Time to Train

I’ve been writing a lot about race experiences lately, but not enough about the training that should go into a major goal race.

It’s kind of like having chocolate cake at a coffee shop. What you see and taste is just the finished product: layers of moist sponge cake, rich fudgy icing, and maybe a few shavings of chocolate on top. It’s delicious, but you don’t taste the flour or the eggs that went into making it. (Flour or eggs by themselves don’t taste very nice, anyway.) But it’s these mundane ingredients that are vital to making a cake.

In the same way, good performance at a race is determined by what you put into training for it. Those are the days you debate with yourself whether to take that trip to the track oval or to the mall, and the track oval wins out. Those are the hours you spend sweating doing speedwork and distance work, complementary aerobic and resistance workouts, and stretching. Those are the minutes every work night you go to bed earlier than your colleagues just so you can squeeze in an early-morning run. Compared to the excitement of a race, those times don’t seem very glamorous. But it’s the training that makes racing well possible.

Starting this month, my run training will have to become more structured. As early as now, I know I want to run the Condura Skyway Marathon in February (yes, the full marathon). This helps me with scheduling my long runs to increase mileage gradually without risking injury, with training to increase my fitness and lactate threshold so I can run faster for longer, and with diet so I can lose fat but keep essential muscle fiber.

So, are you training to make your next big race a great one?

About Noelle De Guzman

Noelle De Guzman is a freelance writer and recreational athlete with over 12 years of experience in fitness and endurance sport. She believes sport and an active healthy lifestyle changes lives.

10 thoughts on “Time to Train

  1. Go Kikay. I have my eyes at Condura too. Never run it since my 21K in 2009. I have been handling a support station for two years. Might run this time.

  2. Go Kikay!! You can do it!

    For me, its really hard to train..

    I really would like to increase my mileage but I cant run now. My schedule is off the charts and I can’t do anything with it.

    I hope I can run a marathon on Condura.. I wish!!

  3. Toffee, we work with the time we have. If schedule really doesn’t permit an increased mileage, then best to train for shorter-distance races. πŸ™‚

  4. Hello. I recently had an injury and stopped running for almost a month now…I just got my TBR dream marathon race kit awhile ago…Runner friends advised me not to run until there is 0% pain in the inner aspect of my left thigh…Hopefully next week I could be able to start with a C25k program…Noelle, is there such thing as a muscle memory?…Because I’m really worried that I will start training from scratch again…that would be a bummer…

  5. Hi Rap. Your current fitness for running depends on how active you remained cardio-wise even when you had to stop running. Muscle memory only refers to the way your body moves (in what sequence the muscles contract). This means you will probably still have the mechanics you used to have when you were running, but endurance will definitely suffer with this long-term break from exercise.

    Best to start training from “scratch” and ramp up intensity/mileage depending on how you feel. Take some time easing back into a regular training routine. After recovering from my injury, I went too much too fast and ended up getting really sick, which set back my training even more.

  6. Noted..So how are you now?Are you fully recovered? Thanks for clarifying things up…Really needed that. I guess I really have to start slow, train smarter while keeping my sane and composure …Thanks again KikayRunner…

  7. Hi Noelle I think I have a problem on this.. “with diet so I can lose fat but keep essential muscle fiber.” haha… Can you help me about that diet… tnx…

  8. Hi! Do you mind if you post or your weekly or monthly training structure or routine? I’m amazed at your PR’s and how fast you’ve progressed since you started running… You’re a monster!:) I’ve been running for a while now and lately I seem to hit a plateau…

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