Way to go for all of you who have finished Week 6 of the running training program and are back for more! The last week we began to add in training elements that were outside of strictly running with weight lifting being the first. Another very important aspect to focus on is proper running form. This will not only make you more efficient and then faster but help prevent injuries. The less excess energy you waste on poor running habits, like crossing your arms in front of your chest or over striding, the easier it will feel to increase the pace.

The goal for this week is to pick one aspect of your running form that needs to be improved and focus on that single thing for the last five minutes of every run. That means if you need to adjust your stride length, for each of those five minutes do a 10 second stride count and try to hit 30. Test yourself and see how close you can get. You only want to tack one thing at a time, and then slowly integrate that change to not only make it easier (you don't want to be thinking of a zillion things you need to fix) but it will also prevent you from getting hurt. As you shift your form you will be noticing different muscles working and you don't want to overload them all at once and wind up unable to get out the door next time.

Monday: Strength training with five minute warm-up (think of form!)
Tuesday: Shorter interval workout for 35-50 minutes (with a warm-up and cool-down have the middle 20 minutes alternate between one minutes hard and one minute easy)
Wednesday: Easy run for 40-55 minutes
Thursday: Strength training with five minute warm-up (think of form!)
Friday: Longer interval workout for 35-50 minutes (with a warm-up and cool-down have the middle include three to four sets of 3 minutes hard, 2 minutes easy, one minute hard, 2 minutes easy)
Saturday: Easy run or cross train for 40-55 minutes
Sunday: Long run 40-70 minutes easy

Keep it up you guys; you should be feeling stronger in those workouts and be sure that the days of your easy days you allow yourself to recover. Don't go too fast or hard or you will be left overly fatigued on the more important workout days.

Week 8