the deeper the root, the taller the tree

Time and time again you hear athletes complaining..... but I want to do speedwork, and lots of it! I want to get faster!!!! Hold on there buckaroo because there is a lot of foundation you need to lay down before you go building a skyscraper. More often than not when I see athletes do seemingly nothing but hard speed work I see either injury or stagnation.

Last night I completed the last hill bounding workout of 2009 (I think). I now run the exact same hill...... exact same distance...... thirteen seconds faster than I did when I began this set in May. I have not done much tempo work and certainly no focused "speed work." I have spent hours and hours and weeks and weeks...... and weeks...... in aerobically focused training. Very boring at times but I know, as we all know that this is the stuff that the later stuff is built on. I begin actual speed work next week.

So what happened? I am more efficient. I am more aerobically fit and in a sport that's..... aerobic that's a great thing.

As I use myself as an example here..... please note that the numbers are not scientific. They are just pulled form the air.... I don't know if the improvements would have been these exact numbers........

Let's say we took that hill repeat that I did in May.... the 1:26 and we began speed work then. The fastest I may have been able to run that hill would have been 1:13....... which is what I did yesterday. That would have been top end speed. Again that number is just random, would it have been that? Who knows. The point I am trying to make is this:

Now we are beginning speedwork at the 1:13 instead of that being my top end speed. We worked in the aerobic, base, endurance phase long enough, and gave it enough time that my bottom end endurance got deeper. If that magic number of improvement was 13 seconds.... then when all was said and done I might be able to break a minute.

The numbers again are not important. The theme is what is important. Without base, without a foundation, you won't have a strong top end. That means..... get out your iPod, tape your favorite movies, there will be a lot of time spent in aerobic heart rates for a long period of time.

In the moments you get frustrated about it, remember what you are doing. You are laying a strong bombproof foundation. Think of a tree..... if it is a tall tree without a deep root it will blow over at the first wind. The tree with the deepest root will be the tree that withstands the storm.

The athlete who does endless amounts of intensity is the athlete who might be down to burning their last match. Those are not the athletes that are around for long. They are the athletes with the strange pains, the fractures, the muscle pulls. The athletes who have a rock solid endurance base are healthier..... stronger.

So as the winter months are a'coming, get ready. With your coach or with yourself plan out a good progression of base work, it will be boring. You will work on technique, you will work on efficiency.

Give yourself things to aim for such as.... within four weeks I will naturally run with a cadence of 90 in my aerobic zone. Then every run between now and then you count your cadence several times during each and every single run. Those kind of small goals give beginnings and ends to training blocks and give lights at the end of the tunnel to aim for. It's incredibly helpful when training is done before the sun comes up and after the sun goes down, and your bike and your iPod become your new BFF.