Run Well Juliet McGrattan (microsoft ebook reader TXT) 📖

of your throat and produce a wet sounding cough, but sometimes the cough is dry and makes your throat feel sore. People often assume that the greener the mucous, the nastier the infection, but we now know this isn’t true and both bacterial and viral infections of differing severity (and even allergies too) can result in clear, yellow, green or brown mucous.

The key really is how does your breathing feel and how are you in yourself? If you just have a bit of a runny nose, sneezing and a dry, tickly cough, then you’re unlikely to do any harm by having a gentle run. In fact, exercise may help to relieve your nasal congestion and make you feel a little better in the short term. Don’t push it, though. Take it easy and see how you feel. If, however, you are more out of breath than normal (test this out by walking up a set of stairs), have any chest pains, or are wheezing or coughing repeatedly, then you really shouldn’t run. Similarly, if you have a high temperature, feel nauseated, achy or just fatigued, then stressing your body by running is not advised. It’s far better to allow a few extra days to get properly well and then return to training (see here for more advice on running and illness).

Did you know?

Vital capacity is the amount of air you can breathe out after you’ve taken a deep breath in. It’s basically a measure of your lung volume. It varies with gender, age, race and height, but it’s between three and five litres.

Q I keep hearing about VO2 max. What is it and is it helpful for runners?

A Exercise requires oxygen. When you’re running, your muscles demand it at a very high rate. The maximum amount of oxygen that your body can transport and use is called your VO2 max. It’s a marker of your cardiovascular fitness and capacity for performance. It’s measured in millilitres per kilogram of bodyweight per minute and VO2 max varies with gender, age and fitness. An inactive woman might have a VO2 max around 30ml/kg/min and an inactive man around 40ml/kg/min. Elite athletes tend to have VO2 max in the region of 60 to 85ml/kg/min with men, on average, reaching higher levels than women.

Many sports watches calculate your VO2 max for you, based on your gender, age and heart rate measurements from previous runs. These calculations aren’t terribly accurate, but they give you some idea. To truly find out your own VO2 max you need to be tested on a treadmill or static bike in a laboratory while wearing a mask to measure the gas concentrations in the air you breathe in and out. You will have to exercise until you reach the point of exhaustion so be prepared to work hard! Plenty of laboratories around the country offer this service to recreational runners.

You can increase your VO2 max through training, but your upper limit is largely determined by your genetics. As your VO2 max increases you will feel fitter, be able to run faster and longer, and you will find running easier. Running sessions that increase your VO2 max include running intervals of two to three minutes at a very fast pace and then allowing three to five minutes to recover before repeating. Hill repeats are good, but rather than a short, sharp hill, find one that takes you about two to three minutes to run up. Run down slowly to recover. Cycling and rowing are great for increasing VO2 max if you work hard or you can try some HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) too.

Whether you are interested in your VO2 max is a very personal thing. Some runners love numbers and stats, and like to track their progress, while others are just happy knowing that they feel fitter as a result of putting in some hard work.

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AT HOME

Breathing and running

Whatever stage of running you’re at, your breathing is a useful, tech-free way to monitor your effort level. It can tell you how much you’re exerting yourself and you can use it to vary your intensity of effort as part of your training programme, without repeatedly looking at your watch. There are variations in definitions of the following running terms, but these are what I use as a guide. Your breathing will be faster with each one.

• The speed of chat You can breathe comfortably and hold a conversation. Great for sociable runs and for very long, slow runs when you’re building up the miles for an endurance event.

• Tempo pace A tempo run is faster than your chatty run and although your breathing may take a while to calm down, it settles into a nice regular rhythm at a pace that you can sustain for about an hour. You won’t want to chat away, but you could manage a few sentences. A good pace for a 40 to 60-minute training run.

• Threshold pace This is a ‘tipping point’ pace. Creep above it and your lactate levels (waste products of exercise) rise sharply and you won’t be able to run for long. Stay just on it and your body is stretched, but you’re able to tolerate the lactate levels and therefore the pace. You’re on the edge of discomfort, but you can still keep going. Your breathing is fast, but you’re able to speak a few words in a row. It’s faster than a normal run, but slower than your 5km pace. With practice, you can maintain threshold pace for up to 30 minutes, so it’s great to throw some threshold runs and intervals into your training if you’re looking to get fitter and faster.

• Sprint pace A super-fast pace for short distances. There’s no talking on this one and you’ll almost certainly be mouth-breathing at a very fast rate. You can’t sustain it for more than a couple of minutes, so short sprints mixed with recovery periods during which you normalise your breathing work well.

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