After six weeks of hard speedwork, stair-running at Stanford stadium, and mega-weight workouts – no surprise, I got injured. But the layoff would prove a blessing, because it gave me time to reflect on my goals.
Could I run without trashing my life? I was weary of mismanaged training. I longed for balance and harmony.
I prayed for guidance, and the next day I stumbled across a message that I’d saved years earlier on the computer. It was from Eric Robinson, an ultramarathoner who runs amazing numbers of races. I once asked Eric how he managed to race so often. He laughed and said he would often sign up for so many races, he’d forget which one he was supposed to run that weekend, and he’d have to consult the spreadsheet where he logs his entries.
Eric told me he trains very little. Yet he races well, and he’s finished most of the major US 100-mile trail races, including Hardrock, the most difficult “hundred” of all.1 In that old message, Eric credited his success to putting all of his effort into the training runs that really matter. For an ultrarunner, that means the weekend long run, which, for Eric, was usually a race.
Eric told me he might do several fast 400 repeats on the track at midweek, but nothing more. He was essentially running just one day a week, but it was often a 30- to 50-miler. It was good training for an ultrarunner, though it might not work as well for, say, a 10K specialist or marathoner. In an email to the Ultra List, Eric described his training before his first 100-mile race:
My most aggressive mileage ramping occurred a couple years ago when my long run went from zero to one hundred in less than six months. I believe that it succeeded because of the massive amounts of rest I got between runs (i.e., in 23 weeks, I ran only 36 times).
I started out trying to run at least two or three times per week, because at the time I believed that was the minimum for any training schedule. I started to make real progress when I abandoned this idea (week 8), and decided to run only once per week unless I felt exceptionally strong.
Yesterday’s run drove home the lesson about harmonious training. During the week, I had let my body become dehydrated, and when Saturday rolled around, I was feeling mildly wasted. Nevertheless, I was eager to begin my new training plan, and so I forged ahead and ran 4½ hours in the Marin Headlands.
I set out from Tennessee Valley and wandered along the coast to Muir Beach and Muir Woods, then trotted up the Dipsea Trail to Cardiac Hill. Arriving at the top, I stumbled off the trail and sat on a rock, feeling thoroughly knackered, and debating limply whether to press on to Stinson Beach, or turn around.
A young runner came trotting up the Dipsea, and when he saw me, he walked over to admire the view. It was gorgeous: from Cardiac you can see 15 miles north to Point Reyes, 15 miles south to Pacifica, and 20 miles west to the Farallon Islands. The runner said that he’d cycled up Mt. Tamalpais that morning. I asked if he was a triathlete, and he said yes. He volunteered that he’d recently hired a personal trainer who told him to put 99 percent of his energy into the workouts that really count, and that if he felt tired, he should simply skip the shorter “recovery” runs.
The universe had spoken twice of balance and harmony – first through Eric, and again through the young triathlete on Cardiac Hill. This time, feeling painfully battered, I drank the message deep into my cells.
How subtly our minds and feelings try to misguide us, playing upon the urge that impels us to do self-hurtful things, whether from pride, confusion, or fretful desire. And with what infinite patience the higher Self allows us to bash our heads into the wall, until we discover the humility to imbibe the next, precious lesson on the path to inner freedom.
1 Just for fun, here’s the Hardrock course description: “The 100-mile race in Silverton CO in early-mid July has 33,000 ft. of climb at an altitude of 7700 to 14,048 ft with 11 mountain passes above 12,000 ft. Cutoff is 48 hours. Terrain is mostly trail, scree, snow, and tundra with many river crossings. Parts of the course are climbed with ropes on scree or snow at a 45-degree slope. Some night sections traverse the edges of cliffs dropping hundreds of feet. Altitude sickness and pulmonary edema are common among competitors. Weather: 15 F to 85 F with afternoon hailstorms and lightning possible.”
