We are doing a different format of podcast today. You may be used to the standard 1 topic podcast where Jason and I chat in depth about 1 topic but today we are asking YOU to bring your questions & we answer them. We talk about a variety of topics. We ask the audience on IG what questions they have and we answer in a podcast forum allowing for a greater discussion of the question than on an IG story. We love to help runners achieve their goals and grow a better understanding for the sport.

1- Mental Strategies for marathon day: How to break up the race?

Struggle with the bigness of marathon race day and by mile 19-20 I hit the wall

When we do most of our training runs it’s usually first thing in the morning with a clear mind. We are done around 19-21 miles. It can be hard on race day to go that extra 5-6 miles when you have never gone that far mentally. Many runners find that they ‘check out’. Things that can help you stay mentally tough and get that extra edge

1- Doing a puzzle or hard game before a run

2- Running in the afternoon for some runs

3- Doing difficult tasks or running in adverse conditions

4- doing something very hard before a run where you are mentally checked out

2- I think I have a stress fracture: How do you know and how long should you take off?

This person suspected they had a stress fracture. What should you do if you think you have one?

Warning signs?

Looking into what caused it to avoid it in the future: nutrition, etc.

Taking the recommended time off 6-8 weeks usually- sometimes more

Starting back with run/walks or alter G treadmill

Always do every other day running

Be careful

3-I struggle to get under 10 min pace miles. How much faster can I conceivably get?

It depends on what you are hoping to accomplish. If you want to run a 5k under 10 min pace, I would start by adding in speed and tempo work. Start small and grow to 20% of weekly mileage at that pace. Looking at weekly mileage. Looking at nutrition and strength. The little tweaks go a long way. Go slow with changes.

Training specifically to the event you hope to run. Even some sub 4 hour marathoners don’t run under 10 min pace outside of races or hard workouts

4- How can we keep efforts easy with the hot temps and humidity?

For easy runs in the heat, it can be a challenge because everything feels HARD. Your HR may also be elevated. It actually takes 6+ weeks to heat acclimate. Some of the best things you can do is to train at the coldest times of day. Go shaded. Stay hydrated. Go early before it’s hot. Stay consistent. Understand that adaptations take time.

Go off effort. Maybe slow down 30-60 seconds per mile. Even on some easy runs you may feel it’s just a lot harder. Staying hydrated is key!

5- Is it okay to include workouts into my long run keeping 20% hard and 80% easy?

It is fun when you get to a place where you can start to add in workouts into your long run. The 80/20 rule we usually talk about is in regard to weekly mileage. We don’t want more than 20% of total weekly mileage to exceed an easy pace. This means if you are training for a marathon running 40 miles a week, only 10 of that should be a ‘hard workout’. When you break this down into 2 days it could be a weekday workout like 4x1 mile then during your longer runs you have 6 more miles of pace work you could do. The 6 miles of pace work might look like 2 x 3 mile @ marathon pace within a 13-14 mile long run.

We typically don’t want to add in pace work into long runs unless the athlete has gone this distance several times before.