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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Training Peaks: Fruitcake or Fast-Pace Work?

3 Ways to Motivate Yourself to Train This Winter
December 15, 2017/Andy Blow, Training Peaks


On the whole endurance athletes are a pretty self-motivated bunch. But even endurance athletes are only human, and as a result we suffer from the same fluctuations in “get up and go” as everyone else from time to time. These dips in motivation can range from the nagging desire to skip training for a day or two to full on slumps where you lose your workout mojo altogether for extended periods of time.


And this time of year can be particularly challenging from a “mojo” point of view because, for the most part, the “A” races for the year have disappeared into the rear view mirror but next season is still a good way off over the horizon. There are also dark mornings and evenings with often colder, wetter weather to contend with (for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere at least). At this time of year it’s easier than ever to just skip training altogether.


Don’t get me wrong, I do believe in taking a decent end-of-year break if you’ve had a long, hard season. This is crucial for mental and physical recuperation. But, assuming that your planned downtime is coming to an end sometime in the near future, I thought it might be a good time to offer up a few tips gleaned from more than 20 years of tricking, cajoling and persuading myself to go out and train when frankly I’d much rather have hit the snooze button or spent more time working on the Homer Simpson-esque butt indentations in my sofa instead.... (link to article...)

Outside Online: Pain and Getting Chicked

The Longer the Race, the Stronger We Get 
Meaghen Brown//Outside Online, Apr 11, 2017

 At the outer edges of endurance sports, something interesting is happening: women are beating men. 

Among the world’s most celebrated long-distance footraces, the Ultra Trail du Mont Blanc is known for being particularly brutal.

The 106-mile course through the French, Swiss, and Italian Alps climbs more than 33,000 feet as it loops around its namesake peak. The weather can be savage—heavy rain, frigid nights, hot and humid days. In August 2013, Rory Bosio took off from the start line without grand expectations, having never won a major event. She trailed well behind the leaders for the first six hours. But as the race stretched into the evening and most competitors slowed, ­Bosio held her pace. When the lanky, brown-haired American runner in pink shoes and a blue running skirt crossed the finish line in 22 hours 37 minutes, she’d destroyed the women’s record by two and a half hours. Bosio took seventh place overall, becoming the first woman to crack the top ten at the event and beating dozens of elite pro men...

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Ironguides: The Rep Loves 'Em, You Can Too

The Treadmill As A Training Tool
Coach Vinnie Santana//Ironguides.net, April 12 2017

The treadmill is a tool that is not explored as much as it should be. It has a reputation of being boring compared to running outside. As much as there is a good deal of truth to this, it also offers many benefits that can’t be replicated on the roads for athletes of all levels. Learn more about this excellent training tool...

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Active.com: I Really Love the Treadmill...

21 Things We’re All Thinking On the Treadmill
By Dorothy Beal//Active.com

No single word in a runner’s vocabulary ignites a debate so fierce as “treadmill.” In fact, the treadmill’s origins really can be traced back to torture, with its earliest form used at penitentiaries in the 19th century to reform stubborn convicts. One prison guard described it thusly: “It is the monotonous steadiness, and not its severity, which constitutes its terror.” (We couldn’t agree more.)

 

But while runners have plenty of derogatory terms for the apparatus (“hamster wheel” and “dreadmill,” to name just a few), it’s hard to argue against its usefulness. Whether you can’t get a babysitter or the weather suddenly resembles an Arctic tundra, the treadmill saves you from writing “unplanned rest day” in your running log—and, for that, we are grateful. In any case, our inner dialogue upon approaching the treadmill goes a little something like this...(link)