbohydrate making it the most efficient source of fuel. The body stores an almost unlimited supply of fat while only being able to store around 2,000 calories of carbohydrate at any one time, which make it the most abundant source of fuel in your body.
Training your ability to improve fuel efficiency is possible and we have seen many people triple their fat burning ability in just 2 – 3 months. This is done through exercising in your ideal fat burning zone, which Racers’ Toolbox establishes during the fuel efficiency test and by managing certain components of your diet.
A Fuel Efficient Diet
We do not believe in any short-term solutions or diets and instead are advocates for making small, simple changes over longer periods of time. In terms of diet, it is important to moderate the amount of carbohydrate you take in and it is crucial to be eating at the right times throughout the day – especially around exercise.
If you can make these small changes, the results can be dramatic and you will feel more energetic, become leaner and perform better in the events you are training for.
The Training Plan
At the heart of any serious attempt to achieve a fitness goal is your training plan. The training plan is a carefully planned outline of how you are going to train from day to day to achieve your goal. It gives you clarity in your approach and effectively allows you to structure your lifestyle in a way that allows you to complete your training without any unnecessary interruptions or setbacks.
Just like a driver uses a GPS to keep themselves on track, a training plan will do the same for your fitness aspirations.
A well thought out training plan is also useful in managing the risk of injury. By progressively increasing your volume and intensity over the length of the plan, you are less likely to do too much too soon therefore reducing your chances of injury, illness and mental burnout.
So What’s in a Training Plan?
Content will vary from person to person depending on your experience level, goals and athletic history but the structure is universal. It should contain the following:
• Volume
How long you plan to train on each day. This can be outlined in time or distance.
• Intensity
The overall intensity of the training session. This can be specified by heart rate, pace, power or rate of perceived exertion or a combination of each.
• Specifics
The specifics are the little details you will do in your training and are usually unique to the event you are training for. Examples of specifics include intervals, hill reps, weights, open water swimming, running off road etc.
While your training plan is only a piece of paper, the power it holds is quite extraordinary when given your full attention. Human beings crave structure, and without it can feel very uneasy and struggle to live up to their capabilities and potential.
By spending the time to create such a plan you can start to make the gains you know are possible.
Drill Yourself To Become A Better Runner
Have you ever had the feeling that running is such hard work and your feet feel like they are made of lead? Even though you are putting in quite an effort to keep on running, others are going past you with such ease that you can’t help but feel exasperated as they take each step along the same path and continue to pull further and further away.
Well you need not feel this way for long as there are ways to overcome this and make your running experience a whole lot easier. Running drills are a great way help to improve your running efficiency and add an extra skip to your step. There are many different drills you can do to improve your overall technique and make your training a lot less of a chore.
Some key running drills to focus on for 10 – 20 seconds.
Fast Feet
The idea behind this drill is turn turn your legs around as quickly as possible.
• Short fast steps (imagine you are riding a little clown bike)
• Keep your chin parallel with the ground (look straight ahead)
• Drive your arms forward and back
Butt kicks
The aim of this drill is to get your heel to your butt as quickly as possible continuously.
• Stay upright with a slight forward lean through your hips
• Continuously flick your heel back – kicking your butt
• Keep your chin parallel with the ground (look straight ahead)
• Drive your arms forward and back
High knee
The idea with this drill is to take off on one leg and get as high in the air as you can.
• Stay upright with a slight forward lean through your hips
• Drive hard off your back leg bringing your knee up to 90 degrees (get as high off the ground as possible)
• Make sure when you lift your knee up your foot stays parallel to the ground
• Keep your chin parallel with the ground (look straight ahead)
• Drive your arms forward and back
Bounding
When completing the bounding drill the goal is to go as far as you can with each bound.
• Stay upright with a slight forward lean through your hips
• Drive hard off your back leg bringing your knee up to 90 degrees (go as far forward with each bound as possible)
• Make sure when you lift your knee up your foot stays parallel to the ground
• Keep your chin parallel with the ground (look straight ahead)
• Drive your arms forward and back
If you can add drills into your running routine once or twice a week and consistently practice these drills, you will start to become a more efficient runner over time. Remember if you invest the time to regularly practice and become more efficient, it will make running easier and get you going faster in no time. Good technique is also a great way to ultimately reduce the chance of getting an injury.
When practicing drills make sure you are not tired and try to perform them as well as you can. Practice make perfect (and permanent) so if you are feeling tired and you do not complete the drills properly you will just reinforce a bad habit and risk getting injured.
Bigger Base, Higher Peak
When you watch something being built from scratch – a kid making a house out of lego blocks, a carpenter building a bookshelf or a skyscraper being constructed. Everything has to be built up from the base and that base needs to be strong, if not it will all come crumbling down very quickly. The same is said for running, without a solid base you can expect limited results, as your body may not be capable of handling the physical training you are putting it through.
Establishing a good training base is “the most crucial” component in taking steps towards achieving peak personal performance in running. The intensity and volume of training that you do at the start will determine how well you will be able to tolerate and benefit from the harder/faster training that you closer to your goal event.
Some benefits of time spent base training.
Basic fitness
Progressively conditioning your body to be able to handle more training.
• Reduces risk of injury
• Promotes better tolerance to training (increase in training volume)
• Improves recovery rate
Fuel efficiency
Improves your body’s ability to utilize fat for fuel by training at a lower intensity.
• Reduces body fat to make you leaner
• Promotes better carbohydrate conservation during exercise
• Improves recovery rate
Lactate clearance
Improving your body’s ability to clear and buffer lactic acid accumulation.
• Reduces onset of acidosis (impedes muscle function)
• Promotes better clearance at low and moderate intensity exercise
• Improves recovery rate
Technique
Developing good running form (posture, gait, cadence and breathing)
• Reduces risk of injury
• Promotes better running efficiency by reducing wastage of energy
• Improves overall running experience
The late Arthur Lydiard was fabled for his 100 miles per week base training volume for a minimum of 6 months. This was regarded as ridiculous at the time, but now studies are proving this training principle to be extremely effective. If you make it a point to invest time to work on base training, you can expect a lot more from yourself in time to come.