Coach Jay coaches athletes at RunnersCoach.com and blogs at CoachJayJohnson.com. And don’t forget, if you have training question for Coach Jay, ask it here!

Hi Coach Jay!
I’m a high school runner getting ready to start winter base mileage for outdoor track (I don’t do indoor). I’m coming off an okay cross season and I would really like to keep improving for track. I’d like to know what kind of volume would be appropriate for my base given that I want to continue improving in college and beyond. I’d like to do well in track, but I would also like to not run too much while I’m still in high school so I become the best runner I can be later. I’m wondering about how long my weekly long runs should top out at as well as if you think it would be better to do three runs in the double digits each week versus a couple days with two runs per day. Any thoughts?

Here’s a brief synopsis of my training background and race times:

6-8th grade: minimal training, and for only about 3 months of the year

9th grade: began running year-round, about 25 mpw max, longest run 9 mi; 17:31 5K cross, 10:02 3200

10th grade: 40 mpw at the most, longest 10 mi, 17:09 cross, 4:40 1600

11th grade: 50 mpw at the most, longest 11 mi, 16:43 cross, 9:36 3200

12th grade: 65 mpw max, but many at 60 even, longest run 13 mi; 16:09 5K cross

Thanks in advance for any expertise you share!

-Will

Will -
This a great question and I appreciate the detailed information regarding your progression as a runner. I have a couple of ideas regarding your volume this winter, but first I want to discuss a psychological aspect of training.

Some runners love to train. It’s in their DNA to go out and enjoy a long run, even if it’s cold and icy and windy. I’ll illustrate this with an example. There are two young men—one running for a school in the Big 12 and one for a school in the Big 10. Both of these young men ran were very successful in high school and both will be running at the Division 1 Championships this coming Monday. The summer between their sophomore and junior years of high school, I meet these young men at my summer running camp. One was running 80-90 miles a week; the other was running roughly 40 miles a week. When I asked the young man running the 80+ miles a week why he did it he said, “I like running and besides playing frisbee golf, it’s what I want to be doing.” Both of these young men can pursue running post-collegiately, yet as 16-year-olds, one ran twice as much as the other; that young man has not burned out and is a quite a runner. Will, you know better than I how much you enjoy training; personally, the 80-85 miles a week in single runs I ran in college was my limit…and at that mileage it was hard to get motivated for three more five mile runs to break the 100 mile barrier. I’m going to assume that you like to train, yet I want you to be honest about the fact that you have four months (December through February) before you’ll be at track practice and that one of the goals of your winter training is to gain fitness WITHOUT depleting the psychological reservoir that you’ll need to train AND race come track season. Don’t go out and run 70+ mile weeks because you think you have to because you can; you will PR this spring off of your 60 miles week if you’re injury-free, running smart threshold runs and fartleks and simply enjoying your training. There are no magic mileage numbers, but there is a marriage between our individual disposition to training and good, hard training that fits your body.

Back the specifics of your volume. There is no doubt you should run some weeks over 70 miles—with long runs of 15 miles—for the simple fact that you’ll gain confidence doing training that you’ve never done before. The other obvious advantage is that most runners who make an appropriate and sound mileage jump during the off-season reap the rewards during the season. However, keep the intensity low during those weeks; maybe some gentle fartek, but don’t worry about getting a threshold run in the first week you bump up your mileage. You need to do strides 2-3 times a week and you should do them during these big mileage weeks, yet the ice in Missiouri can be nasty so go to a gym or even a parking garage and if you can only run 50m-80m at a time that’s fine.

Following the 70 mile week, I’d go back and do two weeks of your fall XC mileage; add the threshold run back in and consider doing a progression run for your long run. Divide your 13 mile run into 4 miles easier than normal long run pace, 4 miles at normal pace then 4 miles slightly faster than your fall long runs, with a 1 mile cool down. The long run is arguably the best day to gain fitness and since you want to run in college this is a great way to improve your aerobic fitness for the long term. You don’t need to do a progression run each week for your long run, especially if you’re a little tired on a given week.

Finally, I would take one week a month this winter and just run 50-55 miles; keep the first 4-5 days of this week VERY EASY, then do a timed threshold run or a timed 6-8 mile run; don’t turn this into a race—you should be able to say, “I could have run 1-2 more miles at that pace, but then it would have felt like a race.” The reason I like the low mileage week with one long, hard workout is that it’s a test to see if you’re over training; if the timed run or threshold run goes poorly then you should take another low week before you tackle the 70+ mile week.

Finally, you’re progression the past three years is tremendous. You no doubt have a good feel subconsciously for the upcoming months of training, so don’t over think this. Good luck Will.

Jay

Hi,
Recently in races I have really been struggling with nerves and it is badly affecting my performance. My training is going well and my coach can’t understand why I can’t do better in races since every target he sets for me I can match. During training runs I just turn up and do them and do some really good workouts, but as soon as racing comes along, the week before I get really worried about doing badly, and lots of negative thoughts enter my head. Its really frustrating because I know I can do it but it just holds me back when it matters.

I was just wondering when you get nervous how you use it in a posititve way to improve your performance. Thanks for any help.

Yours sincerely,
Oliver

Oliver -
Thank you for your candid email. More runners than you would imagine suffer from the same problem. I do not claim to have all of the answers, but I’ll give you some things to think about that I know have worked for others.

The first thing to consider is the power of self-talk. The narrative that goes on inside our heads is extremely powerful, yet it’s hard to filter, especially if there is a pattern of good training followed by poor racing. To combat this I would suggest that you first be mindful of these thoughts. Mindfulness is different than doing. My guess is that when you first have a negative thought about your racing that you quickly “react to it” - you quickly move to some other thought, maybe “Not this time” or “Great, here it goes again.” The point is that it’s really hard to be mindful of your thoughts, but once you are mindful of your thoughts, you don’t necessarily need to squash the negative thoughts immediately; let them hang out in your head for a second and see what happens. When I was in HS my negative thoughts were always the same two things: “Am I prepared to beat this person?” and “If I get beat, how will people view me?”. The answer to the second question was easy, if I had calmly thought about it: “No one cares if I race poorly.” And while the answer to the first wasn’t ideal (I only ran 30 miles a week at the time), if I would have been mindful of my thinking I would have realized there wasn’t anything, especially standing on the starting line, beneficial from thinking those two thoughts. Obviously there are tons and tons of books on this stuff, but to be honest, I think that you likely know what self talk you need to stop. You will need to give your self time to learn the skill of quieting those thoughts - it won’t happen overnight, but with some practice you can get better at that skill.

The other element that you need to be mindful of at the start of a race is your breathing. Once you’ve warmed up you should do your best to keep your breathing controlled. Most humans shorten their breath when nervous and for a distance runner this is a huge potential problem. If you start the race with your oxygen transport system askew you will no doubt run poorly as the key to distance running is using oxygen efficiently. How important is breathing? Well, I’ve witnessed my college coach—arguably the best cross country coach to ever coach in the collegiate realm—give a short tutorial about paying attention to your breathing in the final days before the national cross country championships. If he values breathing, then you should too.

Finally, don’t hesitate to work with a counseling psychologist if you can afford to do so. They will help you figure out the specifics with your self-talk and give you tools to change it. Obviously it would be nice if this person is or was an athlete, yet don’t dismiss the potential benefit of working with a trained counseling psychologist who is not familiar with running—they’re familiar with the human mind and once you can control you self-talk then you’ll likely race faster.

Take care Oliver and thanks for your candid email.

Jay

*Coach Jay’s advice is provided as general training information. Use at your own risk. Always consult with your own heath care provider for questions relating to your specific training and nutrition.