After Cori’s birth, my schedule changed dramatically. I was loaded down with embryology, anatomy, genetics, ecology, and inorganic chemistry, and – prior to Cori’s arrival – would often study until midnight. With Cori making studying impossible during the early parts of evenings, I began staying up until 2 or 3 A. M. and yet could still be found at the corner of Elmwood and Sumter at 6:15 each morning, ready to take the bus to downtown Providence and then catch the 7:05 to South Kingstown. My work load increased, my sleep diminished, and my feelings of fatigue advanced steadily, but I assumed I would simply adjust and get through it all.

 

I didn’t. After four months of the new schedule, Cori and my course grades were fine, but I developed a serious inflammatory disorder, from which several weeks of recovery were required. I had forgotten that increases in work load, even when the work is wonderfully fulfilling and meaningful, require corresponding expansions of recovery. Recovery (which in my case was the recuperation produced by sleep) can not be ignored or discarded without a significant cost to health.

 

Many serious runners create an imbalance between training and recovery, and the result can be an unexpected fall-off in performance which is often called staleness. Increases in training volume (mileage or kilometrage) are a principal cause of staleness, because the new, higher amount of work being performed often exceeds the capacity of a runner’s body to recover from the augmented training stress and then adapt physiologically (just as the added challenges of fatherhood wiped me out physically). Each added mile places an additional stress on the body, and yet runners often blithely increase mileage without making corresponding and necessary changes in the ways they are preparing for and recovering from their workouts.

 

One key problem is that runners often advance volume without having the intrinsic running-specific strength to do so successfully (i. e., to do so without causing staleness and/or injury). Runners tend to believe that higher volume would be a good thing from the standpoint of aerobic-capacity expansion and thus pursue greater volume avidly, without taking into account the wear and tear on the muscular and connective-tissue systems which such running produces.

 

That destructive action, the lysis of myofibers and myofibrils in response to the thousands of additional running steps taken each week, has to be counteracted in some way, either by first expanding running-specific strength (prior to the mileage build-up) to protect the muscles or else by enhancing recovery processes in appropriate correspondence with the volume augmentation (actually both steps, upgraded strength and enhanced recovery, are recommended).

 

A firm bottom line is that a runner can’t simply proceed as usual when he/she ramps up mileage. The strength preparation must match the increase in work load, and the recovery processes must be enhanced in order to allow the body to adapt and re-build adequately despite the bruising blows of the longer-duration training.

 

Many different recovery modes can be effective. Certainly, if a runner’s weight has been at a desirable level, he/she can not increase mileage without also stepping up intakes of total calories and carbohydrate. Without adequate calories to fuel the additional miles, internal energy stores will run low. In the absence of copious carbohydrate intake, muscle-glycogen levels will drop, energy and endurance will dip, and overall performances will fall (yes, staleness can occur in this way). When volume expands, taking in more calories and carbs is a key part of recovery.

 

Sleep is an often-overlooked but amazingly effective recovery mode, as I learned after Cori’s birth. Many runners believe that they can advance from 30 to 45 miles per week without any change at all in sleep patterns, but such a strategy is extremely ill-advised. Sleep encompasses a variety of different recovery processes, not the least of which is a night-time surge in the pituitary production of human growth hormone, which in turn repairs bone and muscle tissues while enhancing the breakdown of fat. The relationship has not been carefully worked out in scientific settings, but it is clear that higher mileage creates a demand for more time in the sack, and – yes – even the occasional use of kindergarten-style afternoon naps, if possible – to restore the body and promote adaptation (I should have been napping on the South-Kingstown bus, instead of poring over chem. notes and talking with fellow riders).

 

Enhanced fluid intakes will also be optimal (because higher training volume means more sweat flowing out onto the skin), and it is impossible to over-estimate the value of “down time” – periods during the day when a runner relaxes totally and does something he/she truly enjoys. Such respites are absolutely without parallel for nervous-system recovery. For a runner who likes to read, a period of significant volume expansion represents the one time in his/her career when reading the collected stories of Isaac Babel will be the best thing for enhancing running economy – far better than kicking out extra reps on a steep hill.

 

A key thing to remember is that neural recovery is highly individualized. For one runner, talking with a girl/boy friend might be the best recovery of all, while for another reading or getting a massage would be the right recovery ticket. For yet another athlete, riding horses could be the perfect recovery stimulator.  Fortunately, each runner knows exactly what produces the maximal amount of mental relaxation and comfort (and thus unifies body and mind and increases the tolerance of hard work during subsequent training sessions).

 

It is only natural for an endurance runner to answer a period of staleness with an increase in total work. Most serious endurance runners believe that nothing in running can be attained without hard work, and the upswing in volume is viewed as a way to kick fitness back up again, as a way to reverse the downward fitness slide of staleness. The truth is that more hard work is exactly the wrong way to treat staleness; it may in fact push staleness “over the cliff” into the murky swamp we call the over-trained state.

 

While the human body is sometimes viewed as a kind of machine, the truth is that the body is dissimilar from a piece of machinery: For example, it can not be driven for increasingly long distances each day and yet be ready every morning for intense, hard work. The human body requires food and water, just as a machine needs fuel and oil. However, the body’s motor – the muscular system – is torn apart by extended training, while the engine of a machine remains intact for thousands of hours. The reality is that each longer-distance “drive” in your body needs to be accompanied by enhancements of your most-effective recovery strategies.

 

 

 

(1) Location, location, location: Owen has camps for you in some of the most beautiful and interesting places in the world, including the Snowy Mountains of Australia, Malibu Canyon in California, Track-Town USA (Eugene, Oregon), the Flatirons of Boulder, Colorado, Brigham Young University in Hawaii, the Green Mountains of Vermont, and yes – even little Oscoda County in northern Michigan. As a result, when you attend one of Owen’s camps you’ll get a transforming running week and a great vacation at the same time.

 

(2) Running Form Improvement: Have you ever wondered whether tweaking your running form might decrease your risk of injury, enhance your economy, and/or upgrade your performances? Wonder no more! At camp, Owen will shoot video of you running at different speeds and sit down with you to analyze your form. He will then work with you individually to optimize the four key elements of great running form – cadence, mid-foot strike pattern, posture, and body angle. When you leave camp, you will be a transformed runner, with more-powerful strides, augmented economy, and greater fatigue-resistance.

 

(3) vVO₂max Training: When you come to camp, Owen will measure your vVO₂max and then show you exactly how to put together a training program which sends your vVO₂max through the roof. vVO₂max is a key predictor of running fitness and performance, so your vVO₂max advancement will help you carve significant chunks of time from your 5Ks, 10Ks, half-marathons, and marathons (and any other distances which you run). You will finally achieve those dream running goals which have been so elusive in the past.

 

Bear in mind that these three great features just touch the surface of what actually happens at Owen’s camps. For example, you will also learn an easy-to-carry-out, full progression of running-specific strength training which will shield you from the sharp arrows of staleness and overuse injury. You will make great new running friends and conduct workouts in unforgettable locations, for example Lake Jindabyne in Australia, Spencer’s Butte in Oregon, or the Appalachian Trail in Vermont. And you will enjoy getting to know Owen and appreciate his commitment to you and eagerness to help you, even after camp ends. To be part of an experience which changes your running life in so many positive ways, sign up right here.