| several different courses over different terrain that allow
for reasonable traction. One course for each week day, if possible. This for psychological
reasons It does help to overcome the boredom that can be experienced at times during
training. Start training by first running against time rather than timing miles run. Get yourself running fit so that you are capable of running long distances continuously. Do this by running on out and back courses. By running out, say 10 minutes and turning around and running back in nearly the same time. If it takes longer to return, then you should realize that you went to fast on the outward journey and so are forced to slow down upon the return journey. You will soon learn about your present capabilities and fitness and so adjust your running efforts accordingly. Progressively, the running time daily should be increases so that as your oxygen uptake improves you will find the training progressively easier, and your possibilities of increasing the running time greater. A schedule such as this should be the ultimate aim for a person, less for younger athletes, prior to starting a schedule designed to have you running against the watch for mileage; Monday; 1 hour, Tuesday; 1.5 hours, Wednesday; 1 hour, Thursday; 1.5 hours to 2 hours, Friday; 1 hour, Saturday; 2 hours or more, Sunday; 1 to 1.5 hours. This running should be done very easily and the miles covered of no real account. The " time" spent training is the important part. Do not go straight into such a schedule, but work up to it according to your fitness and ability to train. Once you are sure you can run for two hours without any problems, then start to the watch per mile as follows: Run over your measured courses for one week, without any influencing factors such as a watch, per mile pace, or another runner. Try to run evenly in effort and as strongly as your condition allows. Start your watch at the start of the runs, so as to be able to take the overall time of each run at the conclusion; this giving an estimate of your capability and condition at this stage of your training. The time taken from the first week"s training should give you a fair indication of your capacity to train and a basis on which to train further. The following week, you should use these times for control and run the same course at the comparable times by checking each mile time as you pass your mile markers. For example, if you took one hour to run a ten mile course the trial week, then the next week you should set out to run six minute per mile, allowing for hills and hollows. After a week or so, you will find that the previous times used for control are becoming to slow for you as your oxygen uptake improves. So it will be necessary to increase the average speed for distance by lowering the average mile time down to 5:55 per mile or thereabouts, In this way, it is possible to keep running at your best aerobic effort rather than too fast or too slow and so to gain the best results for the time spent in training. I discovered years ago, through trial and error methods, that the best results in this respect were gained by running about 100 miles weekly at near my best aerobic efforts and that supplementary to this, by running at an easier effort as many miles as I possibly could. I also found that by alternating the length of the runs by running 10 miles one day and 20 the next, rather than by running 15 miles a day, I gained better results. .
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