Tapering Running

Tapering Running - How to Take 10 Minutes of Your Marathon Time

If I taper my running and reduce my training before a race won't I lose some of my fitness?

Last minute cramming is great for exams but it actually hurts your marathon performance. The truth is, anything you do after Wednesday doesn't really matter, you can't increase your speed or endurance for a race in the last few days. And contrary to what you would think, forcing your body to rest rather than get in more training will increase your performance by an average of 3%. That's 9 minutes off a time of 5 hours and even more if you are a beginner.

To put tapering running into context, it's a reduction in weekly and long run mileage during the last two weeks before your race. You would think that after weeks and weeks of training, the time to ease back would be welcome; it never is. Either the addiction to the daily runs or the fear of losing fitness makes it very hard for people to cool off on their mileage. But this period of rest is one of the most important pieces of your training.

Tapering Running allows Your Body To Recover and Rest so You Perform At Your Peak When It Counts

The reason your body responds so well to this forced recuperation is that it has been under even more strain than you are aware of. The unrelenting miles have depleted your glycogen, hormone and enzyme stores and have created muscle damage. Reducing weekly and long run mileage during these final two weeks ensures that you will be fully recovered from previous workouts while at the same time, be completely rested for your long awaited race. Here's what to do.

The Four Key Steps to Effectively Tapering Running

1. Cut Back your Mileage and Long Runs by About 30% for the last Two Weeks. Although you reduce the distance of all of your runs, the most rest comes primarily by reducing your long run.

2. Increase Your Intensity During these Shorter Runs. Research indicates that enhanced rest combined with up-tempo running results in faster times...so leverage intervals or tempo runs.

3. Drink More Water. Carbohydrates convert to glycogen more effectively when combined with water.

4. Find something new to focus on. With less running, you will need a new activity to focus on. Spend your new found time thinking about your eating and drinking strategy for before and during the race.

Hopefully tapering running will let you get some much needed rest and perform even better on race day. Good luck!

Learn more at http://www.MorePrimeTime.com, a site dedicated to sharing fitness and nutrition tips to make you look years younger and have more energy.