Intro to Summer Training

Hello Lassiter Cross Country,

It's time for the real work of the summer to begin.  We had good numbers for our optional workouts at the end of the school year.  It is very important to have everyone out over the summer who can possibly make it.  Also, make sure you are all registered for Flotrack and are logging your miles there.  You can't get credit for your mileage if you don't log it on Flotrack.  Here are a few thoughts about which summer plan to follow.

I've created 3 categories for summer training.  The Advanced category is for returning cross country runners who ran track.  If you follow this plan, you will log somewhere between 450-600 miles over the next 10 weeks depending on your pace.  Only follow this plan if you ran both seasons in the past year.  The Level II plan is meant for returning cross country runners who did not run track in the spring.  This will end up totaling around 350-450 miles.  If anyone who is new to the school or a rising 9th grader feels they are up to this, please email me and we can help make an educated decision on what is best.  The rising 9th grade plan is obviously for our rising 9th graders.  This should get you to the 300 mile goal for the summer.  I will probably make a "Never Run Before" category as well.

Remember, we are going to hand out t-shirts for athletes who log 300, 400, 500, and 600 miles over the summer.  Also, while we are encouraging summer running, always remember the biggest rule of training, IT IS ALWAYS BETTER TO UNDER TRAIN THAN TO OVER TRAIN.  You don't want to do something you aren't ready for, get injured, and end up having a frustrating season. Doing any of these plans will put us way better off than we were last year.

Make sure to do the strength workouts!  They are absolutely essential to your health and speed as a runner.  The purpose of our strength program is to keep you healthy enough to handle the amount of running we will be asking you to do.  If you skip warm up, stretching, and strength work, you will get injured.

A quick note about pace.  The runs in the first 4 weeks tend to say Easy or Long next to them.  While we aren't focusing on speed and certainly don't want to over do things, there is a difference between easy and slow.  The easiest way to find your easy running pace without buying a heart rate monitor is to count steps per breath.  Easy pace is 3/3.  Breathing is should be 3 steps, breathing out should be 3 steps.  If you need to breath more often, you are going too fast.  If you don't need to breath that often or could easily breath through your nose with your mouth closed, you are going too slow.  Find that 3/3 rhythm and you will get in shape very quickly.  Long runs can be done a little slower but you still want to be getting something out of your run.  Simply wogging (walk/jog) around the neighborhood won't do anything for you in terms of fitness.
We have 23 weeks until the Region Championship Meet.  While that seems a long way off, it is exactly the amount of time sports science says it takes to build an aerobic peak.  Don't get in the habbit of making excuses.  Putting off the start of your summer training until after your beach trip, or waiting until camp will put us way behind where we need to be.  I'll see you all next Tuesday at 9:00 at the track.

Go Trojans!

Coach Freed