Hey everyone! Welcome to Week 4 of Training for the Trails! How is everyone's training going so far? Honestly, mine has been both good and bad.
I feel stronger than I have in a long time, now that I've incorporated more of Coach Tim's strength training exericises in my routine, and my ankles feel like they could keep going forever, but I've been having a lot of trouble with my breathing. I find myself getting wheezy and not able to catch my breath. I brought this up with my MD last week and she suggested it could be allergies from being in the woods more often (I'm allergic to birch trees and dogs) or some exercise-induced asthma. She wants me to keep training, but slow down if the breathing gets too bad just in case it is asthma. She doesn't want me to have a full-blown attack without having medicine handy. This is really frustrating, but I'm going to get officially tested next week and will hopefully have an answer - yay!
But, until then, it was business as usual with Coach Tim this week.
We decided to meet at the local high school track. I got there early to warm up and do some strength training. I did one warm-up lap around the track and as I finished I was met by approximately 40 high-school football players charging the field for practice. Woops!
So, I moved myself to the bleechers and got to work there. I did some of the step-back adductor exercises suggested by Coach Tim during our first meeting, squats with my 10# medicine ball, four sets of sprints up and down the stairs, push-ups on the bleechers, calf raises with the medicine ball and also tricep dips using the stairs. I did three sets of this set. Boy can I really feel it today!!
When Coach Tim arrived, we moved back to the track with the football players. It was slightly awkward, but not too bad. We did four sets of 600m runs (with a few stops to walk due to my breathing issues) followed by some agility work.
Agility work is very important for trail running, according to Coach Tim. When you're road running, the obsticles you encounter are few and far between (except for maybe roadkill - ew!!). But, that is not the case with trail running. You're always dodging rocks and roots or moving from side to side to find the best path to take. So, working on agility is going to be a big help when preparing for trail races.
When our runs were done, Coach Tim took off to "go get the ladder". I had no idea what to expect and totally throught that he'd come back with one of those big metal house ladders! Haha! Boy was I wrong! This agility ladder is super-cool! It folds up nicely and can be taken anywhere.
Now, describing some of the drills we did would be rather confusing, so I've tracked down a YouTube video of a personal trainer going over ladder drills - he breaks them down slowly, which is very helpful! While looking for this video, I found one that was more representative of what we did this week, but the woman in the video was rather scantily clad and the comments below were not exactly PG. Haha!
Try out some of these agility drills for yourself. You don't really even need a fancy ladder - try making your own by just laying out sticks from your yard or rope you have laying around in the basement.
Hope to see you on September 6th! Don't forget - you can make a donation to CFPA anytime!
I feel stronger than I have in a long time, now that I've incorporated more of Coach Tim's strength training exericises in my routine, and my ankles feel like they could keep going forever, but I've been having a lot of trouble with my breathing. I find myself getting wheezy and not able to catch my breath. I brought this up with my MD last week and she suggested it could be allergies from being in the woods more often (I'm allergic to birch trees and dogs) or some exercise-induced asthma. She wants me to keep training, but slow down if the breathing gets too bad just in case it is asthma. She doesn't want me to have a full-blown attack without having medicine handy. This is really frustrating, but I'm going to get officially tested next week and will hopefully have an answer - yay!
But, until then, it was business as usual with Coach Tim this week.
We decided to meet at the local high school track. I got there early to warm up and do some strength training. I did one warm-up lap around the track and as I finished I was met by approximately 40 high-school football players charging the field for practice. Woops!
So, I moved myself to the bleechers and got to work there. I did some of the step-back adductor exercises suggested by Coach Tim during our first meeting, squats with my 10# medicine ball, four sets of sprints up and down the stairs, push-ups on the bleechers, calf raises with the medicine ball and also tricep dips using the stairs. I did three sets of this set. Boy can I really feel it today!!
When Coach Tim arrived, we moved back to the track with the football players. It was slightly awkward, but not too bad. We did four sets of 600m runs (with a few stops to walk due to my breathing issues) followed by some agility work.
Agility work is very important for trail running, according to Coach Tim. When you're road running, the obsticles you encounter are few and far between (except for maybe roadkill - ew!!). But, that is not the case with trail running. You're always dodging rocks and roots or moving from side to side to find the best path to take. So, working on agility is going to be a big help when preparing for trail races.
When our runs were done, Coach Tim took off to "go get the ladder". I had no idea what to expect and totally throught that he'd come back with one of those big metal house ladders! Haha! Boy was I wrong! This agility ladder is super-cool! It folds up nicely and can be taken anywhere.
Now, describing some of the drills we did would be rather confusing, so I've tracked down a YouTube video of a personal trainer going over ladder drills - he breaks them down slowly, which is very helpful! While looking for this video, I found one that was more representative of what we did this week, but the woman in the video was rather scantily clad and the comments below were not exactly PG. Haha!
Try out some of these agility drills for yourself. You don't really even need a fancy ladder - try making your own by just laying out sticks from your yard or rope you have laying around in the basement.
Hope to see you on September 6th! Don't forget - you can make a donation to CFPA anytime!