I hesitated for a long time about writing this section, but I run into so many friends or web visitors who say "hey, you who run all the time, couldn't you give me a few tips?" that I ended up putting together this little primer, which has no pretension other than to give a few pointers to beginners or to those who want to make progress.
Beyond the tips below, I'm offering two training "plans", one to get yourself running 6 miles in an hour or a bit more — who cares, the point is to get moving, the other to cross over into the ultra world and do a 24h. Between the two I have nothing. I have nothing because topics like the Marathon, and to some extent the 62-mile (100K) race, are already very well covered, and I have nothing to add on those subjects.
Tip #1: listen to the experts
Many specialists have looked into running and the training adapted to each distance. The first thing to do is to listen to what they have to say! For example, you can find resources online; you'll find everything on the Internet these days to progress from the 10K to the marathon, including the half.
But the most effective approach, in the "absorbing the theory" category, is to buy a good book and... read it. In French I would recommend the "Encyclopédie du jogging" by Serge Cottereau. I don't know exactly what would be the equivalent for English readers, but TL;DR -> the older the book, probably the better. The basics of running science were set a long time ago. Recent science and technology improvements have changed the deal for top runners tackling a marathon in 2 hours and change (or less...), but for most people, it's just about the good old running science. When in doubt, go for books by Arthur Lydiard, who had it all figured out already, back in the previous century.
Now, if you have all that and it's still not enough, if the professionals tire you and you really want my amateur opinion on the question, read on ;)
Tip #2: no silver bullet
There is no silver bullet. The reference is from a book by Brooks on software engineering, which itself referred to a legend that says to kill a werewolf you need a silver bullet. Well, all that to say that there isn't, there hasn't been, there never will be a miracle gadget, a miracle pill, a miracle biiiiiip. You might come back at me with the miracle-pill point, because with the Belgian pot, EPO, and all the innovations filed under "doping", we do seem to have some serious candidates in the miracle-product category. Well, no, because for all the performance they bring, those products bring nothing to the practitioner in terms of self-discovery, in terms of the direct pleasure they can get from running. So there you go, no point believing in Santa.
I say this mostly because we'd like to be able to say "to be good at running you need an oversized VO2 max, period". No, it's more complicated. You also have to have followed the right training, have an efficient stride, be mentally prepared — you simply need a bit of everything. Otherwise this sport would lose much of its appeal.
Tip #3: set yourself a goal
It sounds silly, but in life you have to know what you want. Setting a goal is a good occasion to ask yourself "what is my aim?". Personally, my goals are often of the form "finish such-and-such a race" but you can also imagine "I want to do under X hours Y minutes over distance Z" or "I want to lose 20 lb".
One important point though: the goal must be reachable, and above all quantifiable. For example "being in shape" is not a goal. In shape for what? How will you know if your goal has been reached? Hmm? Tell yourself instead that you want to 1) stop smoking and 2) take part in the local fun-run just around the corner. That's concrete. Did I stop smoking? Yes? No? Did I take part in the race? Yes? No? There you go, it's as simple as that.
Tip #4: quality, not quantity
It's not about doing a huge amount of training. It's about doing the right training. And quality doesn't necessarily mean "speed". You can do a quality session at a slow pace. That's actually very often the best option. The recipe to permanently burn yourself out, not progress, and incidentally injure yourself, is to try every single time you go out to push your limits. For sure you'll find your limits, and they'll show up in the form of demotivation at best, or, more commonly, an injury — tendinitis, that sort of thing. Trust your body to set you straight and send you a strong (and painful...) message that will stop you in mid-flight.
When I say "quality, not quantity" I'm saying exactly the opposite of what many people think, which could be summed up as "no point piling up the miles, better to run fewer and faster". I claim exactly the contrary: it's good to have high-volume weeks, and what you mustn't overdo is the speed work, which is extremely tiring and destructive. Miles done at slow pace are very profitable and relatively harmless. As an indication: to run a marathon at 9 mph I do enormous amounts of training at... 7 mph. And I gather that marathon champions (12.5 mph) do plenty of outings at... 10 mph. Just sayin'.
The best training is the one that perfectly combines rest phases and intense phases, and certainly not the one that brings the athlete to exhaustion every time out.
Tip #5: rest
Rest is fundamental. It's during rest that the body rebuilds itself. You need rest to make progress. Without rest, you head for exhaustion, you injure yourself, and performance declines.
Even during very intense training periods where I do two or even three sessions in a day, I always keep in mind that I have to keep one rest day, somewhere, in the week. Now, rest doesn't necessarily mean "stay shut in at home". If you're very fit, you can consider that a 6-mile jog is rest, although a sport-free day is the best way to keep things calm. In the same spirit, the alternation "3 intense weeks / 1 rest week" is a recipe that has proven itself, as has the annual one-month-ish break, which lets you recharge your batteries and start fresh.
The hardest thing is to rest when you're in good shape. You want to go out, run, smash it. Calm down. If your plan calls for rest, rest. You'll have plenty of time to push later, during the hard sessions, during the races. So enjoy your current good form, appreciate being in full health with energy to burn.
Tip #6: keep a training log
The training log is the runner's indispensable companion. Ideally you have a coach who handles all this paperwork for you. In practice, except for professionals or wealthy enthusiasts, that's rarely the case. So arm yourself with a paper notebook or a spreadsheet-type tool, and write down everything you do. At a minimum: date, time, distance, and a brief summary, e.g. "speed work 5×1000m" or "easy run". One line is enough — don't write a novel, the point is just to keep a record.
You'll then be able to better analyse your progression, plan what's next, detect over-training, avoid the "slacking" periods we don't want to admit to ourselves. All good. I ran for years without keeping a log; the day I started, I progressed much faster. A word to the wise...
Tip #7: have a training plan
A good training plan is a powerful thing. If you don't know how to build one yourself, find one adapted to your goal — they exist on the Internet or in any specialised magazine, any book on running. Today, in the 21st century, the field has been relatively well explored; scrupulously following a professional programme is the best way to reach your goal under optimal conditions.
But there are good reasons not to follow a plan to the letter. For starters, past 6 to 7 hours of weekly training, finding the time for the sessions becomes problematic. So you have to make concessions, and it's sometimes impossible to do the long run on the day your programme would impose it. Then you have to adapt...
Personally, once in my running "career" I followed a plan to the day, by the minute. Since then, now that I've gone through that initiation and grasped the "spirit" of the thing a bit, I build my own plans, along these principles:
- arrange a one-month break in the year;
- prepare a theme (speed, distance, fun, rest...) and a volume (miles) for each week. Then adapt day by day as constraints arise;
- systematically insert a rest week between 2 or 3 weeks of intensive training, making cycles of just under a month;
- don't forget speed work, even when preparing for an ultra;
- relax before races — I take my foot off the gas two to three weeks before the event;
- listen to yourself, listen to yourself, listen to yourself... if the body is screaming that something's wrong, act accordingly, change tack;
- don't race in training — race day is when you let the horses loose, not before;
- when in doubt → rest!
I know, it's vague, but that's the full extent of my knowledge in this area. More seriously, you need some experience to build your own plan (hence the value of finding one ready-made) but it's far from impossible. And it's especially gratifying because you have the feeling of really having managed your season from A to Z, from the first training of the season to crossing the finish line of the annual goal.
Tip #8: cross-training is good, eat it up
I'm a (very, very) keen supporter of cross-training, which means not doing only running but also other sports as complements. As for me, I dope my running training with:
- cycling
- swimming
- inline skating
- weightlifting
It's pretty much certain that all the time I spend on these alternative sports, if I spent it running, would improve my performance. In other words, if you have an hour available, the best way to use that hour to make progress in running is to run! Or sometimes to rest, but that's another story...
All that to say that 5h running + 2h cycling in the week is, running-wise, less effective than 7h of pure running.
OK then, in that case, why do cycling and all the rest, if it's less effective than pure running?
On one hand, personally, it's more enriching to open up a bit to other sports than to confine yourself to running, running, nothing but running. You see what I mean?
On the other hand, if you only ever run... you get injured. Sure, 7h of running is more effective than 5h running + 2h cycling. But it's also far more likely to generate a good old-fashioned injury. By swimming, you build up your upper body, which will be heavier (muscles...) and which you'll have to lug around constantly. Yes, but a properly muscled upper body will probably spare you a good little back problem. Same for cycling or skating — they make you work the legs in an unusual way, rebuilding muscle in areas that would have weakened from only running, and cheaply getting you used to what happens after 3 or 4 hours of effort, which is far from easy in pure running.
To be very concrete, I've managed to push to 15h of weekly training by practising cross-training, which gives me a fairly good recovery capacity. I absolutely don't feel capable of running 15h/week. That would be on one hand unpleasant (tedium...) and on the other dangerous (injury...).
Tip #9: think "preparation", not "training"
Physical training, the running sessions, is and remains the heart of the matter. It's the foundation. But you must not neglect the rest. Nutrition, gear, mental preparation (visualising the race in your head, freeing yourself from disruptive stress) often make the difference, and that's all the more true as the distance grows. On an ultra, drop-outs "because I was knackered" are rare. Being tired is expected, predictable. Often things break because you have a bad blister, because your stomach hurts, because you caught a cold, because you didn't eat/drink enough, and so on...
Tip #10: work on your weak points
This one is a bit special. Because in truth, strengths matter too. The trick is to build an approach, a philosophy, a battle plan that plays to your strengths. You have to showcase them, no doubt. If you climb like a mountain goat, do mountain races; if you love the heat, do desert races; if you like to chat, do team races or circuit races.
But beyond that, weak points are often roadblocks. Without obsessing over it, it's worth trying to at least do the bare minimum and avoid having one aspect — just one — ruin the rest of your preparation.
And out in the field, how does it go?
Beyond these perhaps too-theoretical tips, and for those who prefer a good example to a long speech, know that my training logs are online — you can for instance consult the PDF versions for the years 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018.
Generally speaking, everything is in this folder with all my training records. Of course this is just an example, nothing is ever perfect, and in practice I sometimes contradict the fine advice I hand out. You don't make progress without making mistakes.