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August 09, 2004
Oh yeah - Junk Miles
My thoughts are very rarely coherent so I apologize in advance if my "stream of consciousness" writing style proves too stressful for you. I have a bad habit of beginning a thought, taking a detour, stopping for directions back to my original destination, but then getting lost and never returning to the original road. In my last entry I meant to address "junk miles," but never got around to it.
I often hear purists and "real" runners despise runners for including junk miles in their daily totals. I probably ran about 14-20 junk miles this week (I hate that word: "JUNK"), meaning I ran at a pace that did little to increase or stimulate my aerobic capacity. Well, here's my personal take on this controversy: we all need recovery miles. If my friend, C., who runs 5Ks at a sub 5 minute pace, does 10 milers at 7 minute pace, then why should I hammer every run? What's wrong with a few 8:30 - 9:00 minute miles? I think my body can handle the mileage because I actually allow it to recover via slower miles. Plus, even though some running gurus and physiologists will preach to us that those miles do nothing to improve our performance, I respond, "So what? Those 6 or 8 miles I just spent running are better than the 50 - 65 minutes I could have spent sitting on the couch."
So I say to junk miles: bring 'em on (as long as I get the hard ones in there too!!).
Posted by bridget at August 9, 2004 01:51 PM