The Key to Cross-Country Success

Many of you desire to know “the secret” to becoming a great cross-country runner. The secret is very simple. YOU MUST RUN 6-7 DAYS A WEEK ON A CONSISTENT BASIS. The big question then is how many minutes/miles should you run per week? That depends on many factors: 1. What is your training experience? 2. What is your body type? 3. How many miles can you run off road (grass or trails)? 4. What other activities are you involved with (work, volunteer, other physical activities)? 5. How good of a runner do you desire to become?

Whether you are moving up from junior high to high school, going from an underclassman to upperclassman, or from high school to college more will be asked of you in terms of increasing your running volume.

For example, Joe Newton has been coaching for over 50 years and has 26 state championships in Illinois. Coach Newton believes that if his teams want to compete at the state/national level they must run more mileage in the summer. His junior and senior boys are running 80-100 miles a week. Sophomores around 70-80 and freshman are 50-60 if they have a running background. He has very few injuries because they do most of their miles on grass and when they start doing hard workouts in the Fall their bodies are strong because of all the miles. While this is at the extreme end of the mileage spectrum, elite college coaches from Jack Daniels to Joe Vigil to Jack Hazen to Greg McMillan and Scott Simmons all stress high mileage consistency in their approaches to training their athletes.

After attending multiple distance running clinics, reading numerous books, watching videos, and obtaining and studying many high school and college training schedules, I have come to the conclusion that the top programs in the country all have different ways of training in the Fall but every of them have the same basic training in the summer- and that is putting as many miles as possible in the summer without injury.

For many of you 30-40-50 miles a week (300-450 minutes) sounds like a lot of miles/minutes, but if done correctly it is not. For example, most of you will train at 7-10 minute per mile pace. If you run a 9 minute per mile pace and run for an hour a day, 6 days a week that is approximately 7 miles a day and equals roughly 42 miles per week. Keep in mind that you will perform faster paced workouts, long runs, race, two-a-days (for upperclassmen), etcetera, which will only increase your fitness and the number of miles/minutes per week you train. If you are injury prone, supplemental cross training will be added to keep fitness up while limiting the chance of injury.

To further illustrate the time-physical activity connection, take the fact that many kids go to soccer or basketball practice that last for 90 minutes to 2 hours a day so running over 30-40-50 miles a week for many kids should not be an impossible task. Heck, the federal government and NFL have recently partnered to establish the “Let’s Move” initiative that recommends all children 8-18 get an hour of cardiovascular exercise a day to curb the childhood obesity epidemic. Considering none of you are anywhere near obese, running for approximately thirty minutes to an hour a day should be a breeze.

How can I help myself become a better runner?

1. Practice- Consistency is key to success. The number one thing is to get to practice as often as possible. It is much easier to run with a group. You will have bad days and likely go through a phase that you will feel very tired and sore. The worst thing to do is stop training. If you do, when you resume training you will have to go through the tired/sore phase all over again.

2. Have goals- Create and post your goals. Goals will provide a purpose to your training and make you more accountable to yourself and your teammates.

3. Wear a watch- Besides shoes and proper clothes, a watch is the only equipment you need to run. Being prepared for practice is one aspect of learning to be a responsible young adult. You would not come to class without your homework so don’t to come to practice without a watch.

4. Proper nutrition- Good nutrition is crucial.

• General: consistently consume meals that are high in complex carbohydrates and whole grains, lean protein, with ample amounts of fresh fruits and vegetables. Female athletes need to pay particular attention to consuming enough calcium (dairy) and iron (protein). A vitamin will help, but not make up for a poor diet. Basic guidelines can be found on myplate.gov and other articles on the team website. Be sensible, forcing yourself not to eat one cookie will only make you obsess/crave for something you cannot have and in the long run you will likely end up caving and eat an entire package instead of a small dessert. • Post-workout: you need to eat a high carbohydrate snack within 30 minutes of a hard/long workout. This will help refuel the body to be ready for the next day’s workout. Chocolate milk, fruit, peanut butter on toast, granola bars are great post workout options. Healthy options are limitless. • Hydration: pass the urine test. • Pre-race: will discuss at a later date. Everyone’s body is different, what works for one person will fail for another. Experimenting before races is important. 5. Vacation- When you go on vacation you need to get your training done. It is always better to get up an hour earlier and get your run in before you do anything else. If you wait until evening, things often come up that will make you miss your run. One week of missed training will take you three weeks to get back to where you were before you went on vacation. Your cardiovascular, respiratory, and musculoskeletal systems don’t know the difference between a typical Tuesday in July in Troy, Ohio from a vacation on the beach. Don’t let your mind cripple your body- if you don’t use it, you lose it…and quickly. 6. Log your runs- Use Running2Win website. See how to set up an account on Troy City Schools Cross-Country website. Make sure they are logging in their miles. 7. Proper running shoes- A good pair of running shoes can save you a lot of money on doctor bills and time away from training. Go to a running specialty store to make sure their shoe fits your type of foot. Running shoes should be replaced every 400-500 miles and should only be worn to run in. Record mileage on R2W. 8. Preventive maintenance- stretch after practice, sleep 7-9 hours a day, run 75% of your workouts on grass or trails as the pounding of the roads increases injury risk.

I understand you are not going to be excited about running every day. There will be times when you have a bad practice and dread coming back the next day. I still have those days but they are few and far between. Don’t allow yourself to stay home or skip a run. Remind yourself of your goals. Most of your runs are 60 minutes or less. I think you can find one hour a day to get a workout in. No excuses- I hope you find it a priority.

*Read Running Times article Making the Jump and Traits of Successful Runners by Greg McMillan. I have posted the articles on the team website.