There is little written about easy running. It is generally referred to as ‘junk mileage’! As an athlete who has always enjoyed and benefited from running slowly, I’ve decided to write in its defence.
I knew instinctively when I was a young teenage runner that a lot of easy running turned me into a fast runner. When I found a book by Ernst Van Aachen advocating that top level performance could be reached through miles and miles of running with the heart rate at only about 60% of max, with small doses of fast running – about 10% of total mileage – I knew I had found the book for me!
I saw how strong and fast winter training made me, lots of easy miles and aerobic short recovery repetitions. Summer training often ensured that my best performances were early season off the back of the winter training and that I slowed down as the season progressed, anaerobic training seeming to poison my system.
Sports scientists argue my point with me, as far as the physiological benefits are concerned it is understood that I would be as well not to go running at all and only carry out the quality workouts – that would mean I hardly ever went running!
I trained for and won the Dublin City Marathon in 1985. In preparation for the event I ran 80 miles a week, often with only one interval session a week, occasionally I would do three when I was feeling fresh. The miles in between were easy – slow even! I ran 2 hours 41 to win the race.
I went on the train for the London Marathon the following year. I ran up to100 miles a week in the weeks leading up to and over Christmas, consisting of all easy running, maybe one interval session on a Saturday. In the 12 weeks leading up to the marathon, I averaged 69 miles per week. During that period, in the weeks I raced, I did no interval training.
I ran 2 hours 36 in the London Marathon – into a headwind!
It could be argued, I am aware, that had I trained faster and harder, I could have recorded a faster time. I believe I would have just been ill! Whenever I tried to handle more intensity, that is what occurred. Maybe I am unusual? Maybe. But I suspect that more people would benefit from ‘backing off’ – paying attention to the quality sessions -and in between running easily. I believe people would find that they got injured and ill less often and therefore experienced greater consistency, which is the key to progression. I do believe that to run fast you need to practise running fast! But not too often, or only as often as you can really manage and that the easy running in between isn’t just about recovering, it has a benefit all of its own.
I believe that the easy miles strengthen the cardiovascular system and the legs, as well as building up the immune system, rather than breaking it down. Training should, after all, be about building the body in readiness for a supreme effort. Too often in my view the best performances are left on the training run. As the yoga philosophy suggests ‘The art of physical progression is through repetition, not aggression’.
The athletes that can do more and can do it harder than everyone else are often held up as role models for the rest of us. They may be able to handle workloads that most of us cannot. Ultimately we are all a ‘study of one’ and our training programmes need to reflect this. If you start with easy running as a base it will be far easier to build a training routine that really suits you, as you see more clearly how your body responds to different workloads.
If we expand this theory to include all sport and exercise programmes, it is my observation that when most people take up a new exercise regimen, join a gym or embark on a new sport, it is quite common that the campaign is short-lived! I believe that one of the main reasons this happens is because generally the exercise is carried out too hard or too fast. Far better to think in the long term – a year ahead perhaps – and to take it easy. Train more slowly, more enjoyably even, which means that you are far more likely to keep doing it, and that the year ahead turns into another and another – until exercising is integral to your life-style and who you are.