Finding Balance in a Runner's Training Program

Question

Answer

To give you a basic idea, let's say that the athlete was running four days a week; they would have three days a week built in for recovery and four days a week for training.  That being the case, within the training, they would probably have two sessions based on time and two sessions based on intensity.  That would be the balance point.  In terms of the distance factor, I would increase the longest workout every second week, not every week.  That is primarily an issue of adaptation.  Far too many programs have you increasing your longest run weekly, which I think is problematic in terms of the body’s ability to adapt to the demands.  So I think that those basic issues in terms of structure are important.  The athlete would also have a couple of days a week for strength training.  Since they are a small volume of work and since they are there to foster and promote adaptation and recovery, those days could effectively be done on recovery days because we are looking at a workout or a session that is really maybe 20 minutes long as opposed to the traditional view of going in and strength training for an hour and 15 minutes or something like that.