(upbeat music with whistling)
- Okay, off the back of run week we receive loads
of great and inquisitive questions from you guys,
so today we though we'd answer a bunch of them.
- Absolutely Mark.
So first off the bat we have a question from Evan Macdougall
who asks my only question as a a triathlete,
is what type of runs should we do for our brick runs?
So firstly, I'd say that brick runs are definitely something
I always like to include because I have the time,
racing professionally had all that time to put in bricks,
and the most obvious brick for me was always to add
30 to 40 minutes easy running off the back
of my longer ride in the week.
- Yeah, and they're brilliant actually.
They kind of hit two things at once.
That back end fatigue, that strength for endurance
off the back of that bike but then also actually
getting us used to the running off the bike
coming out of T2.
That feeling of jelly legs, the mentality as well
that you need so that strength mentally, so yeah.
Great question.
Next one is from Andrew Lingwood and they've said
at the moment I'm aiming for a 16 minute 5K
which is a cracking time.
- [Fraser] Sure is.
- [Mark] They do a long run, hills and sprints, intervals
or tempo, and an easy run per week.
They feel like they should be doing two threshold
or tempo runs per week, is that advisable?
- Firstly we would say you don't need to be doing
two threshold or two tempo or two speeds,
but definitely two type of sessions that incorporate
those type of efforts, right?
- Yeah, that, it all gets a bit confusing because threshold
and tempo tend to be used interchangeably.
They're, you could argue that there was a difference
between the two, but let's assume they're the same thing,
tempo and threshold.
So you want to do one of those per week, not two,
because they're quite a demanding workout for you and put
a lot of stress on the body.
The other session is a speed workout.
So that's focusing on the top end, the threshold is focusing
on bumping that lactate threshold up and probably
a little bit close to something like a half marathon
race pace and then if you have time,
a longer run would be really useful,
but you could argue for a 5K you don't really need to be
running much more than 60 or 70 minutes for your long run.
- Yeah, so good luck with that Andrew and please let us
know if you do manage hit that target,
because that's blooming good running if you ask me.
- Yeah, cracking time.
Well now we had a great question actually
coming in regarding our three weekly run workouts video
and they in short have asked what about hills?
When do we put them in?
And that is a very good question,
we had a few people asking that.
That one came in specifically from Edward Green.
- Yeah, no, we didn't mention hills in that particular
video, even through hills are actually a really useful
type of session, there's so many that you can add in,
but I think personally that you would definitely
add in hills maybe in replacement of a speed type
of workout, and again, I would like to add them a
little bit more early in the season as you're
approaching a target race.
I mean, would you agree?
- Yeah, absolutely.
I actually ten to advise doing a lot of hill workouts
during the off season, as you're coming into the winter.
Great as a strength tool, activating the muscles
and injury prevention.
And then as we start to get closer to race season,
and you're wanting to improve that top end speed,
so you bring that speed session in
that we've already spoken about.
But every so often you might want to just drop that out
in place of a hill session, so yeah.
They are very useful and it's good to just keep that going.
- [Fraser] Yeah, and it takes impact away as well,
doesn't it?
- [Mark] Exactly.
And I know some people that struggle with injuries
actually quite often use it for that reason.
- Next question we've got from Lisapet who is asking
really about foot form, where we have our placement
in regards to our run form really, aren't they?
- [Mark] Yeah. - Because we did a video
talking perfect run technique.
- Yeah, so a lot of people asking about
where our foot lands, whether it's forefoot, mid-foot or
heel strike and it's a very good question,
and actually we kind of, by actually having good technique
in the rest of our body, looking forward,
head at the right angle, good posture,
actually our feet should kind of almost fall into place,
and strike in the right motion.
- Yeah, so hopefully the theory being if you get everything
set right from the top, as in our head, the chain of the
body follows suit, right?
- Yeah, I mean there is a lot of talk about you must
run forefoot or mid-foot, and you should never
heel strike, and I understand the theory behind that
heel striking is almost like a braking force and can
cause injuries, but actually you don't want to try
and dramatically change your own technique.
You actually see a lot of top elite runners actually
running with heel strikes.
So it's not a blanket no go, just try and work on the rest
of your technique.
- I think it made case for a whole new video actually Mark.
- Yes, absolutely.
- Now, moving on to Fin Evans and they ask does anyone
find that as they get tired,
the head starts to lean backwards?
- To answer your question, yes.
(laughs)
I've been there and I've definitely raced some other guys
who really kind of almost turn themselves into like
a big C, they were leaning back so much.
Yeah, they were definitely not looking like they were
having the best of run form.
So, as you say, it can go both ways, right?
- Yeah, I mean I tend to actually almost like lean forward,
but I guess that's almost me trying to make it easier for
myself, like trying to fall forwards.
What I try to do in this sort of instance,
is actually, I have key points I think about,
so I've got this thing called arrow.
So I always think about my knee drive as old coach taught
me that, and that sort of helps
with my posture as I'm running along.
And I try to maintain that, or at least I think I am.
- Yeah, no, that's a really interesting point there.
And I guess the next question after that would be
from Fernando, who asks us what is a long run
for a marathon, in kilometers by the way?
- Yeah, this is quite a good point actually,
'cause, for marathon running, it's actually quite
rare that you would cover the marathon distance
before race day.
I mean, have you?
- [Fraser] No, I never did it before a race, no,
not that far, not quite 42.
- And what would be the peak for you then?
- The most I would have ever done would have been
35, but that was kind of a one off, so personally
I would say no more than 32 kilometers
or 20 miles for those that aren't used to the kilometers.
- Yeah, I'm no so experienced in this department,
so I'm passing on to Fraser.
- Yeah, I mean I guess it's always very subjective.
You've got to be careful with the time on your feet,
because you can start stressing your body too much.
So let's say three hours is a cap, because that's a really
long time to be doing it anyway.
And that type of distance for a long run,
you would hope to be achieving three weeks out from
your target race, and then after that you would start
tapering that off until race day.
Yeah, I mean, I think that's sort of.
- Well, yeah I guess the takeaway point is that you want
to get the physiological benefit,
but you actually don't want to stress
your body so far that actually arriving on race day
falling apart or actually really quite fatigued, so yeah.
Trying to cover the actual marathon distance
isn't totally necessary.
- But it does build a lot of confidence,
knowing that you've run, really quite a long way
before the marathon, which let's be honest,
is a long way.
- Yeah.
Well now moving on, Plumsie28 has picked up on my reference
to running on asphalt or tartan.
They said I've never run on tartan, is that just for
the Scottish viewers?
- Well, I can see why you might think that but--
- I love the vision and the image of Fraser
just gliding across a tartan track.
- I've got to choose my clan tartan.
- But in actual fact, there is actually a running
surface that is used for athletics tracks
that is called tartan.
- Yeah no, on a slightly seedish note,
this refers to the very first manufactures of an all
weather surface running track was a brand called 3M,
and they were very famous for having created
Scotch tape, so this was just a continuation
of that Scottish reference and it stuck ever since.
- I love it.
Well now moving on as Steve Ward has said RE running faster
I would assume running faster depends on the event you are
training for, EG are you running for a marathon
and a full triathlon or are you running a very
different kind of event such as 5K
or an inner sprint triathlon?
- Well Steve, the answer is, in simple terms yes.
Yes.
Running for a marathon or a 5K is a completely
different sort of kettle of fish, isn't it?
- Yeah, absolutely and I do remember Jan Frodeno actually
saying when he switched from Olympic distance triathlons
and draft league IT racing, to Ironman distance,
that yes, he had to back the speed off
in some of his speed sessions.
So say he was doing six by 1K in a speed session,
sub three minute Ks, he then backed off to like, three
minute, ten three minute 15 which is still incredibly fast,
don't get me wrong,
but he's not going quite as insanely fast,
because it's just not necessary.
He's getting that physiological benefit of a speed session,
without the impact and the stress on the body.
But still, a bit of speed there.
- And it's all about being specific to your race
distance isn't it?
- Absolutely, yeah.
So we're not saying cut it, it's just being specific
in your approach to it.
- So our next question from Nathalie
is does a slow run benefit us for going faster?
Yeah, I think it does.
- Yeah.
I mean we do talk a little bit about polarized training,
we've spoken about on the channel before.
And that is all about, this kind of polarized approach
to our training.
Our easy runs are really, really easy
and our hard runs are really, really hard.
And the Brownlees are a prime example of this,
if you go for an easy run with them,
you're literally walking.
It's so slow, but then when they do their hard
runs they are through the roof fast,
so it really does work, but it obviously only works
if you have the time available to do hard runs
as well as easy ones.
- Yeah, and I think that's absolutely key isn't it?
'Cause one thing I always sort of got drummed into me
as a youngster going to running club was
if you're gonna slow all the time,
you'll end up racing slow.
But that's only the case if that's all you do.
So yes, they definitely work, but as long as Mark says
they're in conjunction with quite a bit faster.
Yeah, and we've actually discussed this a little bit
in a video with Heather and myself previously.
By running faster, it is actually enabling us to
tap into these top end speeds and essentially unlocking
this greater speed range within ourselves.
And actually by running fast, it can also help to
improve our efficiency as runners
and we all know that efficiency is what we're striving for
by being more efficient we can run faster.
- Well, the key, as you say Mark to these sessions
is actually hitting those top end speeds.
So in order to do that, and to get the benefit from it,
we're actually gonna break it down into intervals or reps.
One example workout is the minute hard, minute easy session.
As the name suggests, after warming up,
just start to run harder, but not quite flat out for one
minute, followed by an easy minute.
Repeat this four to six times to start with
and then gradually increase the number by
one or two reps each week.
- So our final question we've got here from Craig Orrell
actually is have you ever thought of entering the
human versus horse race as a GTN challenge?
Have we?
- Funny you should ask.
Well it is certainly on the radar,
and essentially the event is that you race against a horse
around the same course and I think the horse
pretty much wins 95 percent of the time.
I think there's only been four runners
in the whole history that have beaten it.
So yes, with Heather's pedigree of horse riding
I think that we are looking at maybe doing that in the near
future, so watch this space.
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