Running Training for Young Runners
Ralph Havens PT IMTC Beyond Limits Physical Therapy
How to train runners, especially young middle school and high school runners….
This applies to anyone looking for improved running and racing but especially the young runners.
As a former 2:28 marathoner an Integrative Physical Therapist for now 39 years I’ve been a student of the sport and running/training/therapy philosophies.
And the key is to not Overcook it. Up here in the pacific northwest we love our salmon and if you cook it just right… or even a little undercooked it’s amazing…
But overcook it a little or even worse overcook it a lot and it’s awful. Dry and Milly….
It’s the same way with a young runner. So what do I mean here?
First it’s good that everyone, the runner, the coach, even the parents know the purpose of the workout, the phase of training one is in, the rest, even the food and lifestyle….
Because then the tenacity of the runner can be useful. Look… most middle school and high school runners want to do well and progress and win… and it’s easy to just go long and hard most days…
But that can over cook it…. And result in injury, lower performances especially end of the season championship racing and staleness and even lead many to drop out of the sport.
There are many who give up the sport or run their best times in middle school or 9th grade instead of getting faster each year.
So here’s our philosophy.
Phases of training:
Phase 1
The purpose here is to build the engine. The heart and lungs and the capillaries as well as strengthen the bones, tendons, ligaments while protecting the joints.
So in phase 1 we emphasize trotting pace. The best runners in the world, the east Africans can run 4:40 or faster for the marathon, 26 miles in a row at 4:40 pace…. Yet they start their runs at 9 and 10 minutes per mile!….
I’ve got story after story of how the east Africans do this.
Why?
Because the purpose of the work out is to recover, to build the heart and lungs while gently building the strength in the body… Running fast or hard at this phase or for easy runs in the other phases is counterproductive. My middle school son’s easy run pace is 7 to 8 minutes per mile based on his VDOT (more on that later) so he starts his easy runs at 9 or 10 minutes a mile.. works up to 8 minutes a mile then finishes the easy runs at 7 to 7”30 pace.
The purpose of this progression is to keep everything easy while training the mind and body to always run the 2nd half of the racer faster. This is how he always closes each race at a much faster pace than the overall race pace. He practices it each run…even the easy runs.
We also add Mile race pace 100 meter striders 6 to 9 two times a week. The purpose is to get speed through the backdoor without stressing the body.
Phase 2
We add in one day a week mile speed paced 150m’s and 200 meter striders and each stride is progressing starting slower than the end pace. We have plenty of rest between each rep and we do 6 to 9 of them (more on these numbers later).
The purpose here is to get the speed systems working but not stressing the body.
We can add in a race or time trial mile ever couple weeks. The purpose here is to get VO2 work in and start to transition to the phase 3 training where the big work is done.
Phase 3
We add in a tempo training day. The pace you can run a full hour race in is your tempo. Usually between 10k and half marathon pace. For a 5 minute miler tempo is 6 minute pace. When I was running under 4:30 for the mile tempo was around 5:30 pace. Let me know and I can guide you to your tempo pace.
And tempo workouts are something like 3 x 1 mile at tempo with a minute rest. The purpose here is to get the lactate threshold systems working to improve the ability to run just under lactate threshold. Increasing this is a big key to racing middle distance.
So it’s not easy but it’s not that hard. You’re running a pace you can run for a full hour race but only running 6 minutes at a time. The purpose is to get the heart ramping up, the body dumping lactate and then the heart ramping down and repeating it a few times. It’s working the heart to race!
Phase 4 is the racing phase.
Here we’ve already put the hay in the barn. The work is done. There’s not much you can do to get faster but there’s a lot you can do to ruin your race.
The right rest is important now more than ever.
This phase we keep the tempo but decrease the reps to about 60% of regular training. So 3 x a mile becomes 2 x a mile and 1 minute rest becomes 2 minutes rest.
Runners in this phase are chomping at the bit and getting this part right … the runner sees big PR’s. Overworking in this phase and the runner is flat and running about the same or a little slower than usual.
During all of these phases the other days are easy days. Trotting days. Think 9 to 10 minutes/mile start and then gentle working down to easy pace (VDOT pacing).
And very important to take days off. One or two days off for any athlete even the elites is important. If you don’t rest you breakdown and the hard work is for knot.
Another key is other sports.
If the athlete is also a soccer player which is very common in middle and high school what do you do?
What I recommend is if the athlete has a hard soccer game or practice we substitute it for one of the tempo or repletion mile race pace workouts.
You can’t just stack hard running and hard soccer on top of each other. You will breakdown if you do this.
If instead you treat soccer as another hard workout you can keep it to 2 a week hard days.
Now one thing I will touch on here and reach out to me for more on this. If the athlete needs to run and work hard because he/she has anxiety or depression and they only feel good if they work hard every day I recommend healing from the root causes of the anxiety and depression.
The body needs to rest to progress and get faster. Working hard more than twice a week is recipe for injuries and leaving the sport all together. If anxiety is present reach out to me for specific healing processes.
This can help race situations too which can bring up a lot of anxiety and fears. It’s a natural thing and we do have a solution for it.
One last thing I will touch on here and again reach out for more info.
You don’t want to put bad gas and oil into your race car…right!
So think of nutrition and sleep as very important parts of your training.
The will to win is nothing without the will to eat right and sleep and rest.
We like 100% gluten free, peanut free, almond free and processed sugar free. Email me for details and I can share more about this. It is very important.
Ok! Let’s get runners running healthy happy and free!
Run Runners!
Ralph Havens PT IMTC
Beyond Limits Physical Therapy
1134 -10 street
Bellingham, (Fairhaven) WA 98225
360.599.2217
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