Reaching Peak Shape for the Biggest Meet

The biggest meets of the cross country season are the Big South Conference Championship, the NCAA Southeast Regional Championship and the NCAA National Championship. All of these meets occur one weekend after another during the end of October and early November. These races hold the  highest level competition and the the most meaningful races for HPU to perform our best at.

In order for us to be at our peak shape for these races, we build and train hard throughout the season. It is impossible for any runner to run his/her best at every meet of the season. In order to be strong at the end, we have to train through meets that occur during the early and middle parts of the season. When I say "training through" the early season meets, I mean we may be a little sore for a race from a tough workout 2 or 3 days prior to the meet. If we let up and had a whole bunch of easy days leading up to every race, it would take away from how fit we could be at the end of the season when it really matter.

Leading up to the Big South Conference Championship, our team takes the whole week leading up to the race fairly easy. We have easier workouts. Instead of running 10 miles a day, we may only run 7 or 8. We also stop weight training in the gym. This allows our legs to feel fresh and ready to go on race day.

Overcoming Time Off From Injury

As much as distance runners do everything we can to prevent injuries from occurring, sometimes they still happen. I stretch my legs every night, use a foam roller, takes ice path and do injury prevention exercises such as gluteus muscle strengthening to prevent injury. My approach to stay injury free has been a success since I began running 8 years ago with only a couple minor bumps along the way. Unfortunately, this winter track season, I got injured with tendonitis on the top of my foot.
The tendonitis prevented me from running at all for a full 2 months. Tendonitis is the type of injury that if you do not let it heal completely before running again, it will not go away and instead become more painful. Just because I did not run during these past 2 months does not mean I did not work hard to stay in shape. Every day I would bike or swim for a full hour to keep my stamina high. I would also do a 20 minute core workout every other day and workout in the gym twice a week. All of this work helps maintain a high aerobic base and muscles strong allowing for an easier comeback to running when the injury is gone.
I finally started running again this past week. It is always a tough start when you haven't run for a while. I have been running 3 miles per day this past week and plan only slowly working my way back up to 10 miles a day by summertime.

Staying Motivated Every Day (NO Excuses)

As I discussed in my previous blog post, distance running is a year round sport because we compete into the fall for cross country, through the end of the winter for indoor track, and finally, through the early summer of outdoor track season.

The day-to-day motivation to get out the door for a run, workout, or strength training session always changes. Over the past 8 years, I have experienced just about every reason to skip a day of training including, I am too tired, too sore, sick with a sore throat, it's too cold outside, its raining, its snowing, its dark out, its too late, its too early, I'm taking a trip into the city with my friends today, too much homework,  I have a test tomorrow or I ran further than usual yesterday.

These are none of my excuses not to run. During the season, besides an injury, I only take 2-3 days off per month. Any great college or professional distance runner knows, if you have excuses you're not going to be great. Whenever these excuses pop into my mind before a run, I immediately think about my long term goal at stake. I face the fact that every day of running is not going to be perfect. In fact, very few days throughout the year are going to feel perfect for a run. Distance runners do everything we can to make every situation as perfect as we can.