Crossfit for Ultrarunners (or, no more LSD?)

Is it time to trade out the long slow run for 20 minutes of sprints, pushups, and squats? The ever-growing Crossfit community thinks so. But who is this Crossfit community anyway? A bunch of cops, firefighters and soldiers? What do they know about ultrarunning.

You might be surprised.

Crossfit Endurance is a group of endurance athletes, Ironmen and ultramarathoners who believe that LSD does little more than slow us down and make us look like a bunch of overaged, emaciated drug addicts. I don't know about the drug addict part (I look more like an overaged beer drinker), but I have preached for years that too much long slow running will turn us all into long slow runners.

Consider this quote from Crossfit Endurance specialist, Brian Mackenzie:

While our approach starts with mechanics, it is based on strength and conditioning... Or CrossFit. The endurance training is a supplement. Our athletes eat the conventional endurance geeks for lunch every time... And we have story after story that explains how their friends either stayed the same, got slower and can't walk after the race. When we are the exact opposite. On almost a 1/3 of the training. How is this not a better approach?

Endurance geeks? And this teaser from the Crossfit Endurance site:

Why should I start training this way?

Are your times CONSISTENTLY getting faster at ALL distances (what was your last 5k time compared to a year ago)?

How high can you jump? (Many marathoners cannot jump onto a 12 inch box).

How many push ups/pull ups/squats/etc can you do? We can do more.

Have you or are you suffering from chronic use injuries (plantar fasciatis, IT Syndrome, runners knee, etc)?

How many hours do you train a week? How many hours does your spouse/family wish you trained? (This program only requires 6-8 hours per week to COMPETE at Ultra/Ironman distances.

Hmmm. Want to learn more about how running shorter and faster *could* make us better ultrarunners? Conditioning Research has a nice post on this very subject.

From my own personal experience, I've incorporated more "crossfit" style workouts into my overall training in the last year, with positive results (e.g., PRs at some tough races, more muscle, less fat) averaging just under 40-miles of running per week. That doesn't prove anything, and I'm not about to give up those epic-long training runs, but I am sold on the idea that too much LSD makes a long slow runner.

Try it for two weeks, and judge for yourself. I'll post a daily workout (not Crossfit per se, but something along those lines), follow along if you want. You might be sore at first... but soreness turns into strength. Strength turns into PRs in running, and other places too.

Run hard out there, and run long too. But run harder more than you run longer.

How I trained for Hellgate

"Neal Jamison probably should not even be here."

That's how Hellgate Race Director David Horton introduced me at the pre-race briefing. He knew that I had been injured since early summer. He knew I had been forced to drop out of the races I had planned for the fall. He knew that I had only decided to run Hellgate a week before this very night. But what he didn't know was that I had a secret.

2008 started out as a great running year for me. I was consistently running 40-50 mile weeks leading into the spring races. I finished almost all of them strong, turning in a couple PRs along the way. I was running strong with the tough Grindstone 100 in my sights when I got a little over ambitious and ran a hundred-miler in early June. I ran a good time, but paid for it. I developed tendinitis in both of my feet, a condition that would possibly change my running forever.

I tried to get the wheels turning again in August, but after a couple "long runs" of 15 and 11 miles, I gave up. The tendinitis was winning. Knowing that it would take time for me to heal - time I could not be training, I contacted David Horton and told him that I was out of Grindstone, Masochist, and quite possibly, Hellgate. Frustrated by injury, I lost the motivation to run. I don't run for "exercise." I run for fun. I wasn't having fun anymore, so I stopped. I hardly ran at all during September and October. I had one 18-mile week, the rest were under 12-miles per week.

Because I do enjoy getting outside and pushing my body, I turned to other things. I started lifting weights again. I began biking again. I rediscovered "Crossfit." While I don't follow their workouts to a T, I began to really enjoy the type of metabolic conditioning workouts that Crossfit prescribes: fast circuits of bodyweight or weighted exercises with very little rest. The feeling I got from those circuits reminded me of when I used to do hill sprints or track workouts. So much so, that I started incorporating sprints and hills into my workouts again. My total weekly mileage rarely topped 15 miles, but I was running again. Sprinting, running fast up hills, all out efforts. My daily run went like this: a 1.5-mile jog to the park, 20 minutes of sprinting, pushups, lunges, squats, planks, whatever felt good that particular day, then a walk or jog (if I could still jog) back. I was running hard, the way I like it.

Then I read about a guy named Carl Borg who ran the Angeles Crest 100 in a decent time with a long training run of 13 miles. That intrigued me. Knowing that my feet were still not ready for long training runs, I decided to see what Carl knew that I didn't. Through Carl, I discovered Crossfit Endurance: a group of accomplished endurance junkies, marathoners, Ironman triathletes, and ultrarunners. But where most endurance junkies run endless long slow miles, these guys run hills, intervals, and sprints. And they lift weights. Heavy weights.

I'll be honest here. I was looking for an easy way out. I couldn't put in the miles needed to train for Hellgate. At least not the way I used to train. In previous years I would ramp up to 60-80 mile training weeks in the last six weeks before Hellgate. There was no way my feet would take that this year. I needed an alternative.

What Carl was doing gave me hope. I was working out like that! I didn't know if it was getting me back into ultra shape or not, but I felt good, and I was having fun doing it. My body was buying into this Crossfit Endurance idea, but my mind just wouldn't go along. I was still convinced that without the long training runs, Hellgate would not be possible.

Then I got an email from a running buddy, Marc. He convinced me to go for it. Run, walk, crawl, do whatever it took. Just give Hellgate a try. I had a streak going there. Five finishes. Only eight others could say that. So with a few weeks to go, I upped my mileage a bit, and threw in lots of walking and a couple trail runs (the first in quite a while). My longest week leading up to Hellgate was 37 miles total, and it included two hill workouts, two interval workouts, two short runs with my dog, and the rest walking. Three weeks out, I ran an 11-mile run on the AT. This would be my longest run since August, and my only long one before Hellgate. I ran it hard, and when I got home and started comparing times, I realized it was a great run. Two days later, I ran a 5K time trial in one of my fastest times in years. Then the following week I ran a favorite 5.6-mile trail, in my third fastest time ever. I now knew my fitness was dialed in. But what about my endurance? Would it be enough to get me through?

Much to my surprise, it was. I'm still processing all of this and determining how it will influence my training in 2009. For now I'm a research project with one test subject. And it's kind of fun.

Crossfit-like Endurance Training Revisited

On April 24, I ran the first ever Blue Ridge Marathon. It was a tough road course, boasting 3,100' of climbing, all within a few miles of my hometown, Roanoke, VA. It was a great run, and I had a very fun time.

I was a bit nervous about this one because I was trying again to run a long, tough endurance run on very little mileage. I am no longer following "Crossfit Endurance" as prescribed, but I do still workout like that. My daily runs are usually 3-5 miles with lots of high intensity sprints, hills, squats, planks, pushups. burpees, etc. thrown in. In fact, the workouts focus on the sprinting and the "calisthenics," the running is just transportation to/from the park were we workout. I think I did about 4 long runs (13-21 miles) in preparation for this marathon. But they were very spread apart, and most of them on trails, not roads. To break it down even more, my 2010 weekly mileage has only crossed 25 miles per week 3 times. My longest week was just under 40 miles two weeks before the marathon. Most of my weeks this year have been at or under 20 miles running with lots of cross training.

(image from RunningAhead.com, where I log all of my runs)

I approached the marathon not knowing how my body would respond to this low mileage. So I started out very conservatively. My goal was to run aerobically (conversational pace) for as long as possible. I knew that would last only a few miles before the climbing started. Over the first few climbs I was feeling great. The fourth climb is the big one up Roanoke Mountain Overlook. This would be the pinnacle of the race. I chose to walk most of that climb, and still caught many people along the way. I knew I could comfortably walk a 12-13 minute mile, so that's what I did.

At the top of that climb, I realized that with most of the climbing behind me, I was averaging 9 minute miles, and feeling great. At that point I knew a sub 4-hour marathon was in my sights. I continued to push, anticipating the "wall" that hits me in most marathons around 18 miles in. 18 miles came, no wall. 20, no wall. 22, no wall, and at this point I was picking up speed. Several times between 20 and 24 I caught myself running a 7-minute per mile pace. I was having a blast, passing people, cheering on other runners and (half marathon) walkers. I found that the more I encouraged others, the better I felt.

End result: a pretty tough road marathon, 3:53, on very little weekly mileage. I recovered quickly, and was back to my crossfit-style workouts on Monday. Can this type of training get me back into ultra shape? I'm going to find out.

Run hard out there.

Crossfit Endurance

I'm heading down to Charlotte, NC this weekend to take a Crossfit Endurance Certification course. I've posted about Crossfit Endurance before, and I believe it works. Now I am going to dive deeper.

I'll post details next week.

Run hard out there...

Holiday Lake 50K on how many training miles?!?

When I heard about this one, I immediately chalked it up to youth and desire for bodily harm, but then I read more. The guy in the white shirt is Adam Eidson. Adam, 34, just finished the Holiday Lake 50K ultra in a fantastic time of 5:19. That put him in 75th place out of 257 starters. He finished ahead of some very fine ultrarunners. It turns out Adam is a very fine ultrarunner too, although his training is a bit atypical.

Before Holiday Lake, Adam ran a total of 7 miles. Really. 7 miles.

Adam runs RARE Crossfit in Fredericksburg, VA. Here is some info about his training, quoted from his website:

This race was about 34 miles long and preparation for it consisted of running a total of about 7 miles and doing CrossFit on a daily basis. Yes, you read it right, Adam has only run twice since October of 2008. He ran 3.1 miles on Thanksgiving morning and 2 weeks before Holiday Lake he ran 3.8 miles. All other training was CrossFit.

Adam also plans to run the Terrapin Mountain 50K, Promise Land, and Bull Run. Stay tuned to see how he does. I hope to talk to Adam soon to learn more about him, his training, and his ultrarunning goals.


P.S. Today's workout: Run to the park, warmup with 20 burpees,
then with a 15 minute timer running, repeat the following with no rest between exercises:

• Sprint 100 yards 100% effort
• 5 push-ups
• plank 20 seconds
• 10 jump squats
• hold squat position for 20 seconds (this was tough)
• repeat

The 15 minutes went by pretty quickly, but the "run" back downtown was a challenge. Total run about 4 miles (1.7 miles of sprinting).


Run hard out there.

Crossfit Endurance WOD review 7/20/2010

Today I did the Crossfit Endurance WOD as prescribed.

One Minute Ladder:

Warmup

All Out Efforts.

1min on, 1 min off, 1 min on, 50 sec off, 1 min on, 40 sec off, 1 min on, 30 sec off, 1 min on 20 sec off, 1 min on, 10 sec off, then go back up the ladder until you finish with 1 min on, 50 sec off, 1 min on.

Cooldown

Timing this workout can be difficult, especially in the later intervals when the mind gets a little fuzzy. I programmed the workout into my Garmin Forerunner, and it worked beautifully. It even features a 5-second countdown timer as each interval is about to end.

The recommended warm-up is an 800m easy jog followed by a few short sprints to prepare the legs for hard running.

This workout definitely got harder as the rest periods got shorter. But I was surprised to find that my distance covered on the run intervals was consistently 0.18 miles. My average run pace was around 5:30/mile. I think I was being conservative, but I won’t know until I try it next time.

The total workout was 2.35 miles, just over 16 minutes. 1.8 miles of hard running.

Give it a shot sometime, and let me know what you think.

Run hard out there...

Crossfit Endurance -- Carl Borg finishes AC 100

34 year old Carl Borg finished the Angeles Crest 100 Mile Endurance Run (AC 100) this past weekend in a time of 29 hours, 31 minutes. He finished 52nd out of 98 finishers (135 starters). Carl subscribes to the Crossfit Endurance methodology that emphasizes functional training over long slow sport specific training. From what I've read, Carl's longest run before the AC 100 was 13 miles.

See an older post or two for more on this somewhat controversial subject.

I'm looking for more information about Carl and his training, and would love to even get a chance to talk to him to learn more about his training and get an idea for how he feels as he recovers from that tough run.

Congrats Carl on a great finish! If you read this, please drop me a comment.

Crossfit Endurance strikes again

Mark Matyazic, 2nd place Javelina Jundred 100 Mile run. 17:22:09. Check out the video [wmv] [mov]. It was his first hundred miler. He seems to be in pretty good shape at the end too.

He trained the AnaerobicEndurance (aka Crossfit Endurance) way. No details yet about his training, but you can bet it was not the traditional long slow distance high weekly mileage plan.

Run hard out there...

Another Crossfit Endurance success story -- MMT 100!

Great job to Jen on a fine finish at MMT 100. Jen trains crossfit and is a very fine ultrarunner. Check out her blog to read her story.

Congrats Jen!

Crossfit Games

Want to see some elite athletes? Watch the Crossfit Games live. Good stuff.

Cross training for the injured runner

There's been some good discussion herein and elsewhere about GPP vs. SPP (general physical preparation vs. specific physical preparation) for endurance training.

The hardcore GPP believers feel that one can train for a marathon, triathlon, or even an ultra by doing little more than GPP exercises Crossfit, cross training, metabolic conditioning weight training, etc.

My question is this. Can a runner who is already in ultra aerobic condition, but injured to the point that 50+ mile weeks are out of the question, train for and successfully complete an ultradistance race (50-100 miles) on a combination of GPP and sport specific training?

How about a plan like this:

• M-F: GPP training (cycling, rowing, metabolic conditioning, swimming, crossfit, sprinting, hill repeats, Tabata intervals, etc.)
• Sat-Sun: SPP (LSD, running on forgiving surfaces, long slow trail runs, etc.)

Total weekly mileage would be around 30-40 miles, all from two or three runs.

Is it possible?

Workout with a Dog

In Crossfit terminology, WOD is the workout of the day. But for ultrarunner Catra Corbett (aka Dirt Diva), WOD has a new meaning. Catra regularly writes about her crossfit experiences and her love for her dog Rocky. Now she has found a way to bring the two together.

WOD = Workout of the Dog.



Read her blog post for more pictures and the full details, but here's her workout:

"Rocky"
run 10 min. 50 squats with Rocky
run 10 min. 4.0 minute walk carying Rocky
run 10 min. 30 push-ups
run 10 min. 20 lunges carrying Rocky
run 10 min. 10 burpess

If you have more than one dog, I suggest you pick the smallest. An alternative would be to carry a sandbag, a dumbbell, or a big cat.


My workout today was short due to time constraints, so I did a fartlek 5k. That's a 5k with some mile-pace fartleks thrown in. Despite a couple short walking breaks (to recover from the fartleks), I finished just over 20 minutes, averaging 6:30 per mile. I'd have gone a lot faster had I not been carrying that dog.

Not really.

Have fun out there...

Review of a Crossfit Endurance Interval workout

Today I did the Crossfit Endurance Interval workout posted on the CFE site on 12/31. In general, this workout consists of short time trial (TT) intervals, followed by brief rest. The only instructions are to cover as much distance as possible during the TT intervals. I guess the "rest" is up to us. I prefer to rest in motion (jog or walk), but as you will see, that is sometimes hard to do. Here's the workout:

Warmup
6 minute TT, 3 minute rest
4 minute TT, 2 minute rest
1 minute TT, 30 second rest
30 second TT, 15 second rest
15 second TT
Cooldown

The recommended warmup is a 800m easy jog followed by a few short sprints to prepare the legs for hard running.

I warmed up as recommended (0.52 miles), then my workout went as follows:

Segment	Time	Miles	Pace
6 min TT	6:02	1.02	5:54
3 min rest	3:01	0.25	12:19
4 min TT	4:01	0.67	6:02
2 min rest	2:01	0.14	14:25
1 min TT	1:00	0.19	5:16
30 sec rest	0:30	0.03	18:11
30 sec TT	0:31	0.11	4:53
15 sec rest	0:16	0.02	18:05
15 sec TT	0:17	0.05	5:21
	Total	2.48

After a short cooldown, the total workout was 3.47 miles, just over 27 minutes. Here's how it went:

The first and longest TT (6 minutes) seemed to go on forever. I went out a bit too fast in the first 3 minutes, and struggled to hold on for the duration. I chose to walk the rest period, and recovered enough to allow me to hit the 4 minute TT pretty hard. Or so I thought...

The 4 min TT seemed easier (duh, it is shorter), but when I see my times I see that I did not hit it as hard as I thought I was.

It was much easier to go "all out" on the shorter TT intervals. For the rest periods following these intervals, I pretty much just stopped and tried my best to catch my breath. It's interesting that the 30 second TT was my fastest, because that one was on a slight incline. I think I ran that one so hard that the last TT was tough for me, even though I knew it was the shortest and my last.

It was all I could do to keep walking after my last interval. I stumbled into a short 800m cooldown feeling like I had really given it my all. This was a good workout that left me feeling like a hard workout should.

Give it a shot sometime, and let me know what you think.

Run hard out there...

Constantly Varied

One of the reasons Crossfit workouts work is that they are "constantly varied." Keep the body guessing. What's next? You want me to do what?!?

Variety in exercises, sets, reps, weight, rounds, etc. is the key to developing every component of physical fitness.

It works for runners too. Run slow miles every day? Great if you want to be a slow runner.

Keep the body guessing.

So I asked my friends Jay and Amanda at Brickhouse Crossfit today, "At what point will constantly varied not equate to constantly sore?"

They did not really have a good answer. Variety is the spice of life.

You know that "good sore" feeling? I'm feeling it right now. And loving it.

Run hard out there...

Back to running -- almost.

My OD100 run really took a toll on my body. Delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) was minimal. Chafing (monkey butt) was fine by day 2 into my recovery. But my feet were definitely the big complaint this time. And my Achilles tendons to some degree. The worst pain was in my right foot. After a week of icing, contrast baths, and Ibuprofen, it still hurt on the outside of my arch when I walked or tried to jog.

I had a doctor look at it (my neighbor, out in the back yard). He said that I probably had a dropped cuboid. With a quick manipulation he put that darn cuboid back where it belonged, and to my surprise, the pain relief was immediate. But then it hurt again the next morning -- more of an ache this time. I resumed my Ibuprofen treatment, and today, 9 days into the recovery, I felt like running again. I planned a 2-week hiatus from running after this one anyway, so I'm biking to/from work, walking and doing some crossfit exercises this week. If all goes well, I'll get back to running just in time for the Burkes Garden Fat Ass at the end of the month.

The quiet

before the storm.

I have not posted to this blog for a while. I've taken on more CrossFit, less ultrarunning. More on that later.

Anyway, came across this video today, wanted to share.

http://beanathlete.tumblr.com/post/7363246904/this-video-gave-me-chills-the-sounds-and-the

Whatever you do out there... do it hard. Then breathe.

100 Burpee Challenge

I came across this on one of the crossfit sites I follow: The 100 Burpee Challenge. It's simple. Start a timer and see how long it takes to do 100 burpees. I tried it for the first time two weeks ago and was a bit disappointed to finish in just under 10 minutes. Today I did it in 8:40. That's good enough for a top 50 time on Sherdog. But I know I can do better. I think I am putting form over speed. I'll try this weekly, and once it gets easier I'll move up to a 150 and eventually a 200 burpee challenge to simulate the stress of a fast 5k.

The first quarter of 2009 is almost gone. What about those goals? I really need to start working on those pullups. With Catawba behind me, it's also time to focus on the 5k training.

Run hard out there.

Crosstraining for Ultrarunners (pt 2)

Let me first say that in yesterday's post, I was not saying that we should all give up running long in exchange for sprints and pushups and still expect to be successful ultrarunners. In fact, I thought I was presenting some interesting opinions with a hint of skepticisim, and emphasizing my personal belief that too much long slow running in the absence of speed, hill, or strength training is not ideal.

I hear many runners, ultra or not, lament that they just keep getting slower and they don't understand why. The most obvious reason (beside the inevitable fact that we are getting older) is that their training is day after day after day of slow running. Specificity is a key principle. You have to train long to run long. You also have to train fast (sometimes) to run fast. There are, however, other principles.

Tabata (or sprinting in general), I believe, has a place in any athlete's toolbox. Sure sprinting down a football field at 100% effort 8 times might not be the best interval workout to improve ultradistance speed. But just try it once and tell me honestly that you don't think it would improve fitness. Studies show that it improves aerobic and anaerobic fitness quicker than steady-state exercise.

Ultrarunning is oxidative, and it does require "training in the oxidative pathway." But the argument that some ultra-endurance athletes who have adopted the "Crossfit principles" are making is that strength also plays a role in ultradistance performance and recovery.

The strength that I get from sprinting, squats, pushups and other bodyweight exercises might not directly help my endurance. But will I be better off 19 hours into a hundred miler than my fellow runner who has done nothing more than run LSD? I think so.

Another aspect of this type of crosstraining is that it keeps running interesting. Go out for your daily run or even your LSD, but halfway through it, drop down and do 30 pushups, or sprint HARD up that hill a couple times, or run up and down those steps 5 times. Then finish your run. You are still getting the oxidative training, but you are also having fun. One of my running buddies today told me that her running was feeling kind of stale. But she also said that today's workout was a lot of fun. Which brings me to today's workout.

• Warmup Jog to the park (1.25 miles)
• 5 x 200 yard sprints (95% effort up and down a groomed soccer field) rest 30 seconds between sprints
• 50 pushups
• 50 squats (bodyweight only)
• 50 situps or crunches
• 5 x 200 yard sprints (rest 30 seconds between sprints)
• Cooldown Jog/walk back to starting point.

It was a little more than 4 miles of running -- about what we would normally do during a group lunch run. But it included over a mile of sprinting. And it was fun. And if it helps me run a better ultra, then that's icing on the cake.

Run the mountain

(Sandbag Hillclimb, 2009 CrossFit Games)

Today we run the mountain at lunch. How high can you get on your lunch hour?

Run hard out there...

More ultrarunners, less mileage

I stumbled across this story of a 22-year-old woman who just finished the Rocky Raccoon 100 in 25-hours on very low training mileage. Yes, she is another Crossfit success story.

Speaking of that, I ran 13.5 miles on the AT today (my longest run since early December. In fact, this week was a 29-mile week, my longest training week since just before Hellgate). It was a cold, windy run with a mix of sun and snow flurries. I reached McAfee's Knob in 51 minutes, a recent record for me. Then I stormed the descent and continued a couple miles toward Tinker Cliffs before turning around and running back. I met a guy coming off the Knob who was carrying a 45-pound backpack, training for some mountaineering. I was impressed.

If I can get just one more power run up there on the AT, then I know I will be ready for the Catawba Run Around. I think the next training run will be on North Mountain. It's been almost a year since I've been up there.

Run hard out there...