19 Replies to “The Off Season and Base Training – Don’t Lose Touch With All of Your Speed”

  1. hehe. I’m totally in the “base building” phase right now…and I guess its all slow right now too, but not by choice 😛 . It’s definitely important not to do all your runs at the same slow pace when you’re fully healthy though!! I like to still have two “workout” days a week when I’m “base building”…except that instead of track sessions, they’re tempos and fartleks. I also probably SHOULD do more of my LR’s at a relaxed pace but I have a lot of trouble restraining myself so more often than not they end up as progression runs haha.

    • haha…power to us forced into ‘base phase’!! haha…although u’re one step ahead of me and at least running. (bad pun…i kno) but even on the elliptical i’m getting the cardio and intervals. 🙂

  2. Great post!! What’s weird is that here there IS no off season! Cross country is still going on and will do until track season begins! Aaaand that leads right through the summer back into XC again! Its tough to find time to fit in base training when you’ve got races year round! I’m going to have a proper look though at my race schedule for this year and find some time to recharge and work on my base! 🙂

    • glad u like the post! ya, cross and track are back to back but sometimes coaches/teams sort of train thru the really early meets. u’re doing AWESOME on the racing girl…keep it up, but avoid tree! 😛

  3. When I think of base building, I think of injuries and summer and winter. When I’m coming back from injury, I focus on slow, easy runs for a while before bringing anything fast in! When I’m in the offseason and injured, I do like to throw in some simple fartleks and tempos and strides every now and then. I can’t wait to be able to do them again!!

    • here’s to a base building season for u that DOESN’T include injuries….mmmmk!! they do exist, i promise, and u will soon find out. 🙂

  4. i use daily mile to track my miles. so easy. and love the cake and icing picture, right now i’m in the cake baking stage. doing a lot of long slow runs that include pick ups that go something like “i think i pick it up enough to chick this dude that won’t let me pass him and is bothering me” or “lets see how long it takes me to get to that light post”. you know, real official training methods.

    • isn’t the idea of icing and cake making all this so much awesome?! 🙂 okay, and the fact u commented with ‘chicking’ totally made my night!

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  6. Ahh, reading this makes me feel even better about all that winter training advice I gave my athletes – not only building their mileage but also including some hills, tempo runs, and strides. It’s always good to have reassurance that you are saying the right things. 🙂

    Personally I ALWAYS keep track of my weekly mileage. Actually pretty obsessive with doing so. Right now I write it down in my weekly planner and then usually eventually transfer it to an Excel file where I have the past few years stored.

    • haha…i think there’s a little OCD in all of us. 😉 and sounds like u and i are on the same page as far as base building…good luck to ur team, i can’t wait to see/hear how they do come race season!

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