Taking part in any endurance event requires a certain level of commitment; the disappointment if it all falls apart on race day can be extreme, so how do you make sure that you arrive on race day ready and able to maximise your performance? Choose the right race for you We could spend a long time talking about physiology and how certain people are better disposed to certain distances or types of races. The reality is that most average runners will do just as well at one race or another with the right training provided they are motivated enough to train adequately and consistently for the ..read more

Whether we have bought, downloaded or created your plan, It can be really easy at the start of your plan to feel confident, motivated and energised by the sessions. However, a few off days and we can start to doubt the efficacy of the plan we are following.  So how do you know if your training plan is effective? The simple solution is to test it; you can do this by entering interim races, or by certain other markers of fitness. Good plans will include some regular testing every 4-6 weeks (although they might not call it a test to avoid stressing you out). How do I test? The best way ..read more

When training for a long event I have found the most difficult and daunting element is the fear that I won’t be able to go the whole distance. For all other types of races I have done I have always run all or nearly all of the distance on at least one or two of my long runs, but when it comes to distances marathon and ultra distances this isn’t always possible. So how long should your longest run be? First of all, you don’t need to run the full distance of your target run in one training session; you will have weeks where you run near (or in some cases above) the distance and it is the accumu ..read more

At this time of year I am prescribing a period of base training for a lot of my athletes and I realised that when I first started training I had no idea what base training was.  So what is base training? It’s a cycle of training of at lest 8 weeks which focuses mainly on endurance training, in short this means almost exclusively easy running at a conversational pace with little or no speed. The focus is on extending the longer endurance runs and creating training volume (ie miles/hours training). For many athletes this can be a really difficult period in their training as they like to go ..read more

A question that people often want to improve is how to get faster at cycling up hills. This is often because they can’t keep up on hills during rides with friends, in training groups or in events or races. There are two main reasons why you might not be as fast as you would like to be when riding up hills but the reason you can’t keep up or have to slow down on hills is probably not due to how fast you are on hills but how much energy you have used before getting to the hill. Improving your overall cycling fitness and managing your energy effectively alongside improving your fitness for cyclin ..read more

Many of us question how much training we need to do to meet our goals. It is an interesting question, as is how much training is too much? I thought I would take some time to write down my thoughts and experience on the subject in the hope that it will help you towards your goals. You should first focus how much training you can sustain now and then build up from there. The optimum amount of training at any time is a bit more than you are comfortable with but not enough to be overwhelming physically or mentally. Unfortunately, there is no absolute amount of training that you need to do, if som ..read more

Whether you regularly run ultra marathons or you have just finished your first ever you are likely to feel really tired. You might also be thinking about how long it will take to feel somewhere near normal again, or simply wondering when you might be ready to train again. So how long does it take tor recover from an ultra marathon? A good rule of thumb is to allow 1 day for every ten miles run (17km), or if it was a particularly mountainous adventure with lots of climb, 1 day for every 6 miles run (10km). However, there are a number of factors involved in recovery which can mean that it not o ..read more

I’ve always liked to sleep…but I’ve not always been able to get a good night’s sleep. I seem to naturally be a night time worrier and a night owl, so will often not prioritise bed time over…well anything really. Then once I’m in bed I can lie awake for hours putting the world to rights. With the hotter summer months upon us and (hopefully) racing due to start before too long, I thought it would be a good time to have a think about sleep and how important it is for performance in endurance sports. So how much sleep do endurance athletes need? A general rule of thumb is between 7 and 9 hours pe ..read more