Her Trails 100km

WEEK 11

OBJECTIVE

“What is a staircase, but a corridor improved by elevation?” Catherine Gilbert Murdock Welcome to stair training!!! This week's objective is how to get strong and the technique required to go UP stairs. 4 key tips to consider whilst climbing stairs are: (a) good form - with an upright posture in order to recruit the large posterior chain muscles, especially your glutes and hamstrings. The core and strength work you do in this program will assist you to keep your chest up and your posture tall. (b) use of your arms - your arm swing supports your power recruitment and assists with the rhythm of our legs, helping us move faster and more efficiently. (c) Shorten your stride - Be light on your feet and try to take the stairs one at a time. Taking large steps will mean you build up lactic acid in your muscles faster, so be careful to not get caught up in taking bigger steps, especially early in the race when the energy and adrenaline is high. (d) Watch your landing - practice landing with your foot fully on each stair and keeping the time your foot stays on the stairs (ground-contact time) short in order to maximize power on the lift. For further details check out the weekly email. Next week we will turn our focus to descending stairs, stay tuned!

TRAINING LEVEL CHART

Reference this training level chart to help you understand your efforts for each training session.

LEVEL 1- 3

EASY RUNS/RECOVERY

LEVEL 4-5

MODERATE

LEVEL 6

GOAL RACE EFFORT
[aka HALF MARATHON PACE]

LEVEL 7-8

THRESHOLD
[aka 5KM/10KM PACE]

LEVEL 9-10

STRONG SPEED
[AKA 1 MILE – 400M PACE]

DAY ONE

BASE MILES

45 minutes @ level 2-3

Intention: Form focus – revisit your focus on hips.

Cue: Neutral and stable hips will allow your leg to fully extend behind you so that it can pull forward into the next stride, it will increase your power and help protect you from injury, so this is what we are going to begin working towards achieving. For this run, focus on keeping your hips high and forward. Holding your hips up and forwards as you run will help engage your glutes and will bring your centre of mass closer to over the landing foot as you strike the ground. It will also result in a lighter and quicker contact-time and slightly increased cadence (stride frequency) as you reduce any tendency you may have had to over stride.

DAY TWO

DAY 2 - WEEK 1 STENGTH PHOTO (LANDSCAPE)

SPEED PLAY & STRENGTH

Stair Speed Play

15 minutes @ level 2-3

2 minute stair effort @ level 7-8

x 6

THEN

10 minutes @ level 3

Note: Focus on posture and even effort. Try to hit the same point on the hill/stairs every effort.

Strength

DAY THREE

BASE MILES

12km @ Level 1-3

OR

1 hour @ level 1-3

DAY FOUR

SPEED PLAY AND FLOW

(1) AM SESSION: TIME TRIAL

10 minutes @ level 2

5km time trial

10 minutes @ level 3

Note: Please record this session on Strava! Remember a time trial is not a race. It’s an opportunity for you to measure your current level of performance against the clock. If you need to walk, jog, crawl… no problems, just keep moving forward until you hit 5km. Write or screen shot your time (and course) down, then compare it to Week 5’s time trial.

(2) PM SESSION: YOGA – Balance

DAY FIVE

ACTIVE RECOVERY OR REST DAY

30 minutes

This is not a run! During this 30 minute session you can walk, cycle, swim, row or use a elliptical machine. We want your body moving at a low intensity for an active recovery session.

DAY SIX

LONG RUN

She-cheetah 2hr 45mins @ level 3-4 on hilly trails with stairs

Lionesses 3.5 hours @ level 1-3 on hilly trails – Power hiking all the climbs

Note: we have separated the long runs into two groups, She-cheetah and Lionesses. You will selected your training group based on how you aim to race UTA 50km or 100km. Below is a detailed description of both groups.

She-cheetah

50km: Your goal is to run most of the course except the stairs/steep inclines.

100km: Aiming to mostly run (running 65-80%)

Lionesses

Here you will be aiming to walk 50% (or more) of the course.

DAY SEVEN

Rest day 🙂