2019 Jerusalem Marathon

If you are training properly for a marathon or a half marathon, you are, by definition, pushing your body hard. Your body is a precision machine that, like a car, must be properly fueled in order to obtain optimal performance. The role of proper nutrition in your program is no less important to your success on race day than your actual training program. In this article, I will attempt to provide a brief overview of what you should be doing to stay properly fueled and hydrated.

Although running is undeniably great for your general health, cardiovascular system, energy level, proper weight maintenance and multiple other health benefits, it does tend to tighten the muscles and render them inflexible.  This is easily correctable which a proper stretching routine. 

Stretching will help you maintain flexibility, enhance blood-flow, flush lactic acid out of your system and prevent soreness.  I recommend doing the following stretching routine after your run.  Stretching before you run (as opposed to warming up) does not provide much benefit and can even be harmful as cold muscle are shorter and are therefore more susceptible to tearing. 

Please note that the optimal duration of a stretch is 15-20 seconds.  Never bounce into a stretch, but rather ease into it slowly.  Finally, the phrase “no pain, no gain” is absolutely incorrect in stretching.  Stretch to the point where you feel tension but not actual pain.  As you do these exercises regularly, you will see your flexibility increase. 

The entire routine  should take no longer than eight minutes and will pay huge dividends.

(Stretches and pictures Runners World: Thomas McDonald)

“10-K” is athlete lingo for a 10-kilometer walk/run. Ten kilometers equals 10,000 meters or 6.2 miles, which translates to  25 times around a high school track.   A 10 Km is long enough to be a challenge but not overly daunting like a half marathon..

The Jerusalem 10 km is an amazing event that draw folks who enjoy exercising, challenging themselves, and meeting people. But the biggest appeal of this race is the party atmosphere. There are snacks and drinks, plus T-shirts, awards, and goody bags stuffed with gifts and coupons.

While some walkers and runners compete for first-place honors, most sign up for the fun of it. Medals are handed out just for participating, not only for being the fastest.
Once you decide to register for a 10 Km, you’ll reap plenty of benefits well before the race day.

Committing to a 10 km can be powerfully motivating because you’ll naturally want to do well. And with the 12 week training program presented in this article, you can definitely enhance your performance.

Setting a goal — namely, to complete a 10 km renews your sense of excitement about weight loss and fitness.

Increasing the intensity of your workouts in preparation for race day builds your speed, boosts your strength and endurance, and maximizes weight loss.
Concentrating on technique and training rewards you with a sense of pride, mastery, and accomplishment, all of which give you the confidence to try something new and succeed.

Of course, you mustn’t overlook the most important benefit of entering a 10 km: Having Fun.  You get to spend time in the great outdoors. You meet scores of like-minded people who share your interest in health and fitness.

Go for the Goal

You don’t have to look very far to find an event in the near future to inspire you. The Jerusalem 10 km takes place on March 9, 2018. And the best part is that many of your friends and neighbors will be training for and participating in this same event.

Note: Anyone with heart disease, diabetes, cancer, or other chronic health conditions should consult a doctor before starting a training program.

Priming Your Body

What may come as a surprise to many people, is that virtually anyone who can walk, can, with a little committment, learn to run. The first thing you need to do is assess your current ability to walk a 5-K. As a benchmark, you should be able to walk briskly — fast enough to work up a light sweat, but not so fast that you’re gasping for breath — for at least 25 minutes. You need to be at this level in order to begin training. If you’re not, you need to work up to it.

Remember to spend a few minutes stretching after every warm-up and cool-down. Choose exercises that target your calf and thigh muscles.

If you miss a session here and there, simply pick up where you left off. If you miss a week or more of training, you may have to back-track a week to resume working out at a comfortable level.

Never do speed workouts on consecutive days or on “easy” days, even if you’re feeling great. Doing too much too soon or too fast puts you at risk for soreness and injury, and often you don’t know that you’re overdoing it until it’s too late. Remember, you are your only training competitor, and your best time is the one that gets you to the finish line safely and comfortably.

Finally, let your body rule your routine. If you’re extremely sore or tired the day after a workout, cut back. Walk only as fast as you can without feeling any kind of muscle or joint pain. If you experience dizziness, chest pain, or sharp pain anywhere in your body, stop your workout and see your doctor.

The single biggest training mistake that people make is their belief that the harder they train, the better they will get. Well, my friends, you are hereby placed on notice that the Law of Diminishing Returns is not just an economic principle. It is also true in the realm of exercise physiology. As a result of this erroneous pereception, many runners go out and run as hard as they can every time they hit the road and entirely ignore their bodies in the process. Inevitably, such runners wind up becoming overtrained, fatigued and ultimately, injured.

In addition to the physical ravages of overtraining, there are also pyschological pitfalls. If you know that every workout is going to be a gut busting, lung searing experience that leaves you totally spent, your brain which naturally register a certain subconscious resistance to doing them, since the brain is programmed to avoid pain. You may be able to override the brain’s reluctance to work hard for awhile but eventually the brain has all kinds of clever tricks to beat you into submission such as side stitches, sprained ankles, stomach issues, dizziness and a whole host of other running related “ailments” that may be nothing more than psychosomatic symptoms generated by a brain that desperately wants you to back off. Therefore, it is crucial that some of your running be easy and enjoyable and not invariably associated with pain and hard work. 

Furthermore, supremely hard efforts during workouts must be made very sparingly. For example, the world’s top marathoners will not run more than two marathons per year. At first glance, this seems strange since these guys run up to 300 km per week, which means that they average a marathon distance worth of running every day. Why should it be a big deal for them to run, say, one marathon per month?

The answer is that the maximal effort that racing a marathon at one’s optimal pace entails is too draining on even a professional athlete (whose body is used to incredible strain) to be done more than twice per year. Our goal is to peak for the Jerusalem Marathon on March 9th and not to waste our best efforts on our training runs. That does not mean, of course, that training should be a walk in the park.

I strongly disagree with the theory that long runs are merely time accumulated on your feet and that pace is almost irrelevant on these long runs. That may be true if your objective is merely to finish the marathon. But if you want to run the marathon well, you have to train according to how you ultimately hope to race, while again reserving those rare supreme efforts for race days. 

All of this sounds wonderful in theory but how do you implement this in practical terms? The answer is by doing proper warm ups and cool downs and by doing recovery runs at the appropriate pace. 

Warming up is critical for three principle reasons:

One major objective is thermonuclear regulation: In order to exercise efficiently, you need to raise your core body temperature.

Another is cardiovascular: As the heart shifts from a resting rate to the vastly increased effort necessitated by running, this increased effort should be made gradually to avoid shocking the heart. By the way, this is one of the reasons why you usually feel much better after 15 minutes of running than you do after 2 minutes. The heart has already adjusted to the new demands and has reached what physiologists refer to as a “steady state”.

The final reason why warming up is important is muscular: Cold muscles are short, tense and easily strained. The bio mechanical principles involved in running, specifically with respect to muscle contraction in the legs, are incredibly complex. Tearing off like a bat out of hell at the start of a run is a recipe for a hamstring, groin or calf strain. So, how long should you warm up? It really depends on how old you are and on your body type.

Some older runners need up to a half hour to warm up while others need no more than 5 minutes. Because everyone has limited time to invest in their training, I recommend the following rule of thumb. Start out very slowly and continue to run slowly for a full 10 minutes before doing anything harder than a moderate effort. If you are going to be doing fast intervals, you need to be warmer so a 15 minute warm-up is preferable and you should slowly pick up the pace in the last three minutes of the warm-up to give your body a subtle hint of what lies ahead.

Recovery runs and cooling down work on the same principle.

Endurance running causes microscopic tissue damage and minuscule muscle tears. This is no big deal and the body’s natural metabolic processes easily heal these impacts. However, since if you are marathon training, you are going to be doing the same thing to your body again tomorrow, you need to help the body accelerate the healing. The way to do this is by increasing blood flow.

Enhanced blood flow is facilitated by movement. Therefore, contrary to popular belief, you will recover best from long runs not by lying comatose on the couch with a box of Pringles but rather by doing an easy recovery run.

How slow and how far should recovery runs be? This is also quite subjective. If I had to give it a specific number, I would say that your recovery pace should be 45 seconds to 1 minute slower than one’s normal moderate training pace and be somewhere between 8-12 kilometers. However, there are a few caveats here:

It is not true that the slower you run, the more you will recover. At some point, the unnatural bio-mechanical process of running so much slower will throw your stride off and actually tax your muscles more, which is precisely the opposite of what we are trying to achieve. Therefore, you should run at the slowest pace at which your body can find a rhythm.

For most people, this is between 45-60 seconds slower per kilometer than their normal, moderate training pace. However, if you are dogging it every time out there, you would slow down less on recovery runs or risk an unnatural stride. With respect to the distance of recovery runs, they can sometimes be effective with as little as 5-6 km, depending on what you are recovering from.

The best part of a recovery run is that theoretically, you should know immediately if you have done it correctly. If you have done it properly, you should feel less sore and more invigorated than you did when you started, which is certainly not the intense exhaustion you would feel after an interval session.

Ok, I’ll be the first to admit that the title of this article can be off-putting for some of you. Who needs to improve, you ask? You run for health, for serenity, for the scenery….whatever. The last thing you want to do is spoil the one simple experience in your life by becoming fixated on the clock.

Fair enough, and yes, I hear you loud and clear. But if, like most people, you have a competitive spirit lurking somewhere beneath that mild-mannered exterior or if you need an inspiring goal to get you out the door when Modern Family and a jumbo size bag of Ruffles beckons, read on.

Most chronic running mistakes come in two forms. The gung-ho crowd, raised on mantras such as “no pain-no gain” train too hard. They try to run faster every time they lace up. The inevitable result is burnout, fatigue and injury.

Some runners make the opposite mistake. They run the same course at the same pace every time out. Usually, this is done at a slow, comfortable pace. Sure, it’s good exercise, but from a training perspective, this is known as junk mileage.

Rarely do the too-fast or too-slow runners realize that their training is off the mark. Both are running the way they feel, just the way they have always been told. Without some scientific guidelines, neither type of runner is likely to improve. Therefore, ask yourself the following question: At what pace or paces should I be training to maximize my fitness and my running performances?

If you can answer this question, you have the key to a successful training program.

Exercise physiologists and coaches generally agree that there are three ways to improve running performance: You can increase your maximum oxygen uptake (max VO2), which measures the greatest volume of oxygen that can be dispatched to your muscles during exercise; you can extend the point at which your muscle efficiency falls off significantly (your lactate threshold or LT); and you can improve your endurance or running economy (RE).

It follows that the most effective training takes direct aim at one or more of these three factors. Training that isn’t specific (e.g. jogging around town) will still produce results, but you’ll get a lot less bang for your buck. Here’s how to train smarter:

Max VO2 Pace

Your maximum oxygen uptake is the greatest amount of oxygen that your muscles can use while you’re exercising as hard as you can. It is not just the amount of oxygen that your heart and lungs can provide. As you train, your leg muscles become more efficient at burning the available oxygen. This is specificity of training, which helps explain why a fantastic swimmer might not run very fast and a great runner might not swim very well. Both have great cardiovascular systems, but an athlete has to train the muscles specific to a particular event.

Your max VO2 pace is not the same as your all-out sprint speed. It’s a pace that you could hold for an 11 minute race. Obviously, if you chose to sprint for just 30 seconds, you could run much faster than max VO2. Faster isn’t better, however. The best pace for improving your max VO2 is your max VO2 pace. Running a daily 11 minute race time trial would quickly lead to chronic fatigue. Except when racing, you should not try to run continually for more than 5 minutes at your VO2 max pace.

So how do you calculate your max VO2 pace? The only way to get a truly accurate reading is to be tested in a sports lab. Since most of us do not have access to one, I will give you the following formula. For faster runners (45 minute 10k and below), your VO2 max is approximately 15 seconds per kilometer faster than your 10k race pace. Thus, if you are a 45 minute 10k’er (a 4:30 /km race pace), your VO2 max would be very close to 4:15 /km. Slower runners need to subtract slightly more time from their race pace to get their VO2 max pace. Thus, a 50 minute 10k’er would subtract 20 seconds from his 5:00/km race pace for a VO2 max of 4:40 while a 60 minute 10k’er would subtract even more time (30 seconds) from his 6:00/km race pace for a VO2 max of 5:30.

When training for an upcoming competition, it is useful to run a max VO2 workout once per week. A good workout would be 800 meters, 3 to 6 repeats, at your max VO2 pace or 400 meters 8-12 repeats at the same pace. Jog 2-3 minutes between repeats to recover. The idea behind this kind of interval training is that you can safely go up to or beyond your maximum capacity of 11 minutes of max VO2 running because the recovery jogging gives you regular rests. Adaptation without exhaustion is the foundation of all training programs. I cannot emphasize this strongly enough. There is no reason for a distance runner to regularly run intervals faster than max VO2 pace. Leave that intense speedwork to the sprinters. Running too fast will lead to fatigue and breakdown. Running with controlled speed (max VO2 pace), on the other hand, will vastly improve your performance potential.

Lactate Threshold (TEMPO Run)

No matter what your distance, the higher your lactate threshold, the faster you can go before your muscles stage a full-fledged rebellion. Elite runners with relatively low max VO2 levels were able to perform at a world-class level because their lactate thresholds were so high, that they could run marathons at 85% of their max VO2’s while other elite runners could only maintain levels of 75-80%.

So how do you improve your lactate threshold? By running at your lactate threshold (LT) pace, of course! This corresponds closely with 85% of your max VO2 pace. Thus, for example a 45 minute 10k’er (a 4:30 /km race pace), with a VO2 max of 4:15 /km would have an LT pace of 4:45 . Half marathon and marathon training should include a weekly LT workout of 5-10 km at LT pace. A good way to do this would be to warm up for 2 km, run at LT pace for 5-10 km, then warm down for 2k. You can also do LT running in the idle of a long run when training for a half or full marathon.

Recovery Runs

The great thing about max VO2 and LT workouts is that they are very focused. You know exactly how fast and how far to run. Not so with recovery runs. Too many runners who head out the door for easy runs wind up running too fast. As a result, they don’t get the necessary recovery after their harder training days. The secret to easy running is to find the slowest pace that will still provide all the generalized aerobic benefits you want. If you run too slowly, you get almost no training effect, and your workout time is essentially wasted. So the big question becomes, how slowly can you run and still be training?

Research indicates that the dividing line is at about 65% of your max VO2 pace. Many find this pace ridiculously slow but it is good to know that when you are exhausted and simply don’t have the strength to run hard, that you can run much slower and still make deposits into your training account.

Nothing defines the long distance runner more than the weekly long run. A long run is technically defined as any run of half marathon distance or more, less than this is considered medium long. The long run is the bread and butter of a marathoner and it is incredibly rewarding when it goes well and it can also be devastating when you crash and burn. Therefore, I am going to explain how and why we do long runs.

First of all, why do we do it?

The answers are both physiological and psychological.
 
1) Glycogen Depletion: The primary form of fuel used by the body when running a marathon is glycogen, a form of carbohydrate stored in the liver. Most people can store only about 2000 calories worth of glycogen and that is only enough for about 25-32 kilometers depending on your weight and metabolic rate. When you hear the expression “hitting the wall” that is simply a colorful way of saying that one became glycogen depleted and lacked the fuel to continue.

As you all know, however, the marathon is 42.2 kilometers, not 25 or 30 km, so the question is, where do you get the rest of the energy you will need. The answer is from fat. Everyone, even the most emaciated runner, has abundant fat stores in his body.

The problem is that the body is not very good at using fat for energy because it requires more oxygen to metabolize fat. Therefore, less oxygen is available to the muscles. What long runs do in this regard is twofold.

First, they train your body to store more glycogen than the average person which means you push the wall further away.

Second, they teach your body to metabolize fats more efficiently. Even if you run 15 kilometers every day, you will not get the same physiological adaptations that are necessary for the unique requirements of the marathon unless you run long.

You can also replenish your glycogen stores mid-run with calorie based snacks such as gels and energy replacement drinks but you need to experiment with what your stomach can handle since everyone is different in this regard.
 
2) Psychology: Everyone who has been training for a marathon regularly can easily run 10 or 15 km at a pace that is comfortable to that runner. You may be exhausted by the end of that run but you will likely recover within 36 hours because your excellent fitness level means that you have not pushed your body to its limit. But herein, my friends, lies the rub.

Marathoning is an extreme sport and I assure you that you will be pushing your body to the limits during the race (it’s actually a lot more fun than it sounds.). By running long, you simulate what your body will go through in the marathon. If your legs feel dead at kilometer 37 or your hamstrings tighten and your general exhaustion makes you want to do anything but run another step, it helps to know that you have been there before and that you can shorten your stride, stretch a bit and tough it out.

The psychological component of marathoning cannot be overestimated. The long runs will build your mind as much as your body. I am a big believer in doing a lot of long runs because aside from the physiological adaptations these runs provide, they make you mentally tough. The goal is to leave as little uncharted territory as possible on race day. Naturally,of course, this has to be balanced against training too hard and risking injury.
 
OK, now you know WHY we do it. But HOW do we do it properly?

During base training, pace is not important at all. There is plenty of time to sharpen our pacing once you have the endurance under your belt. I suggest the following progression for long runs during base training. Start out SLOW. For the first five kilometers take it very easy, allowing your body warm up properly. Once you are warm, you can quicken the pace  by about 15 or 20 seconds per kilometer but make sure that you settle into a comfortable rythm and are not pushing too hard. 

You should be able to carry on a conversation during this stage of the run.  If you can’t you are running too fast.  Unless you are training for a hilly marathon,  forget about your pace completely on a steep hill. Just shorten your stride, pump your arms and survive the hill. Resist the temptation to walk, however, because pyschologically, walking will kill the run for you.  Over the final quarter of the run, although you may be exhausted, try to actually quicken the pace to about 10% slower than goal marathon pace. Once your run is concluded, do a five minute warmdown consisting either of slow jogging or brisk walking.  Stretch very gently but never to the point of pain.

 It is very important to eat a large meal of complex carbohydrates on the night before a long morning run to ensure that your glycogen stores are topped out. Although pasta is the traditional favorite, rice, potatoes, high grain cereal and bagels will do just fine also.

Drink a lot throughout the previous day to ensure that you are well-hydrated. If you can stomach ice tea or sports drink early in the morning and some crackers or rice cakes, you will be better off having some calories in your system to replace the ones you burned overnight. Make sure that there are drinks along the course. Water is OK, but flavored water or ice tea or non-acidic juice is better as it provides calories and hence, glycogen.

Some people like to eat raisins on the run. If this works for you, terrific. Make sure that you drink at least 1.5 liters during the run, more if it warm and/or humid. Your thirst mechanism does not keep up with the actual process of dehydration and therefore, if you suddenly feel very thirsty, you are probably already dehydrated and the rest of your run will suffer.

A final word of encouragement. Don’t be discouraged if you are exhausted during or after the run. I have always found the early season long runs the most difficult. Paradoxically, even though your long runs will get progressively longer, they will actually get easier and you will ultimately agree that there is nothing that feels as sweet as a good long run. 

Course selection is important.  Long runs are precious and the body cannot tolerate too many of them so you will definitely want to treat each one with the proper respect and maximize the experience.  The specificity of training principle also dictates that you train on a similar type of course as your goal marathon. 

For example, if your goal marathon is on a flat course, there is no reason for you to train on a hilly course.  Personally, I prefer point to point  courses over out and back courses because it is much more fun and motivating to actually get somewhere. Still, sometimes time restrictions will force you to finish your long runs at the same place you start them so you will just have to make the best of it.

Eat a high carb meal within 1-2 hours after the run because you will be severely glycogen depleted and the body absorbs glycogen very efficiently within 2 hours after a long run.

There are three main problems that runners encounter when racing:

1. They start out too fast.
2. They lose concentration and their pace drifts.
3. They tire in the late stages of a race.

In order to address these problems, try doing a progression workout.  This workout is one in which you will run between 10-12 kilometers, with each kilometer 3-5 seconds faster than the previous kilometer.  Obviously, you will need a GPS watch or you will need to run with somebody who has one, in order to to do this workout precisely.

Your first kilometer should be run at 40 seconds slower than goal marathon pace.  Do your 2nd kilometer 3-5 seconds faster than your first kilometer but no faster.  Do the 3rd kilometer 3-5 seconds faster than the 2nd and continue this pattern for 10-12 kilometers.  (the total workout time tonight is 54 minutes so calculate how many km’s you can do in this time). 

Here are the rules:  You cannot make things too easy on yourself by starting at an artificially slow pace so that the progressively faster kilometers are still not that hard by the end. You should be running at fast 10k pace or slightly below by the end.

You also must be very disciplined.  For example, if you do Kilometer 2 at a 5:06 pace and kilometer 3 at a 4:49 pace, you will have to run Kilometer 4 at 4:45 and kilometer 5 at 4:40 and by kilometer 12, when you are doing a 3:45/km you will be gasping for air at best or keeling over at worst.  The goals are to: 1) start out intelligently 2) Run progressively but gradually faster in a highly disciplined fashion and 3) run faster when you are are beginning to get tired towards the late stages of the run.

If you miss your goal on a particular kilometer, you should continue running the next kilometer as if you had reached your goal for that kilometer (i.e 6-10 seconds faster than two kilometers ago).

This workout is focused and fun and you will feel great if you succeed in doing it correctly.