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  • Training plans are intentional progressions to bring athletes to a new level of fitness

    Hi Gale,

    I saw your twitter feed commenting on the difference between exercise and training. Though you referenced another columnist, can you expand on your thoughts some more? I'm a big fan and I've used several of your training plans. I know they work. Now that I'm gaining more experience as an endurance athlete, I'm more interested in understanding why your plans work. Any information you can give to help me learn (without giving away secrets!) is much appreciated.

    Regards,

    C.S.

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    Hi C.S. ~

    First, thank you for letting me know my plans help you succeed!

    In short, my training plans for triathletes, cyclists, mountain bikers and runners are programmed progression. You'll notice I begin all of them with an athlete profile or a stake in the ground of where the athlete's fitness is right now and some bit about presumed athletic history. The next items I list are goals and constraints. Two athletes may want to do the same race, but one only has six hours per week to train and the second one has 10 hours.

    The items in the last paragraph are the foundation for plan design. If you look at any of the plans for base or race training, you will notice there is a progression over the course of the plan. The progression could be any one or a combination of daily volume (the long weekly workout or workouts), daily intensity, weekly volume, weekly intensity and workout frequency. Those are the heavy hitters. Every three or four weeks is a recovery week so you can absorb the training and get stronger.

    In many of the plans, if you look at all the weeks in a single view, you will notice patterns of manipulating training loads. All of these items combined are why the plans work. Very simply, they are planned load progression and recovery.

    Honestly I don't have "secrets" and you can view my general strategies in the plans. I hope this helps.

    If you have a specific question about one of the plans, drop me a note. If your questions are more lengthy and you want to modify one of the plans to meet your personal needs, let me know and we can schedule a consulting session.

    Keep me posted on your success!

    Gale

     

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