Running Tips From Professional Runner Josh Cox

B slept in this morning so I got to re-listen to the entire audio recording of Josh Cox's Q&A session on my ipod. Some of it was a good review of things I already knew, and some of it was new stuff that I'm excited to try out for future races. 

Here are some of the highlights:

The 2 weeks leading up to race day:

1. A hard training session during the last two weeks before your marathon/half marathon will only take away from race day performance. 
2. Once or twice a month during marathon training Josh does a marathon simulation workout where he runs 8-12 miles at marathon pace, practicing all the fluid and fuels he plans to use on race day. He also eats the same breakfast, lunch and dinner he plans to eat the night before his race.
3. Josh visualizes race day in the weeks leading up to the race, but the night before he focuses on relaxing. He said you only have so much mental energy, so the day before you should just relax your body and mind as much as possible. 
4. The day before the race he runs for 20-30 minutes. Two days before is normally a complete rest day. (I usually do the opposite and do a light run two days before and nothing the day before, but I think I'll try it Josh's way next time.)

Nutrition:

1. Josh keeps his food intake before a race very simple. He is a big believer in white rice. He'll have white rice for lunch and dinner the day before the race. He eats dinner around 5 or 6PM, then has a simple snack before bed like an electrolyte drink. He also makes lunch his biggest meal the day before the race. (You don't want to be making porta potty stops during the race. :))
2. This one I already knew, but I know it's a common mistake to try new things race morning, or the day before a race in hopes of magically improving your performance, but he emphasized not eating anything new the few days before your race. Eat what you normally eat before a long run. Keep your food simple.
3. About 10-15 minutes before the start of the race, Josh will eat a power gel with 8 oz. of water.

Running the Right Race:

1. 1/3 to 1/2 the people in the race will go out too fast! "Keep the horses in the barn early on."
2. There is no such thing as banking time in a marathon. If you try to get a time buffer during the first half of the marathon, those 2-3 "extra" minutes will only turn into 6-10 minutes lost at the end.
3. The fastest race times in history were all run with even or negative splits. (Meaning your time in the first half of the race is equal to or slower than your time in the second half.) 
4. Go easy, and be PATIENT. In the half marathon, do not speed up (meaning faster than your goal pace) until mile 9 or 10. In the marathon, don't pick it up until mile 20.
5. In a marathon the half-way point is the 20 mile mark. The last 10K will make or break your marathon.
6. "EMBRACE the PAIN." (He said this several times throughout the session, so I dubbed it his signature quote.) You need the pain in order to succeed in this sport.  Know the pain will come, and when it does, embrace it. 

The Last (Dreaded) 10K of the Marathon:

1. Have in your mind all the reasons why you're doing what you're doing. Have your story be bigger than just a race. Have all those reasons be ready for when it gets tough. (Some of the reasons I run are to help me be a better mom/wife, feel the satisfaction of setting and achieving goals, learn to overcome and endure hard things so it will help me in other areas of my life.)
2. Have certain miles for family members. (Ex. This mile is for my husband, this mile is for my son.) 
3. Be in the moment (Embrace the pain). It's going to be hard. If it were easy, you wouldn't be doing it. (This one was interesting to me because I usually try to think my "happy thoughts" when the race gets hard. He has the opposite philosophy, so I might try this mind frame next time just to see if it works for me.)

Recovery:

1. Recovery begins the second you finish your race. Get some calories and fluid in even if you don't feel like eating. (He said his friend who's won two World Championship Ironmans eats a vanilla shake from McDonalds because he can't stomach food. It doesn't really matter too much what you eat right after, just get some calories in so you can start recovery.)
2. Do NOT get in the Jacuzzi despite how good it may sound. The heat will only increase the inflammation in your legs. (The jacuzzi always sounds good to me after a race. Now I know better.) 
3. Josh takes an ice bath for 15 minutes post-race. (I have never done this. Not sure if I'll ever be serious enough about my training to do this either. We'll see. Who knows what my future running goals will make me do.)
4. The day after the race try to run an easy 2 miles, or at least go for a walk to get the blood circulating in your legs. The worst thing you can do the day after the race is nothing. (I've noticed that walking the day after a marathon despite how stiff my legs are or how awkward I might look hobbling around definitely speeds up recovery.)
5. You won't increase your fitness the 2 weeks after a marathon, you will only delay your recovery. (Now that I've heard it straight from the mouth of a professional runner, I don't think I'll ever feel guilty again about taking a running break after a race. I used to feel like I was being lazy if I didn't want to run again after about 3 days post-marathon.)

I hope you learned something new! 

What do you do/think about during the last 10K of a marathon?

Like I said, I've never tried the "embrace the pain" approach yet. I usually try to distract myself from the pain by thinking about family, friends, praying, quoting scriptures, and happy memories. When I was trying to qualify for Boston last September I was visualizing how it would feel to tell everyone that I missed my goal time by one minute verses that I made it. That thought was strong enough to help me gut it out during the really painful moments and finish with about 1.5 minutes to spare. 


Do you get runner's guilt even when you're not supposed to be running like during your taper week, or recovery week? 
I used to, but I'm getting much better (and smarter) about resting when I need to.