Coach Jay Johnson's Articles

The Keys to Injury-free Running

📌 KEY TAKEAWAYS

Post-run strength and mobility work is essential, but it won’t make up for poor training design — intelligent programming is the foundation of injury prevention.
An injury-free system requires five elements: a thoughtful progression of volume, intensity, and strides, a progression of workouts that teaches running by feel, and a weekly rhythm of easy and hard days.
Coaches using a comprehensive system consistently report zero ...

NXR and Footlocker Training Plans

📌 KEY TAKEAWAYS

After the state meet, athletes are emotionally drained from 3–4 weeks of high-stakes racing — give them an easy first week before introducing hard workouts.
The two biggest post-season training mistakes are (a) not giving athletes easy days the first week and (b) not practicing at the faster goal pace they’ll need for NXR/Footlocker courses.
Use short progression runs (20–25 minutes) for fun aerobic stimulus, and ensure at le...

10 Keys for Great XC Races in October and November

📌 KEY TAKEAWAYS

You don’t need an A+ race — solid B+ performances will produce a great team score, especially since much of the competition will falter by aiming too high.
Trust running less: the aerobic fitness is built, the “hay is in the barn,” and now is the time for fresh legs and mental readiness.
Focus on what’s in your control — weather, course conditions, and other people’s energy are not. Bad weather is actually an advantage for we...

If You Want To Do Things You've Never Done Before...

Here’s a phrase I love to use with athletes:

If you want to do things you’ve never done before, you’ve got to do things you’ve never done before.

You asked your kids to do things like a new warm-up or new post-run work to run PRs in May.

Now that it’s May you are going to ask them to do things they’ve never done before:

How to Warm-up Between Races

📌 KEY TAKEAWAYS

After the first race, take 10–15 minutes to feel mostly normal, then do a quick 6-exercise mobility routine (iron cross, low whips, groiners, reach under/up, cat-cow, side bends) before hydrating and refueling.
Use an adjusted Jeff Boele warm-up for the second race: 20m of dynamic drills, wall/fence exercises (leg swings, hurdle trail leg, eagles), ground exercises, then A-march and A-skip sequences.
Skip B-march and B-skip w...

Imagery for Runners

📌 KEY TAKEAWAYS

Mental imagery is a powerful tool for race preparation — find a quiet space and spend 3–10 minutes per day visualizing your race, starting 10–14 days out.
In early sessions, envision everything going perfectly: the pace, the crowd, grabbing water easily, feeling strong. Build that positive mental picture first.
Once the positive image is solid, practice visualizing things going wrong — a tough mile, a missed aid station — and...

Growth Mindset for Runners

📌 KEY TAKEAWAYS

A growth mindset focuses on getting better; a fixed mindset focuses on being good — this subtle distinction leads to dramatically different training decisions and race experiences.
Fixed mindset traps for runners include using training runs as proving grounds, running too hard on recovery days, and chasing mileage/pace numbers for social media instead of listening to your body.
Growth mindset decisions include racing in races...