For those of you who hate indoors: Rowbury says Alberto's focus on indoors and 2-peaks has really benfitted her

I agree. I think if you can properly plan, having two peaks in a year is beneficial as long as one is your "primary" and the other is secondary. This allows you to plan your periodization accordingly.

For some athletes this may not hold true, but I think for most athletes it is true.

I think where most develop a negative impression of indoors is because they burned out doing three seasons in college with no overall plan, or they overemphasized their peak for indoors, resulting in burning out during outdoors. I think it is the exception where an athlete/coach does it "right" and then finds it to set them back.

Do they take a break after indoor?

I love indoors, breaks up the monotony of boring and cold winter training.

Also who doesn't train every month? Your break if you are pro is october, enjoy that month.

The pro version of indoors and outdoors is a little different than college. The college runners basically go from indoors straight into outdoors as their championship meets are mid to late May and early June. Elites can pick a handful of high quality indoor meets and then focusing on training for again during March, April and May before having a full summer of outdoor meets.

Indoors is fun. You walk into run a good indoor meet, the building is charged with a seductive energy you can't get any other way.

Alberto cut his teeth at weekly Dual County League meets on his home turf inside the Wayland Field House. A gritty but wonderful 11 lap track with mildly banked turns.

A year older than Al, running for a rival team, I was there. It was some of the most darn fun I've ever had. Eight teams every week, tapping into something magical.

Yes.

Pros: Winter indoor, summer outdoorCollege: Winter indoor, Spring outdoor

Indoor? wrote:

The pro version of indoors and outdoors is a little different than college. The college runners basically go from indoors straight into outdoors as their championship meets are mid to late May and early June. Elites can pick a handful of high quality indoor meets and then focusing on training for again during March, April and May before having a full summer of outdoor meets.

Craig Lutz Fan wrote:

Do they take a break after indoor?

they treat the year as two wholly distinct cycles. break after indoor for NOP is same as after outdoor.

markpryor2 wrote:

Craig Lutz Fan wrote:

Do they take a break after indoor?

they treat the year as two wholly distinct cycles. break after indoor for NOP is same as after outdoor.

That might explain why Rowbury wasn't quite as sharp as the leaders at Prefontaine last year. It was a bit early after her indoor break to be ready to race at that level.

NCAA should get rid of indoor 3k and 5k plus schedule at least 3 months between outdoor and indoor champs. Oh, and make womens XC 10k.

This gives distance runners two peaks a year, XC and outdoors and gives the tracksters two peaks a year, indoor and outdoor even if indoor is more of a mini peak.

A few runners will be and to do well at 10k and the indoor mile and compete at both but these runners will be the exception and not the norm.

Pro Alberto mods are deleting posts in this thread. Post with care.

I agree that indoors can really muck up a training schedule for collegiate runners who are basically racing almost year round. I do think it is tough for youth runners as well. I know my kids love indoor and then running during the summer and going to Nationals in the beginning of August. We had some issues though when their school track season came around in the spring and they were a bit too tired to run that closely after indoors. We tried to pick and choose, but it started all kinds of issues. So it seems all amateur runners have a more intense schedule than pro runners throughout the year. Kind of weird that people do not see that and try and finish up indoors a bit earlier to at least allow the student athletes time to recover before another grueling season. I realize I went off the mark a bit, but this issue hits close to home because my kids were either told to skip the season they loved competing in or suck it up and basically run year round. It is just sad that we are allowing young runners to destroy their bodies when even the pros understand that racing year round will only lead to problems down the line.

I wish there was a winter xc circuit here like there is in Europe. You could build a great aerobic base for outdoor while still getting in some good races

Why do you keep pimping San Francisco runners?

Well, San Francisco has an incredible talent pool. You know how all the Kenyan kids have to run to and from school every day at some log distances, well San Fransisco also has something like that going on. You see in San Fransisco there is a much higher than average homosexual population so in order for kids to get away from them, they are constantly running. To school, from school, to the store, to the pool, and everywhere else they go. They are afraid to get caught so they are always on the move therefore they are faster than kids from other parts of the USA and even the world. As years went by and the next generation came, they evolved into very fast, straight, runners.

These kids also have longer limbs because they need to keep these pillow biters at bay, so after hundreds of years of this little cat and mouse game, their limbs are actually longer than most peoples and it makes them faster.