Friday, September 16, 2011

8 miles with strides and hill plyometrics

8 miles, no HR monitor and no watch. 6 X 10"-20" downhill strides followed by uphill plyometrics (which I've talked about before on here). The strides are a slick way to do speed work with out messing up your base work and I did these downhill in order to lessen the effort even more. The goal is not to push or hurt during these but rather to increase leg speed to well beyond your norm for just a brief period (I was hitting maybe 5:00 pace on these) and teach your muscles to fire in a more economical pattern. Once you can achieve greater economy then you move forward with less effort. These also have an effect on all efforts of running, even MAF type work where efficiency in the movement is a significant component. And you might notice how the first one or two feel wonky... and then they flow much easier after that once your muscles start to coordinate better. And one key point: more is not better and longer is not better. Once you introduce fatigue in to the mix then you are not achieving the same effect and you're changing the session away from neuromuscular economy. Watch an elite runner float along with perfect efficiency in movement, that is coordination. A cyclist will get the same effect with 'spin-ups' or high cadence drill work.
 The view from the top...
Denver under the sea

Starr Peak and the Powerline climb to the top. Seeing this today, in conjunction with the next picture, makes me realize I might not have too may more chances to run hike this before it's buried in snow  

A dusting of new snow above Nederland

3 comments:

David said...

You are such an awesome picture-taker. I especially like the third one, because you are probably less than a quarter mile from my nano-cabin. Hopefully the karma rubs off if/when I come back next summer! But not the rashes. In fact, I hope the rashes do not rub off.

Any plans for interim races before PBro (my attempt at abbreviating Leadman)? Hope things are awesome Tim!

Lucho said...

Thanks Dave! If (?) you come back next summer? What could possibly be better than Ned?
I'm racing a marathon this winter.

David said...

A marathon!? AWESOME. I first picked up on the blog when you were doing insane workouts for Chicago.

With next summer, it is all job-dependent. Which could lead to....awkwardly dramatic pause.....DC. Ugh. Though hopefully CO, my number 1 choice should make their decision really soon.