This past weekend I raced in the End of the Trail half marathon. This race is in my backyard; literally started 3 miles from my house. I enjoy coming out to this race because of the positive locals all pushing themselves and spreading the “I CAN” mindset. This was an exciting year though, as they changed the course to a more scenic and runner friendly route. Also, they placed the start and finish line right in the heart of historic downtown Visalia. Kudos to The Visalia Runners Club who puts on this race to raise money for local high school cross-country teams. Thank you to all of the supporters and volunteers who donate their time and help out this great race. And a big congrats to my good friend and training partner, Joshua Hickey, who was the official race director of this event. He truly put on a terrific and organized event.
Going into this race, my training has been consistent. Consistency is one of my strongest
traits; I clock in and do the work.
I do not look for day-to-day gains per se; I understand that this is a
process and each training block helps build the fitness I need to achieve my
goals.
There have been slight
modifications to my training plan thus far in 2016.
1.
Mindfulness practice. I would say this has been the most vital to my performance
gains over the past 12 weeks.
Notice I said the word “practice” because that is what this is. I’m not sure one can master
mindfulness. Because once you
“master” mindfulness, you start over. (Think about that one for a second) Daily practice is needed to truly
maximize this super power. Here
are a few strategies:
a.
breathing practice: take 3-5 minutes to take
some deep abdominal belly breaths. Do this before work or before you walk into
the house.
b.
quiet/meditation time: you can do this after
your breathing practice or by itself but this is you gently silencing your
thoughts and calming your mind; start with 2-4 minutes and build to 8-10. Try your best to be still. Yoga can be a great practice for both
breathing and meditation. (Make
sure to go at your own individual level)
c.
laser focus on specific tasks: this can be done
anytime, anywhere. Plain and
simple, be in the present moment.
When you are with someone, focus on them and their words. When you are doing dishes, focus on
that moment without anxiety. When
you are exercising, focus on your movements and breathing. When you are driving, focus on
driving. Slow down a bit and be mindful
about your day and watch the positive results that follow.
d.
focused exercise: “focused” is the key word
here. When you exercise, listen to
your body. Control your breathing,
even when your heart rate is rising.
Move well and controlled.
This mindfulness strategy has major physiological benefits as well.
2.
Higher quality nutrition. My nutrition is usually pretty healthy
and supportive to my goals. But I
wanted to rearrange a bit. Starting
in late January, I began the revamp by decreasing my carbohydrate intake and
increasing my healthy fat intake.
My goals were to improve upon my overall nutrition, fill my body with
more nutrient dense foods and become more efficient at burning fat during
training. I think I was getting
very dependant on carbohydrates.
Last year, I had some days where I was eating over 600 grams of
carbohydrates. As the majority of
these carbohydrates are needed due to 1-4 hours per day of training, I had to
reevaluate my overall state of nutrition and the impact this high consumption
of carbs would have later in my life.
So what I did was flip my carb intake to approximately 20-25% of my
daily calorie needs and fat intake to 40-55%. Protein would be at about 20-25%. I followed this protocol for 5 solid weeks. One day per week during this 5-week
period, I would splurge and eat heavier carbohydrates to “refill” my tank after
a strenuous week of working and training.
My main carbohydrates are vegetables, fruits, beans and grains like
pasta, oatmeal, brown rice, whole grain breads and can’t forget the tortilla
chips! See below for a couple of
my macronutrient breakdowns of various days in February. I was pretty aggressive with lowering my carbohydrate intake to see how my body would respond. If I had higher intensity training planned, I would increase my intake leading up to the workout and post-workout.
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| This is a low carb/high fat day. If training was moderate, this worked out well. |
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| This is a higher intensity training day, so I added carbohydrates to prepare for the workout and replenish post-workout. |
After this 5-week period, I have
increased my carbohydrate intake back to approximately 250-400 grams (30-40%), depending on the day. This has
aided in my glycogen replenishment, which is key for recovery and for the higher
intensity training I am doing. (And since I
was leading into a half marathon, I needed a fully functional source of
glycogen ready to be utilized.) I
also feel due to the healthy fat increase in my diet that I have been able to
burn fat more efficiently during workouts. How do I feel this you ask? I have recognized the decrease of my need for food during
longer training sessions. I have
also saw that my recovery has improved (due to the flood of nutrients) within
each workout and I am able to absorb the training stress more rapidly. As an endurance athlete, it’s
imperative to be as efficient as possible at oxidizing fat for energy. If carbohydrates are your dependency, you
risk erratic insulin behavior, high inflammation in your diet, gut issues when
training and unhealthy patterns as you age. Yes, even endurance athletes who train a lot can surface unhealthy issues! I also dramatically increased my
cruciferous vegetable intake.
Kale, spinach, brussel sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower and red leaf
lettuce as become staples in my daily intake. These foods, no matter the fitness goals you have, should be
consumed regularly for their nutrient dense properties. I increased my healthy fats like
coconut and olive oil, walnuts, salmon, raw nut butters, almonds, avocados and
olives. These foods are
anti-inflammatory and promote post-workout recovery and improve
circulation. So what I was doing
through this process was ingesting a higher amount of vitamins and nutrients to
decrease inflammation and assist my body rebuild and recover after training,
which equals improved performance; also increasing my fat intake would help
boost my recovery outside training and I would become more efficient at burning
fat during training, which also improves performance. This combined with my training points below has assisted in
my early season performance.
3.
Training points. I am a believer in quality over quantity in my program. And the past 12 weeks have been no
different. Something that I have
changed from years past is my longer phase of power and strength work in the
gym. In past years, I hit the strength
workouts post-Thanksgiving up until mid-January, about 6 weeks. This year I have continued hitting the
strength workouts longer into the beginning of the season (I am now on about
week 12). This added strength and
power have been noticed in my swim, bike and run training and it’s been a great
way to build my athletic foundation for the upcoming year. Also, I have followed an unorthodox
endurance training method by keeping volume (training mileage) low to moderate but very
intense. So my workouts are
shorter in duration but higher in intensity. Of course not every workout follows this protocol as I
always add in lower to medium intensity training to help with the adaptation of
the harder training sessions. But to give you an example, in the past 12 weeks, I have only ran over 10 miles three times. I
will begin to add volume into my training as I move closer to my “A” race,
which is in July. This added
strength, power and speed from my early season training plan will be firing on
all cylinders come May and June and as I peak for my race in July.
A little about my race…
I had a good warm up that consisted of a 10-minute easy jog,
dynamic stretches and some 30-60 second race pace pick ups. This charged my system and prepared it
for the day ahead. The warm up is
critical to any athlete/runner looking to succeed.
My goal was to be around 6:10 minute per mile for the first
few miles, then settle around 6:20 for the middle miles and descend to as fast
as I can withstand towards the end.
Here were my mile splits: 6:13, 6:17, 6:15, 6:18, 6:20, 6:21, 6:22, 6:16, 6:22, 6:20, 6:17, 5:51. Consistency was the name of the game. I went out aggressive but controlled, settled down and found my rhythm and finished with a bang! It’s exactly how I train. Any runner at any level can use this same philosophy.
During the race, I found myself being mindful of my
breathing, talking myself into “staying relaxed” and keeping form and staying
positive in my thoughts. I guess
you can say I was in the “zone”.
I finished with a time of 1 hour 22 minutes, 3rd place overall and 1st in my 35-39 age group. This also
gives me confidence as I embark on a new triathlon season, hoping to get as
close as I can to the 4 hour 30 minute mark for the Vineman half Ironman in
July. (Last year I went 4:45)
If you have any questions with anything I discussed, please
send me a private message through Facebook and I will get back to you in a
timely manner.
Peace.
Justin
