ATC 199: What You Need This Offseason, Pros and Cons of A Coach, ‘Less is More’ for Injury Prevention

December 18, 2015

• Announcements:
• Ragnar SoCal signups! Join us April 1-2, 2016, for an epic adventure of a lifetime. Email: events@enduranceplanet.com.
  LOL: Bro science takes on altitude training masks, watch here.
  Teaser: Upcoming podcast on hydration, sweat rate, sweat sodium loss with Precision Hydration.

• Offseason talk:
• Lucho and Tawnee give their take on the article “The Myth of winter base training for cyclists“
• What do you need this offseason? Depends on experience, what was your season like, and what are next season goals? So, figure out your needs.
• You have the same weekly volume available, but just drop intensity to base/junk miles? That usually wont get you anywhere.
• What about mitochondrial density? There are other ways to get results than low-intensity training.
• “In a well-trained endurance athlete more volume at low intensity will no longer result in greater mitochondrial density (they’ve already adapted to the intensity level required)1 (Dudley, 1982). To get faster they need to stimulate mitochondrial development with higher intensity efforts.2 (Burgomaster, 2005) Very long training sessions are still necessary, but more from an experiential standpoint than a physiological one.”
• Amend: “going slow makes you slow” to: “going too low HR/recovery zone too often won’t make you faster.” Slowing down to work on base at MAF is fine and will get you faster (until you reach the plateau).
• Be ok with losing a little fitness to avoid OTS!
• How do you know when to go from the base period to the build period? Or, when can you graduate from total MAF training to adding more intensity?

• On coaching:
• Hire a coach for 2016? Be self-coached? Or get online training plans?
• How effective is online/remote coaching?
• Thoughts on a remote coach who can’t always see you in person, and how today’s technology makes that easier.
• Advice for athletes who are on a budget and can’t afford coaching services but still want to succeed at longer distance events?

• Books for the self-coached athlete:
• Joe Friel’s Training Bible books
• Training and Racing with a Power Meter (Allen & Coggan)
• Your Best Triathlon (Friel)
• The Big Book of Endurance Training and Racing (Maffetone)
• The Endurance Handbook (Maffetone)

• Female runner “case study”:
• On making a marathon comeback post-injury
• “I know I know…. Let your race choose you. But I have a bone to pick here. Ran a 3:02 on the course (Portland marathon) in 2013. Ran another 3:02 in 2014 in Vancouver. Missed Boston 2015 with tibial stress fracture. Currently back to building base 65-80 miles a week (easy pace of 7:30-8:05) with one tempo per week (think 5-8 miles 6:40-6:50 pace). My own training history shows me that too much intensity (400s, 800s, mile repeats) leads to injury. I’m 10 months out from planning to finally break 3. A recent maf test has my heart rate 150ish pace around 7:40. Wondering about looking at building a plan around more goal pace training instead of intensity and working more leg turnover with fartlek work. Goal marathon pace would be 6:45. Which I know I can do. It’s strategizing how to get there by building slowly consistently and injury free.”

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