I ' m going to be honest with you, because that ' s the whole deal with this column: I really struggled with my running this year. As you probably know, I didn ' t qualify for Comrades.
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And the whole time, quietly, in the part of my brain I don ' t like listening to, I knew exactly why. I had been completely ignoring every bit of advice and research out there about the importance of strength work. Not doing it. Not even stretching. Just plodding and suffering, week after week, hoping that sheer stubbornness would somehow count as training.
A few months ago, I put my foot down. Pun intended. I finally walked into the gym I ' d been paying for, religiously, for two years without once using it, and I booked a personal trainer. Mostly for accountability, if I ' m honest, I knew full well I ' d never actually show up unless there was someone I was already paying a month in advance, standing there, judging me if I didn ' t.
Quick detour, because I need to say this somewhere: can we talk about the people at the gym who do burpees voluntarily? Every single day. Nobody is telling them to. Nobody is paying them to. They just... choose this. For themselves. Burpees! Those exercises where you have to drop down, do a push-up, and then jump up again and try your best not to throw up as you land. You now understand exactly why I need a trainer, and why that trainer is not optional. You’ ll never see me doing this without someone standing over me with a metaphorical whip.
So, yes. I stopped running completely and committed myself to a few months of focused suffering and torture in the gym. Asande, my trainer, has a very simple philosophy: pull this thing here, now pull it there, now push this thing here, now push it there. I genuinely wish he ' d just decide where he wants that square box jump thing with the weights on it, or that rope with the weights tied to the end, because we seem to be moving it to new locations every session.
Where was I? Right, gym, two to three times a week, and absolutely no running. Just cardio and weight training. Guns, boet. Basically guns. Oh, and quads! I’ m already close to buying those short, tight khaki shorts for the summer.
Long story short: as I sit here writing this, I went for my first run in three months this morning, and I can categorically state, under oath, that strength training works. Three months without a single run, and it turned into my best run in about eighteen months. I didn ' t need to
walk a single hill. My legs felt strong, my whole body just felt in tune. I honestly can ' t remember the last time a run felt that good. I almost wanted to cry.
So the experiment is done. Peer-reviewed, published, case closed. Stop making excuses for not doing at least some strength training. I ' ve learned the hard way that running isn ' t just about arriving and trusting your legs to carry you. You need to be tortured with some weights first, so that when you finally take them off, you feel as light as a Backstreet Boy in his prime.
I ' m back now. Officially running again and alternating it with strength work – three days of running, two days in the gym, every week. TTOM, I ' m coming for you. And Cape 100, I ' m not just entering this one. I plan to come first.
Champions, keep at it. I love you. 5-nils. www. modernathlete. co. za 21