Striders / Core

da bears

4-6 strides post run

a few drills

pilates, situps, the plank

as much as you can handle without hurting too bad the next day

The lack of core is not going to make that big of a difference. Other than your form will break down a little earlier and you will struggle a tad more on hills. As far as striders, that's even less of a factor considering you've been doing fast paced efforts. So basically you're just lacking planks, lifting, and an ab routine. Meh you should be fine.

So strides daily? Even on interval days? Thanks.

I recommend rotating through 10-30 or so exercises, several sets each of 4 or 6 exercises in a session. Vary the frequency depending on running. between 2 and 6-7 times a week. Me ayuda to keep track of how many repetitions, or time spent holding yourself in a position.

Same with strides. Do them often before or after hard or easy runs, but take a few or more days away from them occasionally. Build up the number you do, and vary that as well. You can vary the intensity. Lengthen or shorten them. 2 to 10 or more.

For the past 4 or 5 months, I have really been focusing on core and striders. Compared with before this, I feel like I have control of more of my body throughout hard efforts. Less minor injury/annoying pain. Neuromuscular conditioning indeed.

Very useful and encouraging. Thank you.

.true wrote:

I recommend rotating through 10-30 or so exercises, several sets each of 4 or 6 exercises in a session. Vary the frequency depending on running. between 2 and 6-7 times a week. Me ayuda to keep track of how many repetitions, or time spent holding yourself in a position.

Same with strides. Do them often before or after hard or easy runs, but take a few or more days away from them occasionally. Build up the number you do, and vary that as well. You can vary the intensity. Lengthen or shorten them. 2 to 10 or more.

For the past 4 or 5 months, I have really been focusing on core and striders. Compared with before this, I feel like I have control of more of my body throughout hard efforts. Less minor injury/annoying pain. Neuromuscular conditioning indeed.

Or if you have a full-time job, you use what little free time you have actually running, rather than worrying about form, core strength, neurotesticular conditioning, minimal shoes, and all that other crap that barely helps at the margins, if at all.

Seal it wrote:

Very useful and encouraging. Thank you.

.true wrote:

I recommend rotating through 10-30 or so exercises, several sets each of 4 or 6 exercises in a session. Vary the frequency depending on running. between 2 and 6-7 times a week. Me ayuda to keep track of how many repetitions, or time spent holding yourself in a position.

Same with strides. Do them often before or after hard or easy runs, but take a few or more days away from them occasionally. Build up the number you do, and vary that as well. You can vary the intensity. Lengthen or shorten them. 2 to 10 or more.

For the past 4 or 5 months, I have really been focusing on core and striders. Compared with before this, I feel like I have control of more of my body throughout hard efforts. Less minor injury/annoying pain. Neuromuscular conditioning indeed.

Lawyer Dude wrote:

Or if you have a full-time job, you use what little free time you have actually running,

Strides and hill sprints ARE running.

Coaches, how do you measure the effectiveness of strides?

Years of Coaching wrote:

Coaches, how do you measure the effectiveness of strides?

I'd like to know this too. I can't find any definitive answers out there. Some articles will hail strides as the cure all for stride length/rate issues while other articles state they will only help an athlete with his kick. Does it depend on the strengths and weaknesses of the individual or can consistent improvement be found around the board for all types of runners?

Years of Coaching wrote:

Coaches, how do you measure the effectiveness of strides?

By racing faster?

Strides are just another form of interval training. Don't overthink it. You are combining your longest effective stride with a fast stride rate.

This is a question from the less serious and slower among us (me), although I'm trying to get faster. Basically I think I am genetically just slow and I am a masters runner anyway, but I have been running seriously for years and just can't get significantly faster.

So. What are striders exactly? How do you do them? And do they really help?

Strides/striders (same thing) are fast repeats at a pace somewhat less than flat out. Start at perhaps 70 meters at a moderately fast pace and as soon as you get your breathing back to normal do another slightly longer and faster. Keep doing this until you are running fast but easy and relaxed.

You have to practice to get the feel.

The reason you are a slow runner is because you run slowly. To be fast you have to practice running fast. It ain't rocket science.

J.O. wrote:

Strides/striders (same thing) are fast repeats at a pace somewhat less than flat out. Start at perhaps 70 meters at a moderately fast pace and as soon as you get your breathing back to normal do another slightly longer and faster. Keep doing this until you are running fast but easy and relaxed.

You have to practice to get the feel.

The reason you are a slow runner is because you run slowly. To be fast you have to practice running fast. It ain't rocket science.

Thank you for the explanation. How many of these per run? Is 70 meters less than 1/4 of a track?

But do you think that some people honestly just do NOT have the ability to run much faster? I have run for probably 15 years, currently coming back from an injury but this is unusual. Mostly I've been healthy/injury free. I built up to 50-70 mpw Pftizinger plan before marathon and still fell apart. My race times increased, but not as much as I would have hoped/thought. This was a 6 month plan. Basically I gave up speed after the effort--which was about 5 years ago. Since then I just run for fun, no racing, maybe 40 mpw. Aren't some people just not capable of running at a speed that is competitive with their age group peers?? I mean, I have won awards, but the fastest women just blew me away, and I imagine on far less mileage. Like there are local women who run 18-19 min 5Ks. My PR was 22:30 . . . 10K before marathon predicted maybe 1 min faster 5K would have been possible, marathon was a disaster for reasons unrelated to training (3:46) and again this was 5 years ago, of course I would be slower now but imagine with same training I could achieve comparable race times for my current age group. I would have given anything to run faster, would do any type of training, and generally don't think many people are more passionate at my age about the sport...I'm just slow...

As J.O. says, but also they are SHORT - could be from 60m to 150m - and should have decent rest. The key point is that you are thinking about form and rhythm, not "my god it hurts, how long can I keep going for..." or "I must break 13sec for this 100"

In college we'd run round some nice cricket pitches on a summer Thursday or Friday, and might either stride 100m and walk back gently, or stride 100 and jog 300 round the edge.

If most of your running is slow aerobic, tempo or even long intervals, strides give you a chance to practice running faster - maybe at 800 pace. Done regularly, this will help strengthen feet, hams and ankles, improve coordination, and generally mean that any lower pace feels easier. You can also get the same benefit from fartlek sessions with some short efforts or from hill sprints, and you can get some of the same strength benefits from weights/circuits/bounding. But if you only have time for one thing, make it a few strides (flat or uphill)

IMHO The biggest reason old geezers and marathon runners lose speed is that they never practice running fast.

Interestingly, a schedule for Buddy Edelen (Marathon WR 1950s) shows that he was doing a few fast 100s every week; and the same thing has been in many elite athletes' schedules for 50-60 years.

Thank you. I will try them. Most of my running for 15 years I would put in the slow aerobic category, with the exception of a 6 month stretch about 5 years ago when I did a training plan. I was amazed that I was faster, but again not as fast as the really fast women. And I was probably training much more. That's when I concluded that I'm just slow...But again thank you. Of course I will never give up until they put me in the grave!!

eurodonkey, I ran my fastest 1500 and 10 at 43 (one week apart) and my fastest 800 at 45 (and a fast 5000 2 hours later, which Tim Grose our UK stats compiler doesn't believe) and my fastest 3000 at 45 also.

Good luck on your 15.30 ish 5000 this year.

J.O. wrote:

eurodonkey, I ran my fastest 1500 and 10 at 43 (one week apart) and my fastest 800 at 45 (and a fast 5000 2 hours later, which Tim Grose our UK stats compiler doesn't believe) and my fastest 3000 at 45 also.

Good luck on your 15.30 ish 5000 this year.

You and eurodonkey were saying the EXACT same thing. You just saw the word "geezers", got all upset, then didn't read the rest of the sentence.