Creativity and clarity of thought do not come naturally to me. I have to work at it. As a writer, I have always marveled at those who can write fiction, short-story prose or poetry, and write it well. I'm not that creative. I need the real world to power my words. And even then, it's not that great.
Anyway, my creative task this week was to come up with a salient workout schedule for the break for the distance men of Marist College. This is always a difficult task. I want to strike the right chord of hard work, speed and recovery -- all the while knowing that several men probably will just train hard and well and not really follow the schedule religiously. Which is fine. But for those that like structure and will actually read and adhere to the schedule, it's important that I get it right. Or at least come close.
And so I struggled with it. But this morning, there was a breakthrough. Perhaps it's the latent journalist in me, the guy who needs a deadline to produce. Guys were starting to leave because they were done with finals; I had to produce something. So I sat down at the laptop and had an amazingly productive 1.5 hours this morning.
-- I completed the daily workout schedule. It had started percolating last week, was mostly done on Tuesday but needed some final tweaking on Wednesday morning. Done.
-- Not satisfied with that relatively easy task, I then plunged into some more long-range thinking. I decided to map out phases of training for the next three or so months of indoor track and early outdoor track. This is an important step for me; I tend to fly by the seat of my pants in terms of creating workouts. Often, I will script a workout while athletes are warming up for that very workout. This may seem chaotic, and perhaps it is. But to me, as long as there is a method behind the madness, it is OK. As long as I know what I want to get accomplished on that given day and that thought process is powering it, it should work out OK.
That is why creating these training cycles -- defining their length and their scope -- is important. Once the cycle is created, the actual implementation of the workouts can follow a seemingly endless and limitless pattern. As long as the concept behind the workouts is there, there are no bounds of how to execute what you want to get out of that workout.
So anyway, I felt really good about the thought process. Vess arrived -- with coffee! -- and we went over it for a few minutes. Excellent. A good morning of work. The December/early January time frame for all training groups consists almost exclusively of strength-based training. Hills. Fartleks. Accelerator (progression) runs. Tempos. Cruise ints. Stuff like that. Pretty basic. Right? Makes perfect sense. Right?
Feeling secure in my thought processes for a change ... and then in walks Mr. Awesome (Curt) and Conor. They have an idea. They have a great idea, they proclaim! Instead of the hill workout I had planned for them, they ask, would it be OK if they did quarters (400s). Quarters? Ha! Flies in the face of everything I was thinking about over the past hour or so.
Normally, I would dismiss this idiotic idea on its face. It's Dec. 16. Who the heck needs quarters of Dec. 16? But alas, I am a sucker for 400-meter workouts. It is my belief that quarters can be used for ANY training group at ANY time. Sprinters? Check. Mid-distance? Check. Long distance? Check. Marathon? Believe it or not, it can work there too!
The key is the proper volume, intensity and recovery. This is where I put my foot down. Mr. A and Conor said they were thinking "not that many quarters, like 8 of them, but pretty fast." Nope. Sorry boys. We do quarters on Dec. 16, we do A LOT of them.
The plan was hatched: 2 sets of 8. Short recovery. Cutdown style, but not too fast. No faster than 3km race pace. Still not a great idea in all, but it's quarters. I'm a sucker for quarters.
Well, it turned out to be a great practice. First and foremost, it must be noted that the hill repeat guys had a GREAT workout. Good for them. That's what they should be doing.
Mr. A and Conor? They ran the 16x400 workout to perfection. They looked relaxed, smooth and ran them in control (for the most part) and with short breaks. Again, was it the best workout on this day? Probably not. But it's quarters. It worked. They looked great, felt great and are confident in their fitness level.
Sometimes, you go with your heart and your gut. Macrocycles and microcycles are nice. But you coach people, not robots, and sometimes you listen, adapt and have fun.
1 comment:
Great stuff. You and I think so much alike it sometimes scares me. There is lots of science to coaching, but it's the art of coaching that matters most. Having that long range plan is essential. I generally sat down each season and worked backwards from the most critical meet at the end of the season.
Once the plan is in place, it becomes all about adaptability. Especially in winter. There are some coaches whose workouts are in stone. It's their way or the highway. For me it was always my initial plan, input from my athletes and the final plan which sometimes came together on workout day just like your 400 workout today. Of course most days were what was in the plan. But some of the best days were adaptions suggested by athletes as we went along.
Happy Holidays!
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