Innholdsfortegnelse for Jan/Feb 2023 i Runner's World South Africa

Mike F, Editor Comrades, 89.9km. At times it feels impossible. But when you enter that finishing stretch, nothing can touch it. Alana M, Creative Director UTMB, in 2015 – 172km around the Mont Blanc massif in France, Switzerland and Italy. It’s a bucket-list event for any long-distance trail runner. I think I found my limit for distance there… Ryan S, Gear Ed Prepping for a Patagonia mission, I did a training run combining mountains and road that totalled 78km. The race itself was only 55km; but I was having great fun on the training run, so I just kept going! Dave B, Chief Sub Knysna Half. And plenty other halves, apparently they’re all 21.1km. But that’s my limit. I once considered a 27km event, but lay down until the feeling…

RESEARCHERS FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS, US, followed more than 2 000 middle-aged adults from a variety of ethnic backgrounds for 11 years. They found that those who managed at least 7 000 steps a day were 50% to 70% less likely to die during the study period than those who managed less than 7 000. Interestingly, the intensity of the steps – in other words, how quickly each person was walking – didn’t seem to matter. Both slow and fast walkers enjoyed the life-lengthening benefits of notching up 7 000 steps a day. An earlier study, from Harvard Medical School, suggested that an even lower step count of 4 400 is enough to significantly lower mortality in older women. Physiotherapist Derek Griffin, a 2:29 marathoner, believes that it’s time…

THE SPORTS SCIENTIST TRAINING WITH THE FACTS A on its stomach, and runners train on theirs. When you run, your fuel supply is either carbohydrate or fat. And when you recover, your fuel choices are even more important. Most of us are aware of how crucial carbs are on the run; but perhaps we’re less aware of the importance of carbohydrates to recovery, and therefore to our adaptation to training. Remember, if you don’t recover, you don’t adapt; so the things you do after training are the things that unlock the benefits of that training session. The carbohydrate contribution to recovery happens in two stages. The first (and probably obvious) one is what happens after we’ve finished our run. Remember that during running, we’re powering our muscles with ATP that comes…

Mix it up Run on different surfaces – training on grass and off-road is more strengthening than concrete. Make it fun Tag, shuttle runs, relay races – they all develop fast-twitch fibres, encourage agility and build social relationships. Add strength/conditioning Introduce circuits as part of drills and warm-ups. Just body weight with a little bit of everything. Try geocaching A great way to go a little further on mixed terrain, with plenty of natural walk/recovery breaks. Run to feel Encourage them not to push for times or pace in every session, but to listen to their bodies. Check clothes and shoes fit well Keep an eye on growth spurts and ease off on training a little if you notice one is underway. Minimise pressure Remember, we want them to have…

GENA LÖFSTRAND SA 800m specialist As a pro runner, how do you keep motivating yourself when you don't feel like training? I start many sessions without any motivation – I just have a training schedule, and I stick to it no matter what. I have some big goals; and I know in order to achieve them I have to stay consistent, so I always have that in mind. I also remind myself that the motivation always comes during the session. Often, getting ready to go and start the training is the toughest part. But I’m always left feeling motivated and inspired after a tough session. How do you pump yourself up for a hard set? I like to put on my favourite running gear, running shoes, and even socks –…

Most ready-made sports drinks on the market contain between 7 and 9g of sugar per 100ml – you’ll find the exact amount on the label. So if your particular drink lists the carbohydrate content at 8g/100ml, for example, then the target of 60g per hour would require that you drink 750ml of it every hour (because every 100ml gives you 8g, so you need 7.5 ‘doses’). But if you’re aiming for 90g per hour, to maximise fuel delivery to the muscles you’d need to drink almost 1.2 litres every hour. See the problem? This explains why you’d have to have a more concentrated drink – but then you run the risk of stomach issues. And that’s why the mixtures of carbs that provide both glucose and fructose are safer than…

Chunk It Out. It works in all long races; but learning how to treat each section of the route as a separate section is a particularly critical skill in long trail endurance runs. Breaking up the different parts of the course means focusing on reaching each aid station one at a time. Eat, Eat and Eat. At times, eating feels impossible. Often you’re not hungry and sometimes you even feel queasy, but it’s critical to eat. Find a way to force down whole foods, whether it’s a sandwich, soup or sloppy butternut (seriously, I heard of one runner who did that!). The aid stations at UTCT are superb, but you should also practise using your own snacks in training. Train At Your Pace. It seems obvious that training will be…

RUNNERS ARE PRONE to injury; we overtrain by increasing our weekly mileage too fast, or sticking to a training plan instead of taking an extra day off. We’re devoted – which isn’t always a good thing. Training for a marathon in 2014, I had disillusioned myself into thinking that I’d attain a PB by running 12 kays a day, five days a week, plus a long run. But it left me feeling like I was walking on broken glass every time I got out of bed. This telltale sign of plantar fasciitis had me turn to orthotics. My quest for pain relief involved testing several insoles, scrunching towels with my toes, and massaging my arches with a bottle of frozen water. The pain eventually disappeared, but the whole experience left…

EVERY PURSUIT NEEDS A REBEL OR TWO IN THE MIX. When he first published his iconic book Born To Run in May 2009, Christopher McDougall challenged a lot of what we know about running. His work chronicled the training and eating habits of the now-famous Tarahumara tribe in Mexico, who run in sandals, eat a mostly vegetarian diet, and yet achieved extraordinary feats of endurance. The book itself has a cult following, and was responsible for igniting the minimalist running trend around the world. So how do you top a book that literally changed the face of global running? By writing a follow-up. McDougall has teamed up with long-time coach Eric Orton to produce Born to Run 2: The Ultimate Training Guide. In all fairness, to claim any book as…

NEW YEAR, NEW ME! I said that last year, too. 01. By mid-January, I will be able to fit into the technical base layer that my ‘best’ friend gave me for Christmas with a straight face. "It’s really quite forgiving," he said. "But I’m not," I thought. 02. I will not buy a pair of Nike Alphafly Next% running shoes, because I do not need to knock two seconds off my 40-minute 5K PB. 03. I promise I won’t call NASA and ask them to set up my Garmin, like I did last year. They are busy people, as they have to prevent Jeff Bezos from buying up space. 04. I will learn how to whittle a spoon. This will give me an excuse to not run. "Sorry, guys, Saturday…

THE WEEKEND WARRIOR – a gung-ho type who attempts to cram a week’s worth of exercise into a 48-hour period – has often been regarded as foolhardy. Surely regular exercise trumps these once-or twice-weekly efforts? Not necessarily, according to a new study. Purely in terms of exercise’s life-extending powers, it seemingly doesn’t matter if you get your recommended 150 minutes a week of moderate exercise, or 75 minutes a week of vigorous activity, in several bursts or one or two longer efforts. The study tracked 350 000 people over a 10-year period to see how well the so-called weekend warriors fared. The results, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, found that those who reached this recommended amount of activity, whether it was over the course of a week or a highly…

No matter what season it is, when you’re an anchor for morning television you wake up in the dark. Zoë Brown gets her day started with SABC’s popular Expresso morning show, follows it up with a radio slot on KFM every weekday, and still finds the time to get her run in. Running has recently become a vital component of Brown’s busy day, inspired by a first-time 42.2 attempt at the 2022 Sanlam Cape Town Marathon. Runner’s World: Where did it all begin for you, and what’s your relationship with running now? • Zoë Brown: I started off running cross-country at school. I was never excellent at it, but I wasn’t bad either – somewhere in that middle ground. I was never much of a runner in my adult life.…

Key Road Trail Urban Rural Flat Hilly ALL RACES GOING AHEAD AT TIME OF GOING TO PRESS! ROAD Comrades Marathon Pietermaritzburg, KZN 11 June The world’s greatest ultra marathon returns to its traditional June time slot in 2023 for its 96th edition. The event will be unusual in that it is again a ‘down’ run, as it was in 2022. Traditionally the race alternates between ‘up’ and ‘down’ runs. comrades.com Totalsports Two Oceans Ultra and Half Marathon Cape Town, WC 15-16 April After a two-year hiatus the Cape classic made a return in 2022 and continues to get ‘back to normal’ in 2023, with both its half marathon and ultra offerings. The traditional fun runs, International Friendship Run and Nappy Dash events are not yet confirmed. twooceansmarathon.org.za Cape Peninsula Marathon…

While it’s perfectly natural for motivation to ebb and flow, if you find that negative feelings around running persist, it’s worth taking stock. Runners often think that overtraining is just the territory of elites; but overtraining simply means that, over an extended period of time, you have been attempting to do more than your body can cope with, sending it into a sort of overdrive. So it can happen to anyone. If the list of symptoms below strikes a chord, take five to seven days off running. Eat healthily and get lots of rest and sleep. If you have physical symptoms, you may want to visit your GP for the peace of mind of ruling out any underlying medical problem or illness, such as anaemia. Yes, you will be worried…

Running a 100-mile event means fighting the sleep monsters. The latest research suggests that even a 10-minute nap can help rejuvenate the body. In his book Do Hard Things, author Steve Magness talks about the value of the 10-minute nap, and why a short sleep is better than a coffee boost to revitalise your day. During the UTCT 100-miler I took three 10-minute naps to help me through the tougher moments – and it worked. My husband Oli seconded me throughout the race, and had laid out a mattress in the back of our SUV. Even though I’d asked him to let me sleep for 15 or 20 minutes, he decided to wake me up at 10. The result was remarkable. I awoke feeling revived and ready to run again.…