Got That Itch Again

The Cowtown Marathon will be held on February 24, 2013. The course is nice and flat, I am quite familiar with the neighborhoods through which the course runs, and the male record is just three minutes faster than my last marathon time.

It's too early to commit to anything just yet, but now might be a good time to brush up on what it takes to run a marathon.

Hey, you never know.

Two Tiers, Revisited

As you have read earlier this year, my new, freshly revised training regimen reflects a two-tiered approach to training. Up to now, though, the "two tiered" aspect of the training hasn't been immediately obvious.

Let's take a closer look at the twice-a-day exercise regimen and try to understand it as a two-tiered fitness approach. These two tiers, expressed as two daily workouts, are analogous to the three levels in last year's marathon training regimen. The difference between Level 2 and Level 3 was the inclusion of the morning workouts.

Tier 1: Strength Training
We can just as easily go the other way. Rather than opting out of the morning workouts, we can opt out of the evening workouts. Doing that, of course, we are no longer training for a marathon, but that would certainly be appropriate for someone who is focused on strength training. Hence the 2012 program contains a built-in strength training tier in the morning workouts.

These Tier 1 workouts start with minimal cardio and some plyometrics. As the regimen proceeds, we phase in regular - but light - cardiovascular exercise in the form of jumping rope or running. One who is focused on building strength will likely not need any more cardiovascular exercise than that.

But I do recommend maintaining the cardio across Tier 1. These days, the strength training fad is to opt out of cardio. Doing so, however, detracts from an important step in strength training: fat-burning. True, a few well-placed HIIT workouts pack a better fat-burning punch than a few morning runs. But I have yet to see any evidence for the superiority of long-term HIIT compared with long-term endurance training. Frankly, it is a lot easier on your body to go for an easy run 3 times a week than to crush through two HIIT workouts per week. It's easier on your mind, too.

Running has the added benefit of strengthening your abs in a way that crunches, planks, etc. cannot. Running improves the strength of your oblique muscles while you burn fat. What could be better than that?

Tier 2: Endurance Training
Nevertheless, if you opt out of Tier 1, you're presented with the same Level 2 evening endurance workouts we had in last year's training regimen. We can call this Tier 2 - an endurance program for people seeking to perhaps complete their second-ever marathon.

1 + 2 = 3
Putting it all together gives you a Level 3 training regimen for a more experienced marathon runner seeking to get a leg up on the competition. Or, perhaps, someone uninterested in running a marathon who is simply looking for a long-term plan to shed fat, build muscle, and get in the best shape of his/her life!

Another 18 Weeks

If you're planning on running the Ottawa Marathon, your 18 weeks began yesterday. I kicked things off pretty strongly yesterday, but it is a long and arduous process to go from where I am now to where I will want to be on Ottawa Race Weekend. Still, 18 weeks will be over before we know it.

As I mentioned previously - and hoped to deliver a few days ago - I've been working on a re-vamped 18-week marathon training regimen. Before I dive into that, I'd like to discuss the previous one a bit, and provide some explanation regarding what's changing, and why.

Out With the Old
There are a few things driving my decision to update and improve the training regimen.

The first reason is simply that no training regimen should ever be considered "perfect" or "complete." By providing an update, I am making tweaks and improvements that come from my last year's experience. The program itself was developed from my 20+ years competitive running experience; but it is the first time I have developed  something so lengthy and comprehensive. As such, there are potential improvements to be made. That's not to say that the existing regimen is bad, but rather that it can still be made better.

The second reason for the changes comes from two injuries I suffered last year. The first was my well-documented pulled calf muscle that ultimately forced me to pull out of Montreal. The second was a very minor sore back I suffered caused by some heavy weight training while I was recovering from that calf injury.

I have long maintained that running is a safe and effective activity (perhaps the most effective activity) as long as you maintain proper running form. The 18 weeks as I laid them out last year certainly do not encourage sports injury, and my pulled muscle was the result - as I now know - of inadequate stretching. Nevertheless, I had to make some tweaks to avoid needless risk. First of all, the morning workouts present a weight training approach that is also reflected in the afternoon running workouts. In an update, I no longer want that to be the case. I also wanted to place a greater emphasis on stretching.

The third reason for updating the training regimen is simplicity. As I have learned from my winter cross-training, there is a lot to say for having a more simplified exercise regimen. Most of these gains pertain to intellectual shorthand, true, but even that is significant if you have a lot to think about. ;)

In With the New
The new regimen presents a similar, albeit more refined 18 week training regimen for marathons. While I am undertaking this program with Ottawa Race Weekend in mind, you may of course begin and end the program at any time.

The current spreadsheet is in a slightly unfinished state. I am not quite finished outlining exactly what I want to present. However, I wanted to provide the full regimen to my readers so that they can get started immediately. If you already started the old program yesterday, you can easily switch back-and-forth between the two programs at your leisure. They are complimentary.

The new link is here. I will also update The Marathon page accordingly.

Good luck!

Happy New You

You know, I just can't resist.

For me, health and fitness are a way of life. I am not the type of person who over-indulges during the holiday season, puts on weight, stops exercising, and then suddenly declares after New Year's Day that I am turning over a new leaf and reinventing my body. I adhere to a daily exercise regiment and maintain a proper diet every day. My occasional indulgences satisfy my cravings; I have no need to take things further than that. Maintaining a healthy lifestyle each and every day is its own reward for me.

What I am, on the other hand, is a person who loves any excuse to become highly motivated and ambitious. Undertaking a personal initiative is a lot of fun. Any excuse to do so is a good one.

Therefore, I just can't resist using the coming of a new year to gain some new motivation and recommit to maintaining my status as basically the healthiest person I know. It is precisely because I am committed to daily exercise and a healthy lifestyle that I like to avail myself of each and every excuse to go the extra mile.

It's Going To Be A Great Year For Everybody
So here we are in the year 2012. I just returned home from a trip to Bangladesh, I cut my hair, got over a cold, readjusted to a (healthy) Western diet, and now I'm ready to take on a new commitment to fitness. It's time for a new me, and it could be time for a new you, too. You might be like me - healthy, fit, and no particular reason for a drastic change. Or, you might be that other kind of person who over-indulged and now wants to reclaim your healthy lifestyle for the new year.

Put another way, you might be like me in that you enjoy endurance training, like to run races (or marathons), and are looking for a way to reach a new personal best. Or, you might be someone who wants to slip down, shape-up, and look great for that beach vacation this year, seeking maximum results for minimal effort.

Great News
Either way, Stationary Waves has you covered. Over the next couple of days, I'll be developing a two-tiered training regimen for anybody. This year we're building on the 18-Week training regimen I established last Summer, improving the methodology, and expanding.

Tier 1 consists of a quick, easy strength and toning regimen that anyone can do at home. All you need is thirty minutes a day (at the most!), a set of free weights or resistance bands, and an empty spot on the floor. You'll tone up, build some muscle mass, improve your posture, agility, and dexterity, and be more than ready for that trip to your exotic location of choice.

Tier 2 can be added for crazy fitness whack-jobs like myself, who haven't yet had their fill of road racing, marathoning, or whatever else you might be aiming for.

Of course, the combined regimen will help you achieve your true inner fitness potential.

So Stay Tuned
I'll be unveiling the new plan within the week. In the meantime, take the time to review the old plan, the philosophy behind it, and the tools required for what is sure to be a terrific challenge.

The Endurance Base, or Endurance Basics

As you know, Stationary Waves is no place for absolute fitness beginners. Just by way of refresher, let me explain that this is not because I am hostile to beginners or dismissive of their efforts - we have all been beginners!

Rather, it is because I feel there is enough advice out there for beginners that it isn't a subject area I feel inclined to explore. I have often been disappointed by the lack of internet distance-running content aimed at the intermediate-to-experienced runner. Therefore, I have decided to fill that niche myself. It's not advice, it's a discussion. If you have a couple of years of running under your belt, join the dialogue!

Let's Talk About The Endurance Base
The unsung secret to having a seamless, injury-free training season is the building up of a good endurance base.

The phrase "endurance base" means exactly what you would expect it to mean. Prior to undertaking a major training regimen (for example, an 18-week marathon training regimen), it is customary for experienced athletes to spend anywhere between one and four months increasing their bodies' cardiovascular endurance.

The goal is rather obvious: The more punishment you can handle, the harder you can train; the harder you can train, the faster you can run.

Building Blocks
Let's think about it this way:

If you've never run a step in your life, your first undertaking is just to get outside and give it a try. That's the first building block.

Once you've tried it out enough times and you've decided you're interested in it, the next step is to learn how to save your energy for the full distance in question. You go from sprinting as fast as you can and then walking the rest of the way, to developing a sense of pacing that takes you from a few hundred meters all the way up to several miles. That's the second building block.

After you get used to controlling your pace for an extended period of time, you discover that alternating the length and speed of your daily run can result in increased speed and increased endurance. Before long, you've exposed yourself to comprehensive training philosophies and you've undertaken to engage in some event-specific training (like a marathon). That's the third building block.

Building an endurance base is simply the next link in the chain (if I may mix metaphors). Once you have some experience with event-specific training, it's time to pre-train (for lack of a better term). In anticipation of the coming training regimen, we start slowly building on our weekly miles run, acquainting (or reacquainting) our muscles with long-distance running and simply getting used to running again. At this point, there is no pressure, and no need to run too fast. Endurance training is a nice, relaxing process of iteratively adding to what your body can handle.

Astute Stationary Waves readers may have noticed that the building blocks I've listed above represent a progressively lengthening cognitive time-horizon.

How to Build an Endurance Base
If you have never built any kind of an endurance base before, then my recommendation is to keep things as simple as possible. Sometimes common sense is the best approach: Start with what you know you can do, and then just get comfortable doing it. When you're finally ready to take on a training regimen, go for it.

That simple approach should get you started. Of course, the more thought and planning you put into it, the better off you'll be.

The options here are virtually limitless, but there are a few important things to keep in mind:

1. The primary goal is to avoid injury. The whole benefit of an endurance base is in being able to subject your body to more strenuous training down the road. If you injure yourself, that is clearly the opposite of the intended effect. To avoid injury, take on only moderate mileage to begin with, and increase your weekly miles by no more than about 10% per week. So if you start with 30 miles per week, add three miles per week on Week #2...
2. Forget about speed for now. There will be time to wow yourself and others with record-breaking speed. Now is not that time. This goes right along with number 1 above. If you go too fast, too soon, you can risk injury. You'll also fatigue your muscles too early in the game, which will make it a challenge to steadily increase your endurance. Remember, we are extending our cognitive time-horizons here, so don't take on future speed training before you've built your base. Always run at a relaxed pace; resist the urge to hold yourself to a specific pace. For now, I'd even suggest you leave your watch at home.
3. Give yourself enough time to reach your goal. If your first week of serious marathon training involves some 50 miles of running, then your endurance base should build up to at least that much mileage. Building up even more mileage in the pre-season will be even better, of course. But if you want to get to 50 miles per week and you're starting from zero, this will take you some time. Be realistic about the amount of time it takes to build up the endurance base you're aiming for. If you're increasing your mileage by 10% per week and starting out at 20 miles per week, do the math. This will take some time. Start early, and don't be afraid to hold yourself to it. 
4. If your body tells you, "This hurts!" then back off. You may still end up with sore joints, tendons, and muscles. You may get some shin splints or a little tendonitis. Don't worry! This is the pre-season! You're not training yet. If your body hurts, back off a little. Take a few days off and try again later. Your training has not yet begun. Don't take on too much too soon.
5. Get in the habit of stretching. If you don't stretch regularly, I would not suggest you even attempt a marathon. Stretch every day. Learn to love it. Stretching improves your body's capacity for muscle-building and elongates your muscle fibers, helping to prevent injury. This is incredibly important!

I might add that this fifth point is vitally important. The reason I pulled a muscle last season and had to bail on the Montreal Marathon is because I wasn't stretching enough. Take that seriously.

What Will I Do?
If you still need a bit more of a real-world example, I'll give you an idea of what I'll be doing to build my endurance base, starting today.

For the past few weeks, I've been running about 30 minutes a day. This week, I plan on doing at least that. Perhaps I will go for 35 minutes if I'm feeling a little ambitious. Nothing more than that, however.

From there, I will add about five minutes of running per week. Now, bear in mind that I'll be travelling out of the country for two weeks in December, and during that time, I'll be lucky to get out for a run at all. So I may lose two weeks there.

Regardless, I should be up to about 50 minutes of running per day by mid-January. More, if I'm lucky. I'll be taking it easy, enjoying the sights of the city, keeping my head up, and trying to stay warm in the cold Ottawa winter.

Motivation and a Projects-Driven Lifestyle

Not long ago, I adopted a new approach to accomplishing the objectives I set for myself.

The Problem
Like many people with a wide variety of interests that they take somewhat seriously, I often found myself short of time. It started getting difficult to, for example, record an album, plan a series of gigs, write articles, and work out hard, while still meeting my day-to-day obligations such as household tasks and, uh, going to work. Not being able to "do it all" is a problem we all face from time to time. This problem compounds itself the more seriously one takes one's hobbies.

The primary obstacle in "doing it all" is that whenever a significant amount of time is dedicated to, say, working out a lot, that steals valuable time away from writing a great piece for Mises Daily or practicing, writing, and recording new music. One begins to feel that the things one loves to do are in competition with one another. For myself, I began to feel that if I sat down and practiced my guitar technique, I was "wasting time" because it didn't produce anything particularly tangible. In contrast, any time spent writing produced an article; any time spent working out improved my blood glucose levels and overall health; any time spent recording produced an mp3. Unfortunately, everything soon felt like a waste of time. I couldn't finish any mp3s, because my technique wasn't up to par; therefore, time spent recording was a waste of time. I couldn't train for a marathon, because I couldn't set aside enough time to put in the proper miles; therefore, time spent running was a waste of time. And so on, and so forth... It felt like a vicious circle.

The Solution
The solution I devised was to break my hobbies into manageable chunks in the form of projects. (I'm not the first to devise an approach like this. Perhaps the clearest expression of this concept is Frank Zappa's "Project/Object" idea.)

Rather than focusing on what I want to do "in general," I instead decided that I needed a paradigm shift. I know conceive of all my objectives as a series of projects. The major advantages of projects is that they are associated with specific deliverables. Focusing on these deliverables costs nothing, because there is an associated end point. It becomes a matter, not of opportunity cost, but of inter-temporal substitution. This has the rather amazing effect of clearing items off my plate and also allowing me to accomplish more of them.

One way this happens is like so: Because I have made my current workout regimen my primary focus, I know that I cannot seriously dedicate large amounts of time to recording my upcoming Solaris album. As a result, the time I spend on it now is far more precise and focused. On top of that, I don't feel bad about stealing 30 minutes here and there to practice my guitar technique, because the tradeoff between that and recording has disappeared - recording is off the table until I run my marathon.

Furthermore, something new and surprising has arisen from all of this: Ryan Ruins Requests. Unable to dedicate sufficient time to a serious recording endeavor, I found myself recording covers as an additional form of practice, and my output has grown as a result!

The first such project (consciously conceived as a project-as-described) was the Prime Numbers show I played last November. We had a limited time to prepare and rehearse our material, and I had a lot of other things going on at the time. I made the strategic decision to focus on the show, and we pulled it off beautifully. Once finished, I quickly dedicated my efforts toward a second project: finding a new job, which I managed to accomplish in just three months.Next, of course, came my 18-week undertaking of training for the Montreal Marathon. It's safe to say that I haven't accomplished this many things in this short a time period in a long time - if ever.

The Challenge At This Point
Nowadays, I find the major challenge with the Projects-Driven Lifestyle is that when a particular undertaking spans a large enough period of time (like eighteen weeks, for example) Motivating oneself to see it through to the end can be somewhat daunting.

I have recently discovered this about running. My goals and desires haven't changed, but it's getting to be quite difficult to push myself to the top of my game for eighteen solid weeks. It seems like such a short period of time, but of course even seconds can feel like an eternity when they involve hard physical effort.

I may not have devised the perfect solution to this challenge, but of course I'm still working on it. My current theory is that I can likely just sally forth with the discomfort, and it will be over before it drives me totally crazy. At that point, I'll be able to start on my next major project, which will be Solaris.

The Marathon: Part XI - Treating Injuries Once They Happen

Despite our best efforts to mitigate against such things, we sometimes suffer running-related injury. Given all I have previously said about the importance of good running form and safe training habits, you may be reluctant to finally admit it if you experience a running injury.

But there is no need for that. Occasionally we type so much at work that our wrists and hands get tendonitis. Sometimes we burn or cut ourselves while cooking. Sometimes we trip and fall or skin our knuckles against something sharp. The bottom line is, you can't always avoid injury even if you do everything correctly. Injuries happen.

They happen, and they are no big deal, provided you take the appropriate course of action. Here are a few guidelines to keep you on track for Montreal, even if you injure yourself.

A Stitch In Time Saves Nine
Never was the adage truer than for running-related injuries. Generally speaking, pain means problems. Too often, runners accustom themselves to "running through the pain" and turn a small problem into a big one.

The impact of this is that what would have required a couple of days' treatment soon requires weeks. By "running through the pain," you end up costing yourself more valuable training time in the long run.

So, don't wait to treat your pain. As soon as you feel it, take the time to make an assessment and determine the best course of action. Do this in the middle of a run, if you have to. As soon as you feel the pain, assess it. Don't wait until later. Don't train through it. Figure it out and act. (If nothing else, you'll be more empowered.)

Shin Splints Don't Count
You can train through shin splints. Never worry about them. The pain subsides after a few strides. There is only one way to make the pain go away: toe taps. If you are doing toe taps regularly, you will not get shin splints. If you're not, start doing them. 200 toe taps per foot per day should suffice. Within a few days, your shin splints will be gone.

Tendonitis: A Quick-and-Dirty Treatment Guide
In general, the only cure for tendonitis is ice and rest. Your tendons are inflamed and you need to leave them alone for a while until they can heal.

When I was an NCAA athlete, my trainer suggested I take three regular-strength aspirin, three times per day, for no longer than a week. The aspirin reduces the swelling in your tendons. Such a recommendation is extremely hard on your liver and kidneys and should only be done under the watchful eye of a professional sports medicine practitioner. For what it's worth, I found this treatment to be highly effective.

As soon as you feel tendonitis coming on, stop running, walk home, and take a day off. If your legs still hurt the following day, take a week off. Trust me, you'll be better off if you put in the rest time and heal quickly. If you run through the pain, it won't be long before you will require 2-6 weeks of rest, rather than just one. Be smart about this.

Stress Fractures
While I've never had one myself, I can tell you that they are serious and require rest and inactivity to heal. There is nothing you can do. Get zen, get a good book, and bite the bullet. You're much better off letting your leg heal than subjecting yourself to an injury that could potentially ensure that you never run again.

Random Pains in Your Ankles, Calves, Knees, Etc.
Occasionally you may find minor pains that do not impact your performance much, but are highly annoying. Many of these can be traced to the fact that your shoes are worn out. If icing and aspirin (for a night) don't resolve the problem, consider whether it's time to buy a new pair of shoes.

Persistent Lower Back Pain
If you seldom do crunches or any kind of core exercises, you will discover that your lower back will start aching like a sprain. It will be a mild, persistent pain that improves with rest, but does not immediately subside when you stop running. It may seem counter-intuitive, but pain like this can be caused by weak abdominal muscles, and can be resolved by dedicating more time to doing crunches.

The Marathon: Part X - Speed Training and Track Work

Speed training is classic. Speed training is what makes the difference between a casual jogger and one who is aiming for a specific goal. There is a lot to be said about speed training and track work, so I will get right down to it.

How Traditional Speed Training Differs from Fartlek TrainingIf this is your first exposure to serious training, then you have not yet encountered speed training, only fartlek training.As I mentioned in Part VIII, fartlek training is somewhat subjective, focusing primarily on how a pace feels to you personally, rather than aiming for a specific distance within a specific time frame. The goal of fartlek training is to improve pacing and increase your VO2-max (i.e. to improve your body's efficiency in terms of aerobic cellular respiration).

In contrast, the goal of speed training is to develop your muscles. If you've ever seen a world-class sprinter, for example, (the fastest human beings on the planet), their leg muscles are enormous. That's because it requires a lot of fast-twitch muscle fiber to go that fast. We're training for a marathon, so we won't be developing that level of muscle mass, nor that level of speed.

What we want to do is bring our abilities in line with our goals. Which brings me to my next point.

The Idea in Principle
We don't just want to run a marathon at our current level of ability. (Especially if you've never run a marathon before, right? You don't yet have the ability.) Instead, we want to aim for a goal. I ran my last marathon in 2:47, which corresponds to about a 6:22/mile pace. Suppose this time I'd like to run closer to 6:00/mile pace. Then, 6:00 per mile becomes my goal pace. This is the pace by which I plan my speed training.

When we engage in track workouts, what we are trying to do is accustom our bodies to that sort of speed, understanding all the while that we cannot currently run that speed (or at least, not for 26.2 miles). We do this by engaging in two techniques to build speed and speed tolerance: (1) Running faster than goal pace and (2) Running goal pace for longer than you can.

Let's start with (1).

Running Faster Than Goal PaceTrack workouts of this variety typically involve short or very-short distances at high speeds. One classic example from my high school track coach was running 20 x 200m repeats (that is, twenty iterations of running half way around the track). Generally speaking, you can run 200 meters at a much faster pace than you can run 26.2 miles. Because we're training for long-distance running, though, just running a few 200-meter repeats won't suffice. Twenty 200m sprints corresponds to ten times around the track, or 2.5 miles. Not bad for a high schooler, but not great for an adult marathoner.

A better way to go might be to tackle your race distance. For example, if you're training for a 5K, you'll want to go for something more like 12 laps. This would correspond to 24 x 200m repeats. That can be a lot of sprints all at once, so to accommodate for the workload, we might break it up into three pieces, as follows:

1. 8 x 200m repeats with 60 seconds rest in between each;
2. Three minutes' rest;
3. 8 x 200m repeats with 60 seconds rest in between each;
4. Three minutes rest;
5. 8 x 200m repeats with 60 seconds rest in between each.

This ensures a rigorous track workout with plenty of recovery time to keep you going all the way to the end.

Running Goal Pace for Longer Than You Currently Can
Another series of track workouts operates under the assumption that your goal pace is perfectly reasonable - or even easy - for a shorter distances, but very difficult for the distance you're training for. For example, I might be able to run a 5K quite comfortably in 19:00, but to keep that pace for an entire marathon - more than 8 times that distance - would prove a formidable goal.

So my track workout might consist of one-mile repeats (four laps) at 6:00/mile pace, or 1:30 per lap. Each one of these one-mile repeats individually might not be a big deal. But if I do enough of them - say, six - then I'll get a very good workout.

Setting Your Baseline
If you have never done any track workouts before, set aside your first track workout day as an experiment. Run a one-mile repeat at tempo pace. Then run a 1200m repeat at tempo pace. Then 800m, 600m, 400m, and 200m. Write down how fast you ran all of them, and use that as your "starting point." Next week, when you tackle your track workout, use the corresponding time as your pacing guideline.

Okay, now we're ready for a track workout!

The Marathon: Part IX - Goals and Pacing

I started my Speed Training write-up this morning and realized that the discussion requires some additional context. The goal of speed training is to increase your speed so that you can achieve your goal. But what if you don't yet have a goal? What if you don't even know how to set one?

Specific Goals Versus Intangible Moving TargetsNo matter what you choose to pursue in life, it is incredibly important to have a specific goal. Your goal wraps a blanket of context around the things you do daily in pursuit of it.

Some of you are inclined to express your goals something like this:

• "I want to do my best."
• "I want to lose some weight."
• "I want to look and feel better."
• "I want to run faster."
• "I just want to try something new and have fun."

I need to tell you something very important about these statements. Read carefully, or you might misunderstand. All of these statements express good and valid desires; but as goals they are completely worthless. Please don't scoff -- simply consider the following.

• It is important to do your best, but that goes without saying. If you try at all, you are trying to do your best. Aiming simply at effort does not present you with any opportunity to succeed, for how will you know when you've reached "your best?"
• Losing weight is a good undertaking if you have some weight to lose. The goal as stated, however, expresses no understanding of measurable success. Many people who simply want to "lose some weight" get caught in a situation in which no amount of weight loss is ever satisfying to them. It becomes a moving target. They are always focused on "those 10 lbs.," no matter what weight loss they achieve. They may also be losing muscle and/or bone mass, which is not a good thing.
  
• Looking and feeling "better" is also a good thing. What is better? How do you know when you're there? Exercising offers us small changes over a lengthy period of time. How will you know what "better" is or even if you can get there? This, too, is a moving target.
• Running "faster" is something we all want to do. But faster than what? Does "one second" count as faster? It might, if you're a 100m sprinter. What about for a marathoner? When and how do you wish to achieve this speed? Is it possible to reach a definable point where you are "faster?"
• If you are only interested in novelty, you are finished before you ever got started. Training involves weeks and months of commitment. It tests your tolerance for discomfort and requires a lot of work. If you're only in it to pursue something new, you will stop the minute it becomes difficult because you will lose interest. Then, you will have accomplished nothing.

What these "goals" all have in common is that they set a person up for failure. No matter how genuine your desire for these kinds of things, if you do not provide yourself with a "deliverable" or a milestone of some kind, then you will never really be satisfied.

And let's be clear: it's important to be satisfied with past performance because it inspires future success.Even if you never run again after these 18 weeks, your achieving a tangible milestone will make you want to succeed at something else, too. Perhaps your next goal will be career-oriented, or artistic, or deeply personal.

Goals help us build self-esteem and motivation. With a few well-placed goals, we can turn our whole lives around. Moving targets and more nebulous statements are useful tools to help us set our goals, but they should never be used as goals themselves, because they undermine the psychology of success.

Therefore, always make sure you set specific goals and then set out to achieve them. Even if you don't shave the full three minutes off your 10K time, you might shave off two minutes, which is still a fantastic - and tangible - achievement. Even "failure" becomes success when you set out to achieve something specific.

Finding Your GoalEverything I've mentioned so far holds as true for life in general as it does for running. Setting and achieving realistic goals is an important part of life. But how do you know what running goal is appropriate for you?

If you're an experienced runner, you probably already have a good idea. If you new to the game, though, you will need a little bit of experience before you can determine an appropriate time-for-distance goal. (How do you know what 5K time to aim for if you've never run a 5K before?) There are a couple of options here.

First, you can extrapolate from your current daily runs. If you run about 2 miles in 15 minutes, then you can expect to run 5K in about 24 minutes. Knowing that, you can set a goal of "anything better than 24 minutes," or in the vernacular of competitive running, you want to break twenty-four minutes.

Another approach might be to set aside a day during which you actually run a 5K informally, by yourself. Time yourself and see how well you do. Once you've established a baseline, you can make it a goal to beat your baseline. However, this approach becomes impractical once we start talking about marathon distances.

If all else fails, just talk to other runners you know and get a feel for what you can expect for your first race. We runners love to talk about this kind of stuff, and you can use our propensity talk about it to your own advantage. ;)

Finding Your Pace
Once you have a goal set in your mind, pacing becomes a bit of an arithmetical exercise. Divide your goal time by the total number of miles or kilometers, and voila - you have your pace.

The funny thing about a goal pace, though, is that you can surprise yourself. Often when we set goals we discover either that we've set the bar too low or too high. Setting the bar too low results in some confusion mid-way through your training regimen when you discover that you've already met your goal and now have to re-think. A lot of your previous training time will have been sub-optimally utilized. Setting the bar too high, on the other hand, will quickly wear your body out.

Therefore, I always suggest that people take their pace to the track. This is a great experience, especially if you've never done track work before.

Suppose you want to run six minutes per mile. At the track, this corresponds to 1:30 per lap. A great way to get a feel for whether your goal pace is too low or too high is to do speed work at that pace and see how much or how little it tires you out. If you run every lap at 1:30 or under, chances are you're not challenging yourself enough. If you struggle to run more than the first couple of laps at your goal pace, you may want to consider slowing down.

But at this point, we're getting into Speed Training territory, and I've saved that for another article.

Up Next: Speed Training

The Marathon: Part VIII - Fartlek Training

One of the most useful training methods for a runner is called fartlek training.

I was exposed to fartlek training for the first time when I was in the seventh grade. My track coach, Ms. Maldonado (sorry, Ms. Maldonado, I forget your first name :( ) announced one afternoon that we would be engaging in fartlek training. You can imagine how a thirteen-year-old boy might react to a word like fartlek. In fact, forget thirteen-year-olds; you are probably thinking much the same thing right now. And so it goes for any English-speaking person who first hears about fartlek training; every introduction to these workouts requires a hand-waving explanation about the world itself. So, here it is:

For the record, ladies and gentlemen, fartlek is a Swedish word that means "speed play." 

Now that we've all grown up a little, we can get down to it.

What You Stand to Gain from Fartlek Training

Physiologically speaking, fartlek training offers all of the same benefits as interval training, namely increased speed, muscle strength endurance, and VO2-max. In fact, fartlek training is just a variety of interval training.

Another major benefit of fartlek training is that it subject the runner to a variety of running speeds over the course of a single outing. As beginners, runners are accustomed to thinking of running from the perspective that it is a singular act. What I mean is that beginners often only have one speed: jog. (I have already warned you of the dangers of jogging. See here for an important discussion of why runners must always attempt to go "beyond jogging," so to speak.) By engaging in interval training in general, and fartlek training in particular, runners acquaint themselves with not simply a "jogging speed" and a "sprinting speed," but with the full spectrum of additional speeds in between those two poles (tempo speed, race pace, goal pace, easy pace, etc., etc.).

For a runner, having a spectrum of speeds from which to draw is like a painter's having more than two colors on the palette, or a carpenter's having more than just a saw and a hammer. In my opinion, fartlek workouts are the single best way to develop a ready source of various running speeds and learn how to apply them in different contexts.

Forget about the abstract explanations; let's get practical. You have heard that you should always increase your running speed when running uphill or downhill during a race. You may have heard that doing so gives you an important edge against your competitors. Yet, if you were to actually sprint every uphill or downhill, you would run out of energy before the finish line. For this kind of approach to running and racing, you need something faster than race pace, but slower than a sprint. What is that pace? Fartlek training can help you learn what it is.

Not a racer? No problem. There will be days when your energy level is such that you cannot commit to a full-on workout, but you neither want to take a day off nor an easy day. You'll need a pace that is slower than usual, but faster than easy. Enter: fartlek training.

Differences Between Fartlek Training and Traditional Interval Training
The key difference between a fartlek and traditional interval training is also its major benefit for non-competitors, aging athletes, and novices: subjectivity.

During the course of a traditional interval workout, you may be tasked to run a given distance (say, 400 meters) at a given speed (say, 1:30, or six-minutes-per-mile pace), a given number of times (say, four times), with a given amount of rest between each repetition (say, ninety seconds). There is little-to-no room in such a workout for runners who find the pace, the amount of rest, or the total workout length inappropriate for their own needs. To make matters worse, most runners aren't even aware of what is appropriate for them, and find themselves continually frustrated as they attempt to engage in solid training that is confounded by the fact that their individual bodies need a more lax approach.

In contrast, fartlek training applies subjective speeds, distances, and durations to achieve the same basic physiological result. No one runner is forced to adhere to the broad, on-average standards of a typical workout regimen. Here we may benefit from some specific examples.

Examples of Fartlek Workouts
Tomorrow, we're scheduled for a fartlek workout. In the spirit of the occasion, I'd like you to choose your own fartlek workout. Here are some examples of fartlek training; I'm certain you'll find something that works for you.

Example 1: Team/Group Fartlek in a Single-File Line
You'll need no less than three other friends or teammates for this workout. Here's how it works. Plot a running course as you normally would. Begin running as a group, in a single-file line, with the leader setting the pace for the entire group. The leader must set an appropriate basis pace, somewhere from easy to moderate (perhaps 6 to 7 on our subjective intensity scale). As the line begins running, the person at the back of the line runs hard to the front of the line, then resumes the original pace (or sets a new one, again from easy to moderate). As soon as that person has reached the front of the line, the new "last person in line" runs hard to the front of the line. The process repeats in that way until the workout is over.

Example 2a: Simple Timed Fartlek Intervals
The easiest way to do this is to simply divide your workout into even segments and alternate pace accordingly. For example, during a 40-minute run, you may divide your time as follows:

1. 5-minute warm-up at easy pace
2. 6 minutes at tempo pace
3. 6 minutes recovery at easy-to-moderate pace
4. 6 minutes at tempo pace
5. 6 minutes at recovery pace
6. 5-minute cool-down at easy pace
   

You may divide the time segments into shorter or longer segments as desired.

Example 2b: Getting Elaborate
If you have a good watch (see here for details) and some prior experience with fartlek training, you can consider more elaborate workouts, such as this:

1. 5-minute warm-up at easy pace
2. 7 minutes tempo pace
3. 3.5 minutes recovery
4. 6 minutes tempo pace
5. 3 minutes recovery
6. 5 minutes tempo pace
7. 2.5 minutes recovery
8. 4 minutes tempo pace
9. 2 minutes recovery
10. 3 minutes tempo pace
11. 1.5 minutes recovery
12. 2 minutes tempo pace
13. 1 minute recovery
14. 1 minute tempo pace
15. 5-minute cool-down at easy pace

This is a long workout, but very rewarding if done once every two weeks or so.

Example 3: The No-Brains Fartlek Workout
If this is all getting a bit too complex for you, you still have options. Here's a dead-simple way to engage in fartlek training without a running group, a watch, or the memory of an elephant. Run on a street or a path lined by streetlamps or power poles. Alternate tempo pace and recovery pace by a chosen number of power poles that you pass (say, tempo until you reach the 2nd power pole, recovery until you reach the next one, repeat). You can even do this with nearby bushes, visible cracks in the sidewalk, fire hydrants, or anything you please.

Oh and Uh, One More Thing...
My training schedule does not specify the length of time for this workout. Again, consider it a choice. Try to make sure it is longer than an easy run and shorter than a long run. Other than that, the choice is yours.

Happy running!

The Marathon: Part VII - The Long Run

Perhaps the most universally recognizable aspect of training for a marathon is the long run. As the furthest distance run in the course of the week, it is often a runner's go-to point when answering the first question asked of all runners by all non-runners, "How far do you run?" It is simultaneously the most common "group run," and the classic solitary trek. It is the run that takes you out into nature with your dog, or the run that weaves you through every familiar city street. It is the greatest source of pride and accomplishment for a runner. It is the sport's archetypical workout.

My long runs have taken me out into the desert without water, or deep into the forest without a map. I used carefully plan my long run courses and stash emergency food and water along the way. I have run through portions of protected North American forests that few if any other human beings had traversed in years. I have discovered hidden waterfalls and met lonely and dangerous animals along the way. Every runner has a great story about an epic long run. (Those of you who know me have probably heard my bull-charging story a few times.)

No blog out there does a better job of capturing the essence of a long run better than that of my old friend Anton Kleparek. Do check it out when you have the chance.

Where a Long Run Takes You
Whether you're training for a marathon or a shorter race - or even just running recreationally - the long run is an integral part of any approach to conditioning. It's not sufficient to simply run every day, lift some weights, do a little speed work, and hit the races. Every runner has to teach themselves to run much further than the maximum-encountered-racing-distance.

For marathon runners, long runs are a unique challenge, since it is extremely impractical for most people to frequently run ultra-marathon distances as part of their marathon training. The goal for us, then, is to acquaint our bodies with extreme distances gradually, so that the final marathon offers no surprises.

Long runs serve a variety of purposes in the training regimen.

First Purpose - Tolerating Distance
It goes without saying that long-distance running is something you have to learn to do. "Long distance" itself is entirely subjective. When I started running at age seven or eight, a mile was a long way to run. I learned to do it, and proclaimed myself to be a distance runner. Even in high school, the 1600m run was considered a race for distance runners. By the time I went to college, though, the 1500m was middle-distance. By age 21, I had long since concluded that the 5K was virtually a middle distance race, too. Top-tier marathoners can run every 10-kilometer split of their marathons faster than my fastest one-off 10K.

As you can see, what constitutes a long distance depends on ability and experience. The only way to acquire that is to go on long runs.

Second Purpose - Muscle Tissue Development
One of the surprising things about the human body is that it contains two kinds of muscle tissue analogous to the "light meat" and "dark meat" of poultry. Among runners, this renders itself as follows:

Sprinters, on one end of the spectrum, mostly possess muscle tissue that is optimized for anaerobic cellular respiration. Marathoners, on the other end of the continuum, predominantly possess muscle tissue that is optimized for aerobic cellular respiration. Everyone else has varying degrees of each.

For any athlete, ideal training optimizes the balance between light and dark meat. In our case, we'd like to train our bodies to excel at aerobic respiration. A major benefit of this is that we will become experts and burning fat tissue and blasting carbohydrates. What most people try to accomplish via "boot camps" and P90X programs we will accomplish by going for consistent weekly long runs. You will shed pounds and inches and, the more you do it, the more efficient your body will be. Have you ever dreamed of being able to eat whatever you want and not gain a single pound? This is how you do it.

But more practically speaking, we want to get to the point where we can go for a two-hour run every week without feeling tight, sore, and shaky the next day. By the time our 18 weeks are over, you'll be there.

Third Purpose - Training Variety
Many people underestimate the need to have lots of variety in any training regimen. There are physiological benefits to this, but perhaps more important than all of that is the fact that people who aren't bored continue working hard.

After a week of waking up early for strength training and hurrying home after work to get in a "basic run" or a do some speed work, it is nice to be able to sleep in one day of the week, relax, take the day as it comes, and then head out for a nice, relaxing long run during which your only responsibility is to enjoy yourself.

Fourth Purpose - Rest
Yes, believe it or not, long runs are an opportunity to give your body a much-needed rest from all the strength training and speed work we encounter during the rest of the week.

During strength and speed training, your body uses up a lot of stored glycogen. Just as water vapor, CO, and CO2 are the natural byproducts of burning fossil fuels, CO2 and acid are the byproducts of human exertion. That acid remains in your muscles until you drive it out with water and, counter-intuitively, additional physical motion.

Long runs are lengthy periods of extended - but easy - physical motion, and they give your body a chance to work out some of that acid build-up. (Of course, proper hydration goes without saying.)

How to Properly Execute a Long Run
Now we know why; what about how?

There are competing theories on the correct way to go on a long run. For you Level 1s out there, I suggest simply relaxing and taking it easy. Don't worry if you have to stop a while. Take a snack, take some water. If you're going somewhere interesting, take a camera and snap a few photos when you get there. Enjoy yourself.

If you're more serious about your long runs (i.e. Level 2s), your focus should be on maintaining a consistent pace. It's easy to have a widely varying pace over the course of two hours, but you'll need to fight that if you want to run a solid marathon. To that end, think about pacing yourself right from the start. Exercise a little restraint and consider whether your initial pace can be sustained for two whole hours.

But there's a catch: By starting out too slowly, many runners shoot themselves in the foot. If you run too slowly, you compromise your running form. Two hours of inefficient running will exhaust you as much or more as two hours at a very high running pace. This is why you may find that by starting out slowly, your pace slows down even further than it would have had you started out faster. Therefore, remember to strike a balance with your long run pace. (Don't worry - it takes practice to get it right!)

If you consider yourself a Level 3 runner, my recommendation is to start out briskly and challenge yourself not to lose speed. You may increase over the course of the run, but never decrease. Fight hard against pace decay. Plan a well-known route that will allow you to gauge your success. If such a course is unavailable to you, you can try an out-and-back run in which you commit to running the 2nd half faster than the first half. This simple approach can provide a lot of success.

So that's it! Good luck tomorrow!

The Marathon: Part VI - Strength Training

There are essentially three forms of strength training, and my Level 3 training schedule is designed to use all of them.

For marathon training, the key is to develop good muscle strength while keeping mass to a minimum. Countless runners underestimate the importance of muscle strength training, but it is a key to making running easier and more efficient. This will help you improve and feel better, regardless of your skill level.

What You Stand to Gain
One of the most important benefits to running of strength training is the improvement in overall posture. Take notice of the people you see over the course of a day. People with weak upper body muscles tend to sag at the shoulders, their necks hunch forward, and they are constantly shifting their body weight from one side to the other as they stand. This is not just a question of an unhealthy body; these poor folks cannot even hold themselves upright! Imagine the extent of their muscle atrophy that they are too weak to carry the weight of their own spine.

That a person can run an entire marathon despite having a weak upper body and core does not mean that everything is okay. Developing core and upper-body strength means being able to sustain proper running form over the multiple hours required to run a marathon. This reduces the probability of injury, as well as increasing your speed.

Speed is the other major benefit of strength training. When I say "speed," I am not merely suggesting that you can improve your time (although that is true). I realize that many of you are only interested in finishing the race strongly. That's okay.

But keep in mind that running for four hours is far more difficult than running for three hours and forty-five minutes. Every minute you shave off your time is a minute made easier on your body. Again, you will reduce your risk of injury. Beyond that, running will be a far more pleasant experience for you overall.

Let's face it: it feels good to run faster than your nearest competitors, whomever they may be. This is a valid and important aspect of running, no matter what your peer group is. Weight training will help you get there.

High Resistance Training
The first of the aforementioned three forms of strength training is standard, classic resistance training with heavy weights, and fewer repetitions.

The physiological objective of this kind of training is to increase the size of your muscle fibers. As you work out, they start to tear. You can think of it almost like metal fatigue or an elastic band in that the activity slowly and imperceptibly breaks down the tissue involved. The body rebuilds this tissue to withstand a greater workload in the future. Namely, the muscle fibers are rebuilt thicker and stronger.

There is a lot of information - and misinformation - out there when it comes to resistance training. Most experts agree that this kind of weight training is most effective under the following conditions:

• Training is done no more than 2-3 times per week. (Only one day per week is dedicated to high resistance training in the Level 3 schedule.)
• Repetitions are limited to about 6-12 per set.
• Proper form and technique is utilized at all times; weight is reduced if proper form cannot be maintained.
• The athlete aims to just reach muscle exhaustion by the final repetition.
  

Low Resistance / High Repetition Training
This form of strength training works a little differently in the body. Rather than increasing muscle fibers, lower resistance / high repetition strength training increases the plasma content between muscle fibers. This also increases muscle size, but not quite in the same way.

The rules to this form of strength training are almost identical to high resistance training, except that weight is significantly reduced while the number of repetitions significantly increased.

A common myth in the fitness world is that this kind of weight training "tones," whereas high resistance training "build mass." In reality, both forms of exercise build a different kind of mass, and you should expect to see your muscles increase using either technique (or a combination of both). Marathon runners need not worry about muscle size, up to a point. Besides, it is unlikely that a runner could build up a detrimental amount of muscle mass in an 18-week training regimen; nor would a body-builder be particularly interested in running a great marathon.

Plyometric Training
The secret weapon to any strength regimen is plyometric training. In simplified terms, plyometric exercises improve the body's ability to convert muscle strength into speed.

This is accomplished by repetition of "explosive" movements, such as jumping. My workout schedule involves plyometric exercises such as squat jumps and clapping push-ups. Believe it or not, these exercises will help you develop running speed and function as a refreshing reprieve from the typical hours of track work included in most training programs.

Most people find plyometrics incredibly difficult initially, if they are not used to them. After a week or two, however, they become much easier, and much more fun. So if you find your heart pounding and your lungs gasping for air in the beginning, take my word for it: you will thank me in a couple of weeks.

The Marathon: Part V - The Tempo Run

My suggested training regimen describes the following different kinds of running workouts:

1. Run
2. Tempo Run
3. Easy Run
4. Fartlek Training
5. Track Workout

I've promised to cover each one of these in greater depth as we come to them. Tonight's run is a thirty-minute tempo run, so now I'd like to explain what a tempo run is and how to approach it.


There is beauty in brevity. Tempo runs are one of my favorite workouts because they cover so much training ground in such a concise way. Tempo runs help you work on your speed, your pace, your endurance, and your mental grit, all in a total elapsed time much shorter than other workouts would. When you don't have time for a full workout, they're also a great way to squeeze a quick one into a tight schedule. They also provide some much-needed variety in the daily running grind.


I covered intensity scales earlier. Tonight, we'll aim for something at about an 8, or perhaps 80% of your maximal heart rate. My coach in college used to say that tempo runs are supposed to be "at race pace, minus thirty seconds per mile." So if you're aiming for a 3-hour marathon, you'll want to do your tempo runs at about 6:30/mile pace. (Need help figuring out what your pace translates to? Try this handy marathon pace calculator.)


More organically, you should be pushing yourself to the level of significant discomfort the whole way. If this feels bad to you (especially considering our substantial strength workout this morning), you need to remember that it is nothing compared to the last 10km of a marathon. Tough it out. Besides, it's only a 30-minute run. You can definitely bite the bullet through a quick thirty-minute jaunt down the road!


What you can hope to achieve from this is a better familiarity with how to push your body beyond the feeling of wanting to give up or slow down. You'll also help acquaint your body with a rapid running gait, which is an important psychological counterpart to speed work. You've heard of runners' highs and endorphine rushes? By the end of your workout today, you'll feel one if you've managed to keep yourself on pace.


You'll know you need to speed up if you feel yourself stop sweating. That's the tell-tale sign that you've reduced your speed. 


I know it can feel difficult, but if you manage to push through today, you're ready for the other 17-and-a-half weeks for sure!

The Marathon: Part IV - The "Run"

My suggested training regimen describes the following different kinds of running workouts:

1. Run
2. Tempo Run
3. Easy Run
4. Fartlek Training
5. Track Workout

I've promised to cover each one of these in greater depth as we come to them. Tonight's workout is a forty-minute run, so today I'll give you an idea of how to approach the basic run.

The Subjective Intensity Scale

Different experts have different approaches to the idea of workout intensity. Some, like Sean Burch, make use of a subjective intensity scale. For example, I could describe an arbitrary scale of 1 to 10, where 1 represents falling asleep and 10 represents running from a man-eating lion. We can imagine, then, that the lower half of the scale is reserved for sedentary activities; the upper half is for workouts and other such activity. 

It is tempting to suggest that an easy run is a 6, race pace is a 10, and the basic run is an 8; but that's not exactly how it works. A marathon runner should only ever approach 10 when nearing the finish line, or during some track workouts; in all other instances 10 is a waste of valuable energy. 9 would be something like your marathon goal pace. 8 is more like tempo pace, 7 is average, and 6 is an easy run.

On a subjective intensity scale, then, tonight's run should be forty minutes at 7/10, or a 70% intensity level. Have a look at the "Legend" tab of my Workout Document to keep track of intensity level.

Now Forget What I Just Said

Having said all that, I seldom reference subjective intensity scales myself. Part of the problem is that, left to our own devices, we'll never push ourselves hard enough. We tend to be convinced that we're at a 7 if we're breaking a sweat. That makes easy runs no different than a brisk walk and tempo runs not nearly difficult enough to achieve our goals. How do you get around that?

One way is to "add 0.5 to everything." If you think you're running at 7, force yourself to run 7.5. If you think you're running 7.5, force yourself up to 8.0. This isn't a perfect solution, but it can be very helpful when you're doing pace work (and especially once we start fartlek training).

My preferred option, though, is a bit more organic. For the basic run, don't think too much about intensity. In fact, don't think about intensity at all. A basic run is the speed you would have run had you simply felt like going for a run.

On Tuesday, we'll be going for our first tempo run, so I'll be sure to provide more organic descriptors of what is perhaps my favorite workout.

The Marathon: Part III - The Philosophy

I believe the most important part of running, like everything else I'm interested in, is the underlying philosophy of the thing. Running isn't just about strapping on some neon clothing and raising money for breast cancer. Running is a way to explore yourself and your health on a level that's difficult to reach via other activities.

Successful running, then, involves understanding the underlying themes and applying them as you work.

No One Gets Tendonitis Running From Man-Eating Lions
There's no such thing as a "naturally gifted runner." Wait, correction: We are all naturally gifted runners. Some of us just don't know it yet.

Why do I say this? Well, humans originated on the Serengeti plains, where we have been hunting and gathering for eons. To survive there, you have to know how to run, and run well. Otherwise, you might get eaten by a man-eating lion (or suffer some comparable fate).

From there, mankind migrated outward: to the Middle East, Europe, South Asia, East Asia, across the Bering Straight to the North American Arctic Circle, and then down to the southern tip of Argentina. In each and every culture from the African plains to the Inca Roads, humans have excelled at running great distances at high speeds.

More to the point: You cannot claim that "people like you" "weren't meant to run." You were. It's in your genes. Some of you might suggest that running hurts you more than it hurts most other people. Every time you go out jogging, you suffer uncontrollable spasms of pain the likes of which I - as a "naturally gifted runner" - surely know nothing about.

But here's a question: Do you honestly think it would be so painful to run from a man-eating lion chasing you across the Serengeti? Of course not, and there is a good reason why. But to understand it, we have to first dispel a horrible idea.

The Idea of the Perpetual Beginner
The commercial "running industry," consisting of shoe sellers, magazines, book publishers, and so forth, have made good inroads promoting running as an activity to people from all walks of life. You can go anywhere and discover all kinds of information about how to be a beginner. For many of you, you stop there. I'm here to encourage you to take strides (pun intended) toward moving from a beginner to an intermediate runner.

There is no need to be a competitive runner. Most people don't have the time or desire to make it to that level. But there are a couple of important truths about running. The first is that running is more fun when you run faster. (Notice I said "faster," not "fast." In other words, whatever is "fast" for you is also "more fun" for you. I'm not talking about universal, cardinal values of speed here.)

The second is that running is an inherently safe activity. You should never suffer running-related injuries. If you do, you have either fallen down or you're running with bad form.

The problem with the Idea of the Perpetual Beginner is that new runners are never taught good running form. As a result, they are at constant risk of injury. They also never get to a point where they are running fast enough for running to become genuinely entertaining.

Therefore, It All Starts With Good Form
Back to the man-eating lion. No one "jogs" from a man-eating lion. No one "walk/runs" from a man-eating lion. When faced with a serious threat, the human body instinctively adopts a safe, efficient, natural, and speedy running gait.

In a future installment, I'll cover tips on how to improve your form, so that you can run safely and rapidly. For now, I'd simply like to ask that you stop jogging and stop walk/running altogether. These activities perpetuate your status as an inexperienced novice and obliterate your running form. You will hate running at best, and get seriously injured at worse.

Every time you get out and run, imagine that you are coursing through the winding paths of a Mayan jungle to deliver an important message, or barreling across an African plain to reach your camp before nightfall. Focus far off into the distance, relax your shoulders and your ankles, and let your running instinct take over.

This is key to safe, happy running.

Mind Over Matter
From there, the only other thing you need is determination. When you get out there and start training tomorrow, you are going to encounter shortness of breath, burning lungs and muscles, hot sun, inclement weather, traffic exhaust, myriad distractions, and thousands of other unpleasantries.

When you do, focus deep into your solar plexus as you tell yourself over and over: Mind over matter.

The moment you feel you cannot press on any longer, repeat this mantra for a few minutes. The more your body screams and begs you to stop, the more consistently you must repeat yourself. You will find after a few short minutes that the desire to stop passes, like a brief fear in the middle of the night. You'll be running a bit faster, you'll laugh to yourself at the futile objections raised by your more fearful self, and carry on in confidence.

The difference between a true beginner and an experienced runner is how much control you have when your body starts to object to the conditions in which you've placed it. Experience means conquering your fears and calmly learning to press onward.

In that sense, running shares a common bond with Buddhist meditation. This is why I have said many times that, to me, running is a prayer. It is an opportunity to overcome your internal fears and objections, accept your surroundings as they are at that moment, accept who you are and what you're doing, and come out that experience with tranquility, serenity, and courage.

Once you've achieved that, there's nothing that can stop you; not in running, not in life.

Up Next: Tips for tomorrow's workout - the first in our journey to Montreal.

The Marathon: Part II - The Tools

I said before that in order to run, all you need is time and feet. This is true. Running is perhaps the world's oldest sport, and our ancient ancestors didn't use fanny packs and Nalgene water bottles.

When you walk into a beginners-oriented running store, you are inundated with "must-have" products, each more expensive than the last. Moisture-wicking clothing, special socks, bizarre neon jackets, hats that claim to breathe better than your own head, ointments and unguents, sundry jellies and liquids that "hydrate better than water," and dozens of salesmen ready to send you off with hundreds of dollars of "necessary" gear.

Friends, this is a lie. This is marketing. What you need is simple. I have your shopping list right here.

1. A Good Pair of Running Shoes
This is obvious. Barefoot running fads notwithstanding, in order to run a marathon, you'll need a good pair of trainers. (Across eighteen weeks of training, you might even need two pair.) In general, you need not spend more than about $80 on a pair of shoes.

Refer to the diagram below:

What you should look for is a shoe that is even along lines B and C, so that your foot doesn't roll side-to-side at impact. The shoe should naturally curve from just behind line C, all the way to the toe, to ensure a healthy roll in your stride to the toes. It's okay to have some curvature behind line B, but you should not be striking your heel that far back.

Beyond those guidelines, it is mostly personal preference. In general, I find Saucony and New Balance shoes to be the most consistent. Nike is a close 3rd place, and Adidas is not bad. I stay away from the other brands, personally.

2. A Good Watch
Despite all the many technological advances we've seen in our lifetime, they have not improved much on the running watch in the past 30 years. The classic Timex Ironman Triathalon has been my watch of choice - and that of most runners - for my entire life, and I don't see that changing any time soon. Forget your latest $100 gadget, here's all the watch you'll ever need at Amazon.com for $24.

Maybe you don't want a blatant product endorsement. Fine. But if you plan on undertaking my marathon training schedule, just make sure your watch has the following: A chronograph (stopwatch) with at least a 12-lap memory, and a countdown timer with a "Countdown Chronograph" feature (it starts the stopwatch as soon as the timer has finished counting down).

In order to easily keep track of the fartlek training sessions on our schedule, you may want to splurge on a $30 watch, but don't spend more money than that - please. Don't be a sucker.

3. Shorts
I don't have any guidelines here. There are a lot of expensive and not-so-expensive options out there. The key is to find some shorts that are physically comfortable to wear. In order to finish a marathon, you'll be literally running for hours. You shouldn't spend that time chaffing or adjusting your junk, and you shouldn't have to apply Vaseline.

My personal favorites are these Under Armour compression shorts, but you can find a perfectly good pair of shorts at Wal-Mart for $10. Go nuts.

4. A Hooded Sweatshirt
I bought mine at Target for less than $10. Forget the fancy running jackets and moisture-wicking long-sleeved clown shirts. Rocky ran in a classic ash-grey sweatsuit, and so can you. When it's cold outside, throw on a couple of t-shirts and a hooded sweatshirt, and you're good to go.

5. Diabetes Stuff
If, like me, you're a type 1 diabetic, then you'll need to make sure you're carrying the following with you at all times for emergency purposes:

• Emergency carbohydrates. A little packet of PowerGel is small and easy to carry, and provides a good enough shot of carbs to get you home if you go hypoglycemic.
• A cellular phone. I don't take one with me on every run, but if you plan on doing a long run alone, you'd be stupid not to take a phone with you if you have an emergency. Ladies who run at night or in isolated places may want to follow suit.
• Rapid-acting insulin analogue. You'll probably only need to take this with you during long runs, in case your body runs out of insulin glargine/detemir/degludec/whatever. If you go into DKA, you'll want this stuff around.

This means we diabetics are the dorks running around with fanny packs. But hey, it beats death. Besides, nobody else has the cajones to run a marathon with a condition like this. So you have my permission to sock-it-to anyone who gives you trouble over this.

Up Next: A bit about running philosophy.

The Marathon: Part I - Introduction

This coming Sunday, I begin training for the Montreal Marathon. I'm in pretty good shape already; I run about 40 minutes per day, and do strength training three times per week. Pretty good. Not great.

Because this blog is a springboard for many ideas, I thought I might include my philosophy and training secrets with respect to running, too. I've been a distance runner for nearly a quarter-century; I started when I was about seven or eight years old.

I ran my last marathon in 2008. I finished in a modest 73rd place, out of about 3,000 people, at a time of 2:47. A year later, I was diagnosed with type 1 (juvenile) diabetes mellitus. It's been a goal of mine for the past year and a half to run a strong marathon as a diabetic. It can be done, and I will do it.

And frankly, if a chronically ill guy like me can, then so can you. So why not join me?

Here's the deal: I'll be posting my 18-week training regimen right here on Stationary Waves. What I plan on undertaking shall be dubbed the Level 3 (Advanced) regimen. I will also include the Level 2, for recreational marathoners; and the Level 1, for less experienced runners interested in tackling their first marathon.

Along the way, I'll be documenting the impact this kind of training has on my diabetes control. There is precious little information out there for diabetic endurance athletes and, while I cannot claim the ability to contribute to the scientific literature on the topic, I can offer firsthand experience to other type 1 diabetics in similar circumstances.

First stop: Check out the training regimen right here, and choose the Level that's right for you.

Up next: What you'll need to successfully run a marathon.