I've had a way too long lay-off from running. It took a long time to recover from an achilles injury, but some recent easy runs tell me that my achilles is no longer an excuse. So what are the challenges to overcome to get back to running?
- Age. It's real, it's measurable, it's progressive. It lowers peak performance levels of course. It makes recovery times longer, so that limits total training workload.
- Weight. I think it's the biggest obstacle I face.
- Flexibility and range of motion. I've lost a lot of both! These are essential to running fast and running efficiently.
- Strength. It would be good to improve my core and upper body strength at the same time I'm working on flexibility and range of motion.
- Doing the training work. I actually like doing the running. The challenge is doing the volume of work required. I'm a natural at just racking up some time and distance during a base-building phase, but I haven't done any higher intensity work in a long time. After rebuilding my base I need to plan some interval/repeat work and hill work. And speed work improves efficiency - efficiency is essential to running long. I think I can do that myself, but a smart runner would find a coach ...
- I like to remind other people that training stress leads to improvement, and greater training stress leads to greater improvement - all good, right up until you get hurt. I need to not injure myself!
I've got some shoes, my old running watch, some comfortable cold-weather running clothes. I've got a challenging race on the calendar just over four months from now.
Gotta run!
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