The biggest difference between successful amateur runners and non-successful amateur runners.

Hi! It’s me Ikegami.

Today, let me ask you one thing first.

Are there any marathon seasons in your country?

I mean, in Japan there are clear 4 seasons and in the Autum and the Winter it’s marathon season while in the Spring and the Summer, there is almost no race.

Of course, it depends on area though.

But most of my blog readers live in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia so far. That means, it’s hot all the year, right?

So, I’m wondering if there is a marathon season or not in your country. Please leave a comment and tell me if there is a marathon season. And I’ll appreciate it.

Anyway, in Japan the marathon season is approximately from November to March. So, at this time, I get tons of e-mails from my students and report how their races went and asked me to analyze their training.

I’ve already analyzed over 500 amateur runners’ training program in the last 6 years. And the reason why they made a good race or a bad race depended on the person of course.

However, on the whole there is one big difference between successful amateur runners and non-successful runners. That is, if they make peaking or not.

What is peaking?

Peaking is literally making your peak for your target race. But it’s not tapering. Tapering is reducing the whole training load to get fresher and get more ready for your target race. And tapering takes only about 2 weeks.

While peaking takes 6-12 months. Otherwise you cannot make your peak and tapering is only the last phase of peaking.

Then, the question is how you can peak yourself for your target race?

Well, there are many ways to explain it.

Today, I will explain it in the following way.

There are several workouts which you can simulate a race physically and psychologically.

For example, if you run 20km at your marathon race effort, you’ll know how fast you are able to run a full marathon if you really run 20km at your marathon race effort honestly.

Or, if you do 5x1000m with one minute recovery at your 5000m race effort, you’ll know how fast you are able to run a 5000m race.

And let’s say, you did 5x1000m with one minute recovery and each 1000m 4 minutes sharp over 6 weeks and you ran a race 20 minutes shape. In this case, if you do 5x1000m with one minute recovery at 3:55, you are able to run 19:35, make sense?

But question is what you can do for arriving there. I mean, how can you do 5x1000m with one minute recovery at 3:55?

In this case, the difference is only 5 seconds per kilometer. So, most people think ‘If I work hard, I can make it sooner or later’.

It’s not a completely wrong thought.

However, my job is getting 4:30 marathoner to a sub 3 marathoner in 2-3 years.

If I ask them to keep doing 20km marathon race effort runs, they cannot improve such a lot.

Please recall the basic principle of training. The harder a workout is, the more difficult your body adapts to it. This is the reason why these specific workouts do not work well in a long term vison.

Let’s think about this in a little different way. Specific workouts which you can simulate a race is tough because you focus on volume and intensity at the same time.

From 800m race to full marathon race, you need to combine speed and endurance, in other words, volume and intensity. That’s why it’s not easy.

However, it’s relatively easy to run long and slow or fast and short.

The way of peaking is, you focus on only speed in speed training and only endurance in endurance training.

Also, whether your body adapts to a new training stimulus or not depends on what kind of stimulus your body has adapted in your whole life and in the last 1-3 months.

Meaning, it’s very difficult that your body adapt to 5x1000m with one minute recovery at 3:30 if your body has not adapted to 400m 84 seconds pace well.

Or, simply you cannot do that workout if your body has not adapted to 400m 84 seconds pace well.

Another example is, it’s very difficult that your body adapts to 40km 5:00/km pace if your body has not adapted to running 40km itself no matter how slow it is.

So, if you want to adapt to a training stimulus, your body needs to adapt to lower training stimulus. And if you want to adapt to a lower training stimulus, your body needs to lower lower training stimulus first.

And, if you want to adapt to a lower lower training stimulus, your body needs to lower lower lower training stimulus on and on.

And, also if you want your body to adapt to a stimulus, your basic fitness level is enough high. Exactly speaking, your body should produce a certain amount of biological energy (Adenosine Triphosphate).

You can produce more energy to improve your basic fitness level by increasing your total volume and the intensity of moderate runs.

So, first of all, you need to focus on increasing your fitness level. And second, you need to focus on speed in speed training and endurance in endurance training and gradually run slower and longer in speed training and gradually faster and shorter in endurance training.

The only exception is marathon.

Actually, even in marathon preparation, you can use this idea. In fact, in the past many Japanese top marathoners did a 60-100km run in training or 8 hours walking in the beginning, and then they ran shorter and faster and finally they did 40km at 90-95% of their race pace.

But imagine, what if I say ‘You should do a 60km run first and then gradually faster and shorter to your next target marathon race’?

How many amateur runners follow my instructions?

It’s unrealistic.

Also, current top marathoners in Japan hardly run longer than 40km in training. Some runners still do a 50-70km run in training. But it’s not a regular style anymore.

But the basic idea is somehow similar in marathon training too. You need to focus on endurance in endurance training first. Meaning, you need to focus on increasing the distance of long runs first and then increase the speed of long runs.

In Japan, many amateur runners believe that it’s absolutely good to do a 30km run on a race pace 3 weeks before the race.

However, if their body have not adapted to slower long runs so far, their body cannot adapt to that training stimulus or simply they cannot do that. And after the race they let them down, disappointed and they believe that they are not talented.

But the real reason is not because they lack talent but they don’t know how to peak themselves for one race.

If you do all things which I mentioned above, it takes 6-12 months.

So, here are two biggest reasons why non-successful runners are not successful.

First, they do not have an enough long term vision, in other words, they cannot think things in 6-12monts, they just think about tomorrow or one week later. And they repeat doing things based on their feelings. They don’t know how to train step by step. They try to jump up to the empire state building only by one jump. Of course, they cannot do it forever.

However, if they jump as high as possible consistently, they are gradually able to jump higher. So, they think that one day they can jump up to the empire state building only by one jump、of course they cannot make it forever. While successful runners step an upstairs surely and finally reach the top of the empire state building.

Second, they take enough time but they don’t set the steps in the right way. The key of how to peak yourself is setting one step is enough small. Always trying to go up to one higher level, not always staying the same level neither going up to two higher levels.

For these reasons, non-successful runners are always non-successful and successful runners are always successful.

For normal runners in Japan, only 4% of runners run a full marathon under 3 hours and about 70% of my students ran a full marathon under 3 hours. Maybe the rest of 30% of them are going to run a full marathon under 3 hours too if they want to run a full marathon under 3 hours (some of them are track runners so they are not interested in a full marathon).

The biggest difference is, again whether they know how to peak yourself for their target race or not. Also, remember your best race in your life are made by repeating best many races of seasons.

I hope this article helps you a lot.

Lastly, if you want to learn more how to run faster, please click here to download my free e-bool ‘Three factors you get faster dramatically without any injuries and overtraining’.