Author: Steve Born

DAYS LEADING UP TO THE RACE

• Avoid the temptation to train too much and/or too close to race day! – You will not be able to positively influence your fitness level in the days leading up to the race; however, you can negatively impact your race by training during that time (training meaning anything of significant duration or intensity). As well-known coach Jeff Cuddeback (pictured right) states, “The week of any event of this duration should be all about resting up and topping off your energy stores. Training is done to keep the engine lubed and tuned up, nothing more. If you think you’re going to further your fitness through training the week of your key race, you’re sadly mistaken. If you are the type to train right up to the event, you will almost certainly under perform.”
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Author: Steve Born

Athletes tend to focus on training and neglect recovery, specifically the critical step of refueling as soon as possible after each workout. We tend to think that a hard workout deserves a nice reward. Do you usually first go for a shower or relaxation after a hard workout? Are beer and pretzels your favored post–workout snack? If so, remember that a hard workout has left your body in a state of utter depletion and physiological vulnerability. However, it’s also in a state of prime receptivity, ready to absorb nutrients. Taking those few extra minutes to properly refuel is one of the most important things that you can do to improve your race day results. In fact, properly refueling your body immediately after your training session is as important as anything you did in the actual workout. When you give your body what it needs as soon as possible after exercise, it will respond wonderfully in the following ways: Continue Reading »

Stevie Cullinan, of the Hammer sponsored Team Waste Management, races during the Redlands Classic. Photo - Brian Smith

Author: Jim Bruskewitz

Gains in strength, power and endurance are adaptations to stress (training). If the stress remains constant, there is no need for further adaptation and improvements are followed by a performance plateau and eventually an involution or decline in performance. Continue Reading »

Author: Steve Born

When exercise goes beyond two hours, we generally recommend that athletes use a “carb + protein” fuel (Sustained Energy or Perpetuem), either as their sole fuel from beginning to end, or as their primary fuel (roughly 2/3 – 3/4 of the time). The reason for this recommendation is that once you hit that second hour and beyond, a small percentage (roughly 5–15%) of their energy requirements will be fulfilled from protein. If you don’t provide some in the fuel mix, at least part of the time, your body has to cannibalize the lean muscle tissue to obtain the amino acids it needs to fulfill that small percentage of its energy requirements. Continue Reading »

Author: Jim Bruskewitz

If you’ve discovered training with electromuscular stimulation (EMS), you’ve no doubt found that you can cut your recovery time down significantly and increase the training load that you can absorb. We all wish we could recover more quickly, fit in more high quality training, and enjoy the increased fitness that results. Athletes find that the Globus Muscle Stimulator active recovery program is an easy and effective start to using EMS to improve their performance. Once the unit is charged, the pads placed, and the program started, the Globus Muscle Stimulator does the rest. It is programmed to flush the muscle beds of the metabolites that remain after training and make room for a fresh supple of oxygen rich, nutrient laden blood. Fitting the active recovery program sessions into a typical training week is easy. Since this program is used to enhance recovery from training, it can be used after any training session with positive results. Since the active recovery program has so much utility, it is generally the most used program. Continue Reading »

Owen Gue stays focused heading into a corner. Photo - Angela Nock

Author: Jim Bruskewitz

I speak with many athletes using E-stim (Electro Muscular Stimulation = EMS). We discuss training with the Globus EMS units and the conversations are just like conversations I have with athletes for whom I write training plans. It isn’t easy to feel as though you’ve fit all the pieces together to produce a plan that yields optimal results. One of the challenges of designing a training plan that does or does not include EMS training is that we are capable on any given day of enduring a training load that is larger than one we can absorb and recover from in time to do it again quickly. What makes it all the more challenging is that we don’t know if we have stepped over the line of doing more than we can absorb until later-a day or two removed from a workout or collection of workouts. Everything may seem to be clicking along in a way that bodes well for a great performance only to find that we “get off track” and “lose our edge”. Of course experience with getting off track teaches us what we shouldn’t have done and that’s valuable information. It doesn’t do much for the frustration we feel when our good intentions leave us bent over to pick up the pieces instead of rolling smoothly toward achieving our goals. Continue Reading »