Runners' World: Not Just The Cave

The Best Conditioning Exercises You Can Do to Stay Fit in the Off-Season 
Combine alternative cardio workouts with a strategic strength circuit so you’ll be firing on all cylinders when you get back into the swing of full-on training.
Ashley Mateo/Runners' World.com, Dec 17, 2019

You might be logging tons of miles a week during warmer weather, but when the temperature drops and the amount of daylight gets shorter, it’s not as feasible to keep that up.

That doesn’t mean you’re sentenced to a season of running on the treadmill in your basement. The off-season is a great time to build your foundation not just with conditioning exercises, but also with cross-training modalities that will keep you rolling strong right into your peak running season, says Zack Allison, a senior coach with Source Endurance and racer for Team Clif Bar... 

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Runners' World - Better Run For Shade?

How to Handle Running in the Heat
Richard A. Lovett/Runners' World, Jul 26

However many bad-weather-will-make-you-tougher quotes we collect, there’s still one aspect of weather that most of us do our best to dodge: heat. In fact, many of us do everything we can to avoid it: running at dawn or in the late evening or even seeking shelter on treadmills in air-conditioned gyms. It is, however, possible to run in heat.

In the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, Portuguese distance star Maria Fernanda Moreira Ribeiro set an Olympic 10,000-meter record under hot, humid conditions (82 degrees with 60 percent relative humidity, according to historical data from Weather Underground). In the process, she posted a time of 31:01.63—one that 16 years later would still have put her in the top 10 in the much more temperate conditions of the London Olympics. The bottom line is that the human body is remarkably adaptable to heat. Its ability to adapt to high temperatures is faster and more dramatic than its ability to adjust to any other environmental stress that nature can throw at us, such as altitude or cold...

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Outside: How to Save That Third Sock

How to Survive the Most Frigid Winter Runs
Get the formula right and you'll never have to resort to the treadmill again
Alex Hutchinson, Outside/Jan 5 2018


The recent frigid temperatures hovering over the Northeast meant that my New Year’s Eve run was (as I noted on Twitter) a “three-sock run.” I was surprised to discover that quite a few people—even men—couldn’t figure out where the third sock would go. It was a reminder that dressing for winter running is an art born of hard-earned experience. Forget the third sock once and you’ll never forget it again...


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Training Peaks: Beat the Heat

Race Day Strategies to Beat the Heat
Jim Peterman, Training Peaks/August 9, 2017


The dog days of summer are here but so too are some of the best races of the year. Performing well in these races requires both fitness and an ability to withstand the heat.


Heat acclimatization in the weeks prior to an event is the most important step for beating the heat on race day.1 However, in addition to acclimatizing to the heat, there are a number of different strategies that can help you keep cool and improve performance on race day.


When you are exercising, roughly 75 percent of the energy required for muscle contraction is lost as heat. Hot summer days make it difficult for the body to get rid of all this heat. As a result, your body temperature begins to increase which can lead to dizziness, headaches, nausea, and even brain damage.


As you might guess, all of these symptoms can affect performance. Therefore, the key to maximizing performance in the summer (and what the strategies listed below attempt to achieve) is to limit the increase in body temperature...


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Active.com: Rule #1: Qualify

The Golden Rules of the Boston Marathon
Megan Harrington/Active.com

It’s that time of year again; the temperature is rising, flowers are blooming and thousands of runners are gearing up to run the Boston marathon. With a rich history and a famous course, it’s on many runners’ bucket lists. But to run a smart race, preparation is key. If you’ve been lucky enough to earn a spot in this year’s race (or someday hope to qualify) this is for you...

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