Comments on: Are easy days a waste of time? http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/2009/08/are-easy-days-a-waste-of-time/ A running resource for coaches and athletes Fri, 03 Feb 2012 08:38:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: hamiltontrack http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/2009/08/are-easy-days-a-waste-of-time/#comment-307 hamiltontrack Fri, 11 Sep 2009 06:59:27 +0000 http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/?p=740#comment-307 Are easy days a waste of time... NO... with middle of the road and lower HS athletes they are MORE important then hard days... <br><br>with higher end athletes they are the key to the kingdom... a well placed easy day refreshed the mind and body... Are easy days a waste of time… NO… with middle of the road and lower HS athletes they are MORE important then hard days…

with higher end athletes they are the key to the kingdom… a well placed easy day refreshed the mind and body…

]]> By: billzeebub http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/2009/08/are-easy-days-a-waste-of-time/#comment-308 billzeebub Wed, 02 Sep 2009 06:05:03 +0000 http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/?p=740#comment-308 One of the very first things that i teach my athletes, is that unless they take both easy days and rest days when i set them, that they are not going to benefit fully from the training that we are doing. If they are not achieving the supercompensation, then they are unlikely to achieve excellence and there is very little point in training quite so hard in the first place, as you can achieve 'reasonable' results on far less structured and time consuming programs. <br><br>I've always found that as soon as i get the message across to each athlete and they understand it fully, then there is rarely any problem in trusting them to keep the easy days easy and take rest days if needed. The only problem is that some guys/girls just don't understand just how slow easy runs should be and i've had several who have tried to clip around at something just short of tempo pace initially. <br><br>What i generally do, is have the newbies shadow some of the more experienced guys on their easy runs and learn it parrot fashion........this works nicely, as when they see their team leaders running easy, then it takes the pressure off a little, as they gain more confidence in the program. <br><br>On the subject of cross training vs easy running on 'easy days', i'm pretty open minded. I coach some very good duathletes/triathletes, who as runners are in the 14:30-15:00/30:20-31:30 region and we obviously have the opportunity to use either the bike or the pool on easy days. This works great for us and has not proven to be a problem over many years now. However, i do prefer my 'runners' to use running on their easy days, unless they are needing to either rest or use the eliptical trainer or pool to help them recover from niggles on these days. One of the very first things that i teach my athletes, is that unless they take both easy days and rest days when i set them, that they are not going to benefit fully from the training that we are doing. If they are not achieving the supercompensation, then they are unlikely to achieve excellence and there is very little point in training quite so hard in the first place, as you can achieve 'reasonable' results on far less structured and time consuming programs.

I've always found that as soon as i get the message across to each athlete and they understand it fully, then there is rarely any problem in trusting them to keep the easy days easy and take rest days if needed. The only problem is that some guys/girls just don't understand just how slow easy runs should be and i've had several who have tried to clip around at something just short of tempo pace initially.

What i generally do, is have the newbies shadow some of the more experienced guys on their easy runs and learn it parrot fashion……..this works nicely, as when they see their team leaders running easy, then it takes the pressure off a little, as they gain more confidence in the program.

On the subject of cross training vs easy running on 'easy days', i'm pretty open minded. I coach some very good duathletes/triathletes, who as runners are in the 14:30-15:00/30:20-31:30 region and we obviously have the opportunity to use either the bike or the pool on easy days. This works great for us and has not proven to be a problem over many years now. However, i do prefer my 'runners' to use running on their easy days, unless they are needing to either rest or use the eliptical trainer or pool to help them recover from niggles on these days.

]]> By: Coach Peter http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/2009/08/are-easy-days-a-waste-of-time/#comment-309 Coach Peter Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:31:12 +0000 http://www.coachjayjohnson.com/?p=740#comment-309 Great post Jay. It's sometimes hard to get my kids and even my post-collegiate runners to understand. They sometimes feel as though every run needs to be medium to hard and if it isn't they aren't getting anything out of it. The problem is when they are rolling higher mileages, day after day of hard work wears them down and the speed work doesn't do as much as it should for them. <br><br>Aside from throwing the heaps of research at them, does anyone have ideas how to get them to understand this concept. One of my new athletes can't get this through his head and I'm quite certain it's why he's been consistantly hurt the past few years.<br><br>Thanks Great post Jay. It's sometimes hard to get my kids and even my post-collegiate runners to understand. They sometimes feel as though every run needs to be medium to hard and if it isn't they aren't getting anything out of it. The problem is when they are rolling higher mileages, day after day of hard work wears them down and the speed work doesn't do as much as it should for them.

Aside from throwing the heaps of research at them, does anyone have ideas how to get them to understand this concept. One of my new athletes can't get this through his head and I'm quite certain it's why he's been consistantly hurt the past few years.

Thanks

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