According to Ben Pulham, 36, the founder Coached, runners are not limited by how fast they are when they run a marathon.
Coached is a heart rate training programme that is designed to help you track, optimise and enjoy your training.
Ben Pulham from Coached.
You are limited by how strong you are, not how fast you are during a marathon
Ben explained, “When you run a marathon, you are not limited by how fast you are but you are limited by how strong and resilient you are. So the goal of the marathon is not to run it as fast as you can, but rather, to run it at the highest pace that you can sustain for the length of the race. One of the ways that you can improve your ability to do that, is to get stronger so that you fatigue at a lower rate.”
And in order to make the body stronger, Ben highly recommends that runners do strength training exercises such as squats and lunges, and in order to fatigue the legs properly, it is important to get the technique right for these exercises.
Ben demonstrates the correct technique for lunges.
He said, “If you are doing these exercises correctly, you are working your legs and bum very hard. So this means that your legs should be feeling heavier and heavier as time goes by.”
Stabilise yourself when doing lunges
Continued Ben, “To stabilise yourself when you do lunges, the easiest way to do them is to have your hands on your hips, and when you come back down, you should do so slowly onto your toes, and be nice and controlled throughout the set. Do not rush the lunges.”
Runners doing walking lunges.
For lunges, Ben reiterated that it is important not to be sloppy because it can unintentionally put pressure on the wrong parts of the body, for example, the knees, and this can possibly lead to knee or ankle injuries in the long run.
After all, five correctly done lunges will reap much more benefits in the long run, than say, 100 sloppy lunges.
Keep your chin parallel to the ground
And Ben stressed that when doing strength drills like lunges and squats, your chin should be parallel to the ground.
A runner doing squats.
He explained, “Your head is the anchor during running drills. When runners do squats, they unintentionally drop their chin. When they do lunges, they may do that too. This is not the right way. Instead you should use your chin as an anchor and keep your chin nice and parallel to the ground. That sets the tone nicely for everything else.”
All photos are from Facebook / Under Armour.
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