第130页 | The Big Book of Endurance Training and R

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MY PERSPECTIVE—BY DR. CORALEE THOMPSON

Dr. Coralee Thompson lectures worldwide and is known for her work with neurologically delayed children, and is author of the book Healthy Brains, Healthy Children.

Growing up on a small farm in Idaho, I was no stranger to hard physical work: changing sprinkler pipes, bucking alfalfa bales, tilling soil by hand, riding bareback, and swimming in the irrigation canals. I complied with the compulsory physical education classes, never enjoying the feeling of competition with my peers. I felt lanky, awkward, and slow with almost every sport. Not until college did I discover my natural grace and speed in the water. With a six-foot-plus arm span, I soon realized how effortless swimming could be and how fast I could move through the water.

Except on two occasions, competition did not appeal to me. The first “race” was during an intercollegiate event. I was eighteen years old. I entered six events in swimming and won them all: 100-free, 100-breast, 100-back, 100-butterfly, 500-free, and 500-back. The second “race” was during a masters swimming event in Cairo, Egypt. I was thirty-three years old. Once again, I won all the events that I entered. For a brief moment, I considered what a thrill athletic competition might be for me. Instead, I chose to continue a variety of physical activities while allowing myself to focus on the health and fitness of my developing children.

As a mother and physician, I never pushed organized sports on my sons, although we exercised together every day. By age six and every fall until age thirteen, they would participate in their grade school-sponsored triathlon, which included 400 meters of swimming, ten kilometers of biking, and five kilometers of running. Throughout the year, we would swim two or three times a week and run at least four days a week. These workouts were always slow and easy. While running, the boys would wear heart-rate monitors to make sure their heart rates did not exceed 165 beats per minute. We had fun being together and feeling the positive effects of exercise. As soon as school finished, we would start biking together on park trails while gradually increasing the distance of successive rides. Two months before the triathlon, we would start putting two different exercises together, for example, run then swim. The most difficult transition was always biking followed by running. No matter how easily we would bike, our legs felt like jelly in the beginning of the run. By one month before the triathlon, every day included two exercises together. Two weeks before the event, we would do a mock trial. Every triathlon was a joyful experience among their classmates, teachers, and parents. When finished with their own triathlon, each kid would continue running with younger classmates until everyone had finished. Years following grade school, my sons would go back to coach, run with, and encourage the young triathletes. As a parent, my greatest satisfaction was not the result of the triathlons, but rather our consistent exercising together.

For one school year, we had an exchange student from Japan. Morokazu, thirteen, had amazing self-discipline in three distinct behaviors: he played the violin in the basement from two to four hours a day, he never ate processed foods, and he faithfully ran six days a week. I observed his running routine with curiosity. He would slowly walk out the front door, looking at his watch, taking small steps with increasing speed and breadth. While checking his watch several times, he would begin a slight jog down the block. About fifteen minutes later, he would round the corner and pass the house running at an easy pace. Each time he would pass the house, he would be running faster, but still looking comfortable and relaxed. After about five passes or so (just over five miles), he would begin walking again while periodically checking his watch. On the weekends, he would be out running for up to two hours and return to the house as if he’d simply walked around the block. From time to time and with quiet pride, he would tell me about his best mile times—6:30, for example. I admired his method. One day, he showed me his exercise “bible,” a book written in Japanese called The Maffetone Method. From then on, I followed Phil’s recommendations, too. One is never too old to learn from a child.

Both of my sons are grown now, but every time they visit me, we still take the time for long hikes. It’s just a way of life.

Despite the evidence that less training offers more benefits, overtraining due to high volume is still common. If you are training for a single sport, your schedule is usually easier than if you are a multisport athlete. Single-sport athletes will usually have one workout a day. The best time to do this is based more on your daily non-training schedule rather than on the latest ever-changing research. When do you work? What other obligations exist? Many runners, for example, find a morning workout most suitable. Athletes in other sports may have limits; swimmers usually have pool hours to consider, cyclists and skiers the weather. I frequently recommend single-sport athletes perform some other activity one to three times per week. As previously noted throughout this book, cross-training has a positive benefit, especially for the brain and nervous system, as long as it is aerobic and fits into your schedule.

If you are a multisport athlete, you may have a busier schedule. But this does not mean you have to perform each sport every day. However, many endurance athletes still attempt this, and often to their detriment. Let me use the example of Jay. He loved triathlon but was stuck in an overtraining cycle for three years. He would train in each of his three events as many days as possible. He would run at 5 AM, swim at noon, and ride late in the day. The problem: Jay had his own business and worked from 7 AM until 9 PM He also had a family. Maintaining that schedule for five days, with Tuesday and Thursday reserved for his long bike ride and run respectively, was quite a chore. Jay was often exhausted, and about every couple of months, he’d have to take about a week off completely due to illness. As he started feeling better, he would pick up his “normal” schedule again. But as this vicious cycle would not end, Jay consulted me for help. I gave Jay my version of a program tailored to his needs, explaining how he would race better and get healthier. However, he could not understand how one could improve without the very high-volume weeks, noting that the pro triathletes all trained that way. I assured him this was not the case. Unfortunately, Jay was not compatible with my approach, and I never saw him again in my office. But occasionally we would meet at a race, where year after year he showed no improvement and often had an injury.

If you’re a multisport athlete with at least three days a week of each activity, your schedule can be very effective, although even this much volume is not always necessary. If possible, spread these workouts through the week so they are not on consecutive days. For example:

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