Words by Taylor Thomas at Thomas Endurance Coaching Most every runner has had the following experience: You’ve been running through neighborhoods and town paths and feeling great. Then you branch out to more technical terrain that involves climbing, descending, and managing your footing and you realize that this is a much different experience than the...
Ask the Experts: What is a Safe Heart Rate for Running
The key to building a run program can often lie in understanding your heart rate and what it means. To gain accurate insights, using a heart rate monitor with a chest strap can be invaluable. It’s easy to get lost in the metrics, especially if you begin to focus on what other athletes are...
How Do I Build a Personal Triathlon Training Camp
What do you think when you hear “training camp”? Maybe an all-inclusive warm-weather winter getaway for a week of professional training? While those camps are possible for some, they’re not realistic for many. But that doesn’t mean you can’t create your own personal training camp and get many of the same benefits. Let’s discuss...
Ask The Experts: Does Cycling Help with Marathon Training?
Completing a marathon is a bucket list item for many runners. Most runners have caught the “running bug” after their first 5k or 10k race and set their sights on the coveted 26.2-mile distance. Training for such an event like the marathon requires time, dedication, and potentially a lot of blister tape. Whether you...
Ask the Experts: Season Planning
When is your race season? Many of us have a different answer for that. Regardless of the timing of our seasons, the pre-season planning always remains the same. Developing a plan for the upcoming season is your ticket to success. Many of us can question if there is a need for following a structured...
Ask the Experts: Understanding Calories
Words by Taylor Thomas at Thomas Endurance Coaching When it comes to sports nutrition there are a million different formulas being presented to athletes. Whether it’s specific diets, “must have” supplements, or the next performance enhancer, there’s plenty of options for athletes to choose from. While ultimately an athlete’s diet is a personal decision when...
What Causes Cramps and How Do You Stop Them?
Many of us have experienced the all too common cramp that causes us to cease exercise immediately and try to walk it off. If you have not experienced it for yourself, you can probably view this occurrence around mile 20 of any marathon. Athletes moving along fine and then all of the sudden being...
Ask the Experts: Beating the Heat
Extreme heat can be an athlete’s worst enemy when it comes to maintaining optimized performance. No matter your discipline or focus, heat makes both exertion and recovery more challenging. Understanding why the body struggles more in the heat can be a valuable tool for helping to cope with higher temperatures. Knowing how to properly...
Everything You Should Know About Heart Rate Training
In a world of sports now dominated by copious amounts of data, sometimes it can be beneficial to take a step back and train off of your own internal clock: your heart rate. Heart rate training in this world of technology may feel outdated or old-school, but perhaps it is just what the doctor...
Running Cadence: Why it Matters and How to Improve Yours
At one point or another, most runners hit a plateau in pace or even become injured. The solution to these issues could lie in your cadence....