Workout Concept: Deep into the competitive season, we have hopefully developed all facets of strong running: a variety of energy systems, neuromuscular abilities and connectivity, biomechanical efficiencies, and mental patterning that coordinates with these efforts. This workout enables you to key into your specific goal pace on specific goal terrain with desired goal mental responses. It follows the law of specificity—when you get closer to your goal performance, mimic the demands of that goal as much as possible. The workout affords us the ability to work on running cohesively, developing our psychological phases of a race, and becoming powerful—when you are self-aware, then you are powerful. You are prepared and you trust in yourself.

This is a demanding psychological and physiological workout. Consequently, I develop the components of this throughout the season through a variety of psychological and physiological practices. Each prior workout has a psychological and physiological momentum, and we attempt to pattern that toward desirable outcomes. I think this results in our runners having truly elite psychological approaches and responses to the competitive environment. Our psychological systems uses: running journals, reflecting on choices and “habit loops,” creating mantras and effective self-talk, interpreting internal and external feedback, experiencing failure, while our physiological plan parallels the mental approach by providing a challenge that requires the psychological goal of the workout.

Workout: [Read more…]