Are you ready to become a faster and more injury proof runner?  Here is a 10 minute routine for you to add after your run! 1.  Body Weight Squats. Position your feet shoulder width apart, with your toes facing forward or only slightly splayed out.  Raise your arms (this will engage your lats and back) and look forward.  Sit back, as if there were a chair behind you, and don’t

We have talked about how important it is to have a strong core–in fact we have talked about your core so much, I hope you are still listening! Your core is key to strong, injury-free running, and hardly any of us work our core as much as we could. Here’s a great article based mainly upon interviews with Greg McMillan (one of my favorite coaches) and Lolo Jones (one of

How many of these athletes have warmed up enough before starting their race? As many of the athletes in MVXC16 know, at the urging of the MIT track & field coach, I’ve passed out a few heart rate monitors and am using one myself.  As I use my HR monitor and look at the results, I’ve been getting quite a bit of data that I did not have before.  This new information

Runners’ muscles get tight–it’s the nature of our sport and the life we have chosen!  It’s easy to skip stretching; I admit, stretching can get tedious.  However, stretching can be your secret weapon, your path to longer strides and more speed, and your shield against common running injuries. Here we are going to present four good static (or long-hold) stretches.  Static stretches are best done after a workout when your

Racing Preparation   The Night Before Eat a healthy well-balanced dinner. Drink plenty of water. Look at the Meet Sheet so you have all the information you need (race time, etc.) Packing checklist for the race: –Uniform –Training shoes for warming up and for after the race –Racing shoes if you have them; racing shoes are recommended for competitive runners –Sock for racing –Dry clothing for after the race (dry

Hydration:  Why We Should Care   As runners, we all hear about hydration.  However many of us just drink when we feel thirsty and really don’t think much further about hydration.  We hope this web posting helps you understand what is going on in your body, and what you should be doing to keep hydrated—and keep your body operating at it’s best. Why Water is Important Water carries out a

  Hey Monta Vista XC– Think about your kicks! There is not much equipment that we need as XC runners; shorts and a ratty old t-shirt will get us most of the way ready for a run (though a nice, technical MVXCOUNTRY shirt is pretty sweet, don’t you think?).  But shoes…folks, I want you to think about your shoes. Shoes are crazy important.  Your feet hit the ground about 1,000

Having a running log is a key tool of the serious runner.  There are lots of ways to keep a running log and it does not have to be complicated: –An Excel spreadsheet or Word document (your coach has a log on Excel that goes back for years). –Notes on a calendar. –A ledger or lab notebook. –On-line logs exist too. It doesn’t take much!  In addition to tracking mileage

Every serious runner should own a foam roller.  We pound our bodies constantly and repetitively, thousands of impacts per mile.  The constant work we endure is good for our bodies, but our muscles do rebel a little bit too.  That’s where a foam roller comes in. A foam roller can augment stretching, as with the IT band.  Rolling your IT band (in your coach’s opinion) is enough to justify owning

I posted a couple photos of the Distance team running our first sets of hill repeats of the season (shown below), and pro runner Josh Cox texted back to me right away–‘Hills are where it’s at!‘ It’s true, hills give us so much as runners.  Hills make us hurt, make us work, make us stronger.  Hills are resistance work.  Hills are a coach every step, making us get fast with

As a coach, having winter break fall two weeks after practice starts is not ideal!  Having a week off a little a later in the season, when we are starting to get tired, might be better.  But at the same time, a break is nice…a break gives a coach time to do things that don’t always fit into a two-hour practice after school.  So I really enjoyed the chance to