How She Did It

How She Did It

PART 1:

THE EXPERTS

FOUR KEYS TO BEING A HEALTHY YOUNG FEMALE RUNNER

No athlete goes it alone, not even the solo runner. Throughout the ebb and flow of our running and racing careers, we’ve relied again and again on the wisdom and care of experts to get us patched up and back on course. What follows is expert advice on four areas crucial to your long-term success:

• Physical health and injury prevention

• Hormonal health

• Sound nutrition

• Mental health and sports psychology

Female athletes face unique challenges. We can get caught up in the pernicious cycle of fixating on lightness, and then end up underfueling as a result. We’re more likely to have male coaches who may not understand the importance of hormone health and the ever-changing physiology of the female athlete. We handle pressure differently, our bones heal differently, and we have these things called wombs that we eventually need to factor into our careers. In short, the female athlete’s kitchen requires a lot of specific tools.

If you decide to skip this chapter and rush ahead to the profiles of runners, we get it. But come back here eventually. All of this material is absolutely essential.

I. PHYSICAL HEALTH AND INJURY PREVENTION

To race your best, you need consistent training. You also need to make it to the starting line. Neither is possible if you’re frequently injured.

In this section we’ll look at physical health from a few angles. First, some basic principles on minimizing your overall injury risk. Then a focus on bone health, a crucial issue for female runners in both the short and long term. We also describe why a little patience as a young runner can have a big payoff later in your running career.

INJURY PREVENTION: FOCUS ON THE FOUNDATION

We’ve both been fortunate enough to work with John Ball, who is officially a chiropractor, but really more like a miracle worker. John knows more than almost anyone about keeping runners healthy and fixing them when they falter. So we asked John to share some basic principles on how to build your best running body.

One of John’s main pieces of advice for reaching your running potential might be the opposite of what you think: Try other sports.

“From an injury perspective, the general rule is, the better the athlete, the fewer the running injuries,” John says. “By athlete I don’t mean a soccer or basketball player per se, but more simply how well-rounded and developed your athletic skills and abilities are.”

In the profiles later in this book, you’ll read again and again how today’s top runners laid the foundation for long-term health by doing lots of different activities growing up.

John points out that, in terms of movement patterns, running is pretty monotonous. “Your body goes through very similar motions over and over and over again,” he says. “You’re constantly refining the motions, and we tend to get more and more ingrained in those patterns.”

In contrast, sports like basketball and soccer have you constantly changing directions and speeds. Gymnastics and dancing build great body awareness. These different activities strengthen your muscles and tendons in ways that running doesn’t. Don’t worry about how good you are at these other activities; just do them. “The ones that you find the most difficult may just be working the most on your weaknesses,” John says.

REAL RECOVERY

MOLLY’S TAKE: You’ve probably heard that the gains from training happen when you’re recovering, not when you’re running. But what exactly does recovery mean?

I learned the answer during my first summer of racing as a pro in Europe. I had thought that as long as I wasn’t running, I was recovering. Then I saw how the women in my training group operated. I watched how much energy my training partners budgeted for racing and realized that real rest is turning off your brain and your body for a while each day. I learned I had to save up willpower, mental energy, and physical energy to get the most out of my workouts and races.

In a way, it felt like a sacrifice to give up some things I was interested in. But in a bigger way, it was exciting to go all-in on something and remove all excuses. The result? I set a PR at every distance I raced that summer, even though I was no fitter than I’d been a few weeks earlier in college.

We’re not saying to give up everything for your running. But recognize that when you’re in your hardest training blocks, or your peak races are coming up, you need to ration your resources. Temporarily set aside things that drain your physical and mental energy. Feel the strength and eagerness grow inside you. You’ll enjoy the things you briefly gave up that much more when you return to them.

John recommends focusing on your feet and core as a young runner. Having strength in these areas is so much more important than something like how much you can bench press.

For foot strength, John recommends a few simple exercises, like toe yoga and toe marching, all done barefoot. “Incorporating some strides and drills, especially those done side to side or diagonally, is extra beneficial when done barefoot,” John says. “Make it fun—learning how to moonwalk and other similar movements will build some serious foot/ankle strength.”

For core strength, also focus on fundamentals. “Basic exercises like bird dogs and front and side planks, while working to make your movements controlled with crisp angles and sharp lines, may not look cool, but quality movement in the basics is essential,” John says.

Most important, stay mindful of your posture. “How you do it is as important as if you do it,” John says. Don’t hold core exercises for arbitrary amounts of time if you can’t maintain good posture. “From time to time, try substituting reps for breaths,” John says. “Instead of holding a plank for 30 seconds, try it for five controlled breaths. It’s a chance to get better at maintaining and coordinating your posture and breathing as you get tired.”

The rest of your strength training as a young runner should also center on basic athletic movements. These include:

• Squats: Sumo, split, goblet varieties

• Pushing: Push-ups, arm presses, leg presses

• Pulling: Rows, pull-ups, hamstring curls

And don’t neglect single-leg versions of exercises. “Running is jumping from one foot to the other, so if you’re missing balance and single-leg strength, it can be disastrous,” John says.

In an overall sense, learn how to listen to your body. “This is undoubtedly a skill, and probably the most important athletic skill you can develop as a young athlete,” John says. “It will tell you when you have to change your stride because something’s not right, when you’re not recovering well, or you’re just working too hard on the right side. Learning to harness these inputs will teach you to back off when you need to and when it’s OK to push it a bit.”