PMC run session Jun 6, 2009

We welcome Nelson Tan to our PMC running community! Nelson joined our run last Sat on Jun 6. We hope that you can join us for future runs.

The devotion for this run is taken from Ephesians 4:2 "Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love."

In the past two weeks, Stephanie and Desmond completed 10 km and 15 km, respectively, at the Passion Run, and Rufina completed a 10 km run and Hongyee completed his first marathon at the Sundown Marathon.

In a previous post, Hongyee shared about sticking to the plan when the race is on, where other runners made him want to run faster. He is referring to patience in the race, to keep to one's pace regardless of what others are doing.

Patience is crucial in structuring our running program. There are good reasons for the 10% rule and having recovery week. The 10% rule says that we should increase mileage no more than 10% per week. So if I ran 20 km last week, my total mileage for this week should be no more than 22 km.

We incorporate recovery week into our training where after every three weeks of increasing mileage, we adopt a week of reduced frequency and intensity to allow the body to recover. These rules are meant to allow our bodies to adapt to higher mileage and intensities gradually over time. Patience is required.

Too often we want to see significant improvements, run longer distances, run faster times within unrealistically short time frame. Ignore these time-honored rules, and risk injury. To many experienced runners, the objective is not merely to complete a certain distance or within a certain time, but to do so injury-free. Train with patience to avoid injury. That way, we'll find running more enjoyable and sustainable.

For more information about the 10% rule, see Best Running Tips, Sports Injury Prevention.

Recovery in training: Build Rest and Recovery , Recovery and Regeneration.